Name: Conner Chinavare, he/him
Year: Junior
Major: I am majoring in Sociology with a Law, Justice, and Social Change subplan as prelaw. I am also pursuing an LGBT+ Studies minor.
Hometown: I am from Dearborn Heights, MI, but now I live in Ann Arbor full time.
What do you do for CSS?: Since I am new to the center, Dr. Young has me starting on the reparations project, analyzing and researching pertinent literature. 
What led you to social justice work?: As an openly gay male that is pursuing a minor in LGBT+ Studies, LGBT+ rights and the fight for social equity is a crucial part of my educational and personal life. With that being said, my main areas of interest are those involved with specific kinds of relationships between people, and those that are concerned with social justice initiatives and concepts. 

 

Name: Linh Tran-Phuong,  she/her
Year: 2022
Major/focus: Master of Public Policy
Hometown: San Jose, CA
What do you do for CSS?: I am researching and developing metrics for an index that tracks corporate social impact commitments. Given that large corporations are built off of exploitation (like labor and natural resources), we want to measure to what extent companies are utilizing their money and power to contribute to the public good.  
What led you to social justice work?: I come from an immigrant, working class family, so helping under-resourced people access better opportunities has always been important to me. Prior to graduate school, I worked for five years as an advocate for survivors of gender-based violence. Many of my clients had economic challenges (like housing or food insecurity) that got exacerbated by their trauma from violence. Helping them navigate the criminal legal and social services processes highlighted for me the depth of work that needs to be done to increase equity and promote actual social justice.

 

Name: Sydney Tunstall, she/her
Year: 4th year PhD candidate
Major/focus: English and Women's & Gender Studies
Hometown: Germantown, MD
What do you do for the Center?: I serve as the Crafting Democratic Futures doctoral intern. In this role, I support the work of the Crafting Democratic Futures project taking place here at U-M and at the other partner sites around the country.
What led you to social justice work?: I've always been really interested in questions of power, identity, and liberation. To offer a more specific example, as a kid I noticed the way that power seemed to replicate itself in the communities that I was part of (my childhood church, my schools, my neighborhoods), often in the form of differential treatment or outright hostility toward some community members. However, I didn't have the language to understand the larger implications of these interactions or what might be undergirding them. I don't think I had a clear grasp on these ideas until high school and college when I began reading works by Black feminist thinkers like Audre Lorde, Barbara Smith, Alice Walker, and so many others. I am forever indebted to these writers who provided me with a clear framework for understanding power as an interlocking nexus of relations that operates on both structural and interpersonal levels. My own work (both intellectual and social justice related) is guided by a Black queer feminist vision of liberation that emphasizes the necessity of intersectional analysis and coalitional politics in dismantling the interlocking structures of power that organize every aspect of our lives.

 

Name: Vivian Ho, she/her
Year: Senior, 4th year 
Major: Sociology, minor in Environment 
Hometown: Lansing, MI
What do you do for the Center?: Currently, I am working on the Future of Work initiative—I am looking into which employment sectors are becoming obsolete. 
What led you to social justice work?: I grew up in a diverse, low-income community. Coming to the University of Michigan, it was apparent how one's racial identity and socioeconomic background were tied to tangible advantages. After taking an Urban Inequality class my sophomore year, I realized that I wanted to get involved in social justice work.