Dr. Cody R. Melcher joined the faculty of Loyola University New Orleans in 2022 after receiving his Ph.D. in sociology from the City University of New York. His research focuses primarily on the intersection of race and class in American public opinion and political behavior. His work has been published in Public Opinion Quarterly, Political Behavior, Ethnic and Racial Studies, American Politics Research (APR), Critical Sociology, Labor: Studies in Working Class History, the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History, Dialectical Anthropology, and elsewhere.
Dr. Melcher was the recipient of the 2023 Faculty Excellence Award in Teaching.
Dr. Melcher’s teaching interests include quantitative methods, the study of capitalism, urban politics, race and class, social policy, and labor history. He has also taught in the departments of political science and sociology at Wayne State University and the City College of New York.
Dr. Melcher is also a research associate at the Workplace Justice Project (WJP), housed in the Stuart H. Smith Law Clinic & Center for Social Justice, Loyola University College of Law.
Dr. Melcher also teaches courses to incarcerated students at the Rayburn Correctional Center in Angie, Louisiana as part of the Loyola at Rayburn (Lo-Ray) prison education program.
Recent Publications
- Melcher, Cody and Spencer Lindsay. 2024. "Investigating the Origins of Status Threat Among White Americans." Public Opinion Quarterly, forthcoming.
- Melcher, Cody R. and Michael Goldfield. 2024. “Gérer les affaires de la bourgoisie à partentière: L’état américain, la législation progressiste et le New Deal” [“Managing the Common Affairs of the Whole Bourgeoisie: The American State, Progressive Legislation, and the NewDeal”]. Mouvement ouvrier, Révolutions et Lutte des Classes (MOLCER) Issue 8. Translated into French by Donna Kesselman.
- Melcher, Cody. 2023. “Race Scholars Denied Syllabus”. TRAILS: Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology. Washington DC: American Sociological Association. DOI: https://trails.asanet.org/article/view/race-scholars-denied-syllabus
- Melcher, Cody R. 2023. “Economic Insecurity and the Racial Attitudes of White Americans.” American Politics Research (APR) 51(3): 343-356.
- Melcher, Cody R. 2022. “Economic Self-Interest and Americans’ Redistributive, Class, and Racial Attitudes: The Case of Economic Insecurity.” Political Behavior. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-021-09694-x
Degrees
Ph.D., City University of New York, 2022; M.Phil., City University of New York, 2021; M.A., Wayne State University, 2018; B.A., University of Michigan, 2013
Classes Taught
- Statistics
- Research Methods and Techniques
- Capitalism
- Race Scholars Denied
- Social Policy
- Urban Sociology
Areas of Expertise
- Intersection of Race and Class
- Economic Insecurity
- The Political Economy of Racism
- Labor
- Experimental Designs
- Public Opinion
- Methods