Brian McCabe

Brian J. McCabe is Associate Professor of Sociology at Georgetown University. He holds secondary appointments an adjunct instructor in the Regional and Urban Planning program at the School of Continuing Studies; a core faculty member in the program on Justice and Peace Studies; an affiliated faculty member in the Department of African-American Studies; and an affiliated faculty member in the McCourt School of Public Policy.

Through his scholarship and teaching, Professor McCabe investigates the structures that contribute to social inequality, especially in American cities. His research offers an interdisciplinary approach to the study of cities, combining his training in sociology, geography and public policy to investigate housing policy and other urban issues.

Professor McCabe recently published his first book, No Place Like Home: Wealth, Community and the Politics of Homeownership (Oxford University Press, 2016). The book unpacks the challenges of strengthening communities through homeownership as owning a home has emerged as the core vehicle for building wealth in the United States. Tracing the origins of our commitment to homeownership to the early-twentieth century, the book offers a unique perspective on the enduring place homeownership continues to hold in the wake of the housing crisis.

Since coming to Georgetown, Professor McCabe has published in numerous journals, including Social Forces, City & Community, the Journal of Urban Economics, Contexts, the International Journal of Public Opinion Research, and the Journal of the American Planning Association. He has presented research at conferences of the American Sociological Association, the Urban Affairs Association and the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.

At Georgetown, Professor McCabe teaches courses on urban studies, neighborhood inequalities and quantitative methods for social research. These course offerings include The City: Approaches to Urban Studies (SOC-209), Neighborhoods, Poverty & Inequality in Washington, DC (SOC-221), Gentrification, Justice and the Future of Cities (SOC-222), Public Housing: Theory and Practice (SOC-223) and Statistics for Social Research (SOC-203). Along with Prof. Linkon in the English Department, he is co-leading a new undergraduate urban studio course launching in the fall of 2017.

Professor McCabe graduated from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in 2002. He completed a Masters degree in urban geography at the London School of Economics in 2004 and a PhD in the Sociology Department at New York University in 2011.

Education

• New York University - Ph.D.
• Georgetown Univ. - B.S.