Biography

Ruby Mendenhall is an Assistant Professor in Sociology and African American Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  In 2004, Mendenhall received her Ph.D. in Human Development and Social Policy program from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.  For her dissertation, Black Women in Gautreaux’s Housing Desegregation Program: The Role of Neighborhoods and Networks in Economic Independence, she used administrative welfare and employment data, census information, and in-depth interviews to examine the long-run effects of placement neighborhood conditions/resources on economic independence. 

Mendenhall’s research focuses on issues of social inequality (race, class, and gender; housing; employment; and wealth accumulation) over the life course
and the role of public policy in facilitating social and economic mobility. Mendenhall is currently involved in a multi-site study, Investing in Enduring Resources using the Earned Income Tax Credit, which examines how families use their EITC for social and economic mobility in Champaign, Boston, and Los Angeles.  Mendenhall is also involved in a study that examines job loss among middle-class and upper middle-class professionals and executives, and their efforts to avoid downward mobility.  Mendenhall teaches social inequality and introduction to research methods (both qualitative and quantitative) in African American Studies.

Publications

Mendenhall, R., Duncan, G.J., and DeLuca, S.A. 2006. Neighborhood Resources, Racial Segregation, and Economic Mobility: Results from the Gautreaux Program. Social Science Research 35: 892-923.

Keels, M., Duncan, G.J., DeLuca, S., Mendenhall, R., & Rosenbaum, J.E. 2005.
Fifteen Years Later: Can Residential Mobility Programs Provide A Permanent

Escape from Neighborhood Segregation, Crime, and Poverty? Demography 42 (1): 51-73.

Mendenhall, R., Kalil, A., Spindel, L., & Hart, C. 2008. Job Loss at Mid-Life:
Managers and Executives Face the "New Risk Economy". Social Forces, 87 (1): 1-26.