Compton Us
Trinidad Baltzell
Astrophysics is a tricky business. Even the closest stars are trillions of miles away, too far to explore them up close any time soon. So astronomers and physicists have to rely on observations they can make from earth. To do this, every night, and day, a wide array of observatories all over the world are catching the light from distant galaxies, radio waves from the early universe and even ripples in space-time itself.
This is a lecture series about these telescopes and how they are used to learn about the universe. We will talk about how modern observatories work, and what the light they detect can tell us about the objects it came from. We will also discuss new types of observatories, that do not detect light, but other messengers, like cosmic rays, neutrinos or gravitational waves.
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This work has culminated in a number of peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, education essays, and two co-authored books including Same-sex Partners: The Social Demography of Sexual Orientation (SUNY Press, 2009) with Amanda K. Baumle and Dudley L. Poston and most recently Legalizing LGBT Families: Haw the Law Shapes Parenthood (NYU Press, 2015) with Amanda K. Baumle. This most recent book project, emphasizes the variability in the laws for LGBT families across the United States and provides an uncommon opportunity to focus on the contextual elements that shape family outcomes. This work draws upon this variation to highlight how individual characteristics, social networks, other legal actors, and contextual characteristics operate together to shape legal consciousness and makes an important contribution toward policy on LGBT families.
Compton currently teaches undergraduate and graduate-level courses in Social Psychology, Gender and Sexualities, Research Methods, and Social Statistics. Dr. Compton has also taught at Texas A&M University and Davidson College before accepting a position at the University of New Orleans. They has also worked to reach beyond the academy via blog posts and tweeting. Compton is a regular contributor to Social (In)queery, Sociological Images, and Feminist Reflections and you can follow them on Twitter @drcompton.