Anna-Britt Coe, Professor of Sociology
Anna-Britt Coe was born in Massachusetts, USA, to a Swedish mother and an American father. She has lived in Washington DC, Lima in Peru and UmeÃ¥/Nordmaling and studied sociology at undergraduate and postgraduate level at American University, Washington DC, and completed her PhD at UmeÃ¥ University. She started her position at ¹û¶³´«Ã½ on 1 March 2024.
"My research is about activism and political action.Ìý I focus on two main questions – firstly, how activism impacts issues such as reproductive rights, sexual health, gender equality, and changes related to safety in society and policies, and secondly, how young people assign meaning to and enact political actions. I have studied these issues in Peru, Ecuador and Sweden. I also work together with researchers from physiotherapy, nursing, occupational therapy and global health. One of the projects looks at how stigma-related emotions such as guilt and shame affect self-care among people with COPD."
Prior to starting her PhD, Anna-Britt Coe worked in non-profit organisations promoting political and social change in both the USA and Peru, with a particular focus on sexual and reproductive rights.
"When I started my PhD, I knew that my research questions were important to activist organisations around the world. During my training, I discovered a research gap – previous research had mainly focused on how a movement arises, how it evolves and how it ceases, but not the impact or influence it had."
Anna-Britt Coe’s research is mainly used by other researchers who want to create a different type of research on social movement and activism.
"A very large part of my research on social movements looks at the non-obvious among activist groups and the invisible conditions they face. This is a response to the fact that a lot of research already exists on the strategic ideas and actions and explicit conditions of these movements. Sociology provides us with tools to study social processes and societal hierarchies based on gender, ethnicity, and age – all of which must be brought to the surface to gain a complete understanding of how social movements affect society and policies."
Anna-Britt Coe lives with her husband, who runs a dog daycare business. They also have a rottweiler and a cat.Ìý In her spare time, she enjoys practising Aikido.
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