Corina Schulze, Ph.D.

cschulze@southalabama.edu


Associate Professor

University of South Alabama

Year of PhD: 2008

City: Mobile, Alabama - 36695

Country: United States

About Me:

I am currently working on a manuscript concerning women and the death penalty. Special attention on the life of M. Watt Espy will be given. I am the chief architect of the first website of its kind: The women's executions project. My CV can also be found via the site.

Research Interests

Sexual Violence

Sexuality And Politics

Gender And Capital_Punishment

Death Penalty

Countries of Interest

United States

My Research:

Dr. Corina Schulze received her PhD in Political Science at the University of New Orleans and is an Associate Professor of Political Science & Criminal Justice at the University of South Alabama. Since joining the University of South Alabama in 2008, she has published dozens of peer-reviewed research articles, book chapters, and has presented in national academic conferences. Her teaching and academic interests have emphasized the significance of including gender, race, and sexual orientation in understanding their systemic impact and effects on political and criminal justice outcomes.  Dr. Schulze and her long-time research collaborator, Dr. Sarah Koon-Magnin, published the book Gender identity, sexual orientation, and Sexual Assault: Challenging the Myths, which explores sexual violence in Queer communities.  Her current work involves gender and capital punishment in the United States. At the moment, she is compiling a database that will be made publically available. It will be the first of its kind in that it will provide a quantitative dataset on women's executions since colonial days. https://www.rienner.com/title/Gender_Identity_Sexual_Orientation_and_Sexual_Assault_Challenging_the_Myths.

Publications:

Journal Articles:

(2024) Explaining Gender Neutrality in Capital Punishment Research by Way of a Systematic Review of Studies Citing the ‘Espy File’, MDPI

Peer-reviewed journal articles provide the data for this study, given that their findings undergird the quantitative data referenced by prominent organizations, courts, and policy-makers. The “Espy file”, based on the research of Major Watt Espy, Jr., is used to identify studies due to the dataset’s esteem and prolific usage. It is the largest known dataset of men’s and women’s executions in the United States since 1608 and has been of monumental significance to capital punishment research. The protocol established by the Preferred Reporting of Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) is the methodology followed due to its conformity to scientific standards and acceptance in scholarly communities. The initial sampling frame involved 613 studies which were narrowed to 79 peer-reviewed journal articles that cited or utilized the Espy file. The empirical findings justify the contention that past and current studies, while interdisciplinary, require new voices and approaches to contribute to the study of capital punishment. Mainstream death penalty research does not generally incorporate critical theories including, for example, gender, intersectional, Black feminist, Queer, and other theories that focus less on quantitative data and more on how capital punishment is a reflection of institutional, historical, and social processes that are hierarchical and defined by power. The findings suggest that not only are executed women removed from many analyses, but so are inclusionary methodologies and theoretical approaches that could bolster the legitimacy of academic studies (inside academia as well as the judicial system) and our understanding of capital punishment in general.

Books Written:

(2019) Gender Identity, Sexual Orientation, and Sexual Assault: Challenging the Myths, Lynne Rienner Publishers

Winner of the American Society of Criminology’s Division on Women & Crime Book Award! The underlying argument of this groundbreaking study is this: Sexual orientation and gender identity influence how sexual assault is experienced, how it is perceived, and ultimately, how victims (and perpetrators) are treated by the criminal justice system. Focusing much of their work on the queer community—a community with a disproportionately high risk of sexual assault—the authors introduce the Identity Inclusive Sexual Assault Myth Scale (IISAMS) to explore the unique aspects of sexual assault and the process of disclosure as experienced by queer victims. They also incorporate participant recommendations, collected during interviews, as they foreground ways for more effectively preventing and responding to sexual violence throughout contemporary society.