Karen Sternheimer

Karen Sternheimer is a distinguished fellow at USC's Center for Excellence in Teaching and is the director of undergraduate studies for the sociology department. She teaches a number of courses touching on issues of inequality, public policy, social exclusion, and childhood. Her research focuses on issues related to popular culture and youth, particularly fears surrounding both. Specific topics of inquiry have included concerns about youth violence, kidnapping, substance use, child obesity,...See more

Karen Sternheimer is a distinguished fellow at USC's Center for Excellence in Teaching and is the director of undergraduate studies for the sociology department. She teaches a number of courses touching on issues of inequality, public policy, social exclusion, and childhood. Her research focuses on issues related to popular culture and youth, particularly fears surrounding both. Specific topics of inquiry have included concerns about youth violence, kidnapping, substance use, child obesity, teen driving, and fears about the effects of media on children. She has also studied the construction of celebrity culture, examining how celebrity has been manufactured from the early twentieth century to the present. She is the author of Celebrity Culture and the American Dream: Stardom and Social Mobility (Routledge, 2011), Connecting Social Problems and Popular Culture: Why Media Is Not the Answer (Westview Press, August 2009), Kids These Days: Facts and Fictions About Today's Youth (Rowman & Littlefield, 2006) and It's Not the Media: The Truth About Pop Culture's Influence on Children (Westview Press, 2003). See less