BAILEY OTTER

Hello! My name is Bailey, and I am an undergraduate sociology student and McNair Scholar at Texas A&M University Corpus Christi (TAMUCC). I study how nonbinary people (individuals whose gender identities exist beyond the man/woman binary) construct, express, and negotiate their identities throughout the life course. These inquiries live at the intersection of gender, health, family, embodiment, and aging. 

For my undergraduate honors thesis, I conducted 28 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with nonbinary individuals from across the United States. One line of findings from these interviews formed the basis of a paper exploring nonbinary individuals' experiences of and barriers to joy related to their gender identities, which earned second place in the 2024 Midwest Sociological Society Undergraduate Student Paper Competition and was published in The Sociological Quarterly. Currently, I am working with Dr. Daniel Bartholomay to reanalyze these interviews, focusing on interviewees' encounters of gender identity erasure within everyday social interactions and the lasting impacts of such erasure. 

I have presented my research at university, regional, and national-level conferences, including the 2023 American Sociological Association's (ASA) Honors Program. Additionally, I was one of 13 undergraduates chosen to be part of the 2024 University of Michigan's Humanities Emerging Researchers (MICHHERS) program, and one of three in the program's sociology cohort. Outside of my research, I have worked as a grader, teaching assistant, and supplemental instructor for multiple sociology courses. I also currently serve on ASA's Student Forum Advisory Board. 

As I look forward to pursuing my PhD, I hope to center my inquiries on nonbinary people's experiences of aging and parenthood.