Heather Berg, PhD
Curriculum Vitae
Last updated 10/1/2017
EDUCATION
PhD University of California, Santa Barbara, 2016 (Feminist Studies)
Dissertation: Porn Work: Adult Film at the Point of Production
Committee: Leila Rupp, Mireille Miller-Young, Eileen Boris, and Constance Penley
MA George Washington University, 2011 (Public Policy and Women’s Studies)
Thesis: An Entrepreneur of Herself: Sex Work in the Age of Neoliberalism
BA New York University, Gallatin School of Individualized Study, 2008
EMPLOYMENT
2016-present Lecturer, University of Southern California, Gender Studies Program
SCHOLARLY PUBLICATIONS
Books
Under review Porn Work
Refereed Articles
2017 “Porn Work, Feminist Critique, and the Market for Authenticity.” Signs. 42 (3): 669-692.
2016 “A Scene is Just a Marketing Tool: Alternative Income Streams in Porn’s Gig Economy.” Porn Studies [Porn and Labour, special issue]. 3 (2): 160-174.
2015 “Trafficking Policy, Meaning Making, and State Violence.” Social Policy and Society. 14 (1): 144—155.
2014 “Working for Love, Loving for Work: Discourses of Labor in Feminist Sex-Work Activism.” Feminist Studies. 40 (3): 693—721. Winner, Feminist Studies Award for best article submitted by a graduate student.
2014 “An Honest Day’s Wage for a Dishonest Day’s Work: (Re)Productivism and Refusal.” WSQ [Debt, special issue]. 42 (1-2): 161—177.
Book Chapters
2016 “Intimate Labor in Porn Work.” Introducing the New Sexuality Studies: Third Edition, Eds. Nancy Fischer and Steven Seidman. New York: Routledge. 448-455.
2016 With Constance Penley, “Creative Precarity in the Adult Film Industry,” in Precarious Creativity: Global Media, Local Labor, Eds. Kevin Sanson and Michael Curtin. Oakland: UC Press. 159-171.
2015 “Sex, Work, Queerly: Identity, Authenticity, and Labored Performance.” in Queer Sex Work, Eds. Mary Laing, Katy Pilcher, and Nicola Smith. London: Taylor & Francis. 23—32.
2014 with Eileen Boris, “Protecting Virtue, Erasing Labor: Historical Responses to Trafficking,” in Human Trafficking Reconsidered: Rethinking the Problem, Envisioning New Solutions, Eds. Kimberly Kay Hoang and Rhacel Parreñas. New York: International Debate and Education Association. 19—29.
Other
Forthcoming “Workers and Publics.” Porn Studies. (invited contribution)
2016 “Practicing Institutional Feelings: A Roundtable.” Feminist Formations. 27 (3): 217-236.
2014 “Laboring Porn Studies.” Porn Studies. 1 (1-2): 75—79.
2014 Review of Playing the Whore: The Work of Sex Work, by Melissa Gira Grant, Porn Studies. 1 (3): 1—2.
2014 “Sex Work and Trafficking.” Encyclopedia of Political Thought, Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell. 3410—3415.
ENGAGED SCHOLARSHIP
2015 “Business as Usual.” Jacobin. February 15. https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/02/porn-industry-labor-adult-expo/
Translated into Polish at Political Critique. April 3. http://www.krytykapolityczna.pl/artykuly/opinie/20150303/porno-biznes-jak-inne
2014 “Katha Pollitt’s Quality Control.” Jacobin. April 21. https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/04/katha-pollitts-quality-control/
2014 “Porn Studies, Context, and Speech.” Feminist Wire. April 2. http://thefeministwire.com/2014/04/porn-studies-context-speech-solidarity-mireille miller-young/
2011 “A Response to ‘A Place of Hope.” Good Men Project. October 11. http://goodmenproject.com/ethics-values/a-response-to-a-place-of-hope/
2011 “The Disastrous Effects of Immigration Policy on Women’s Lives.” RH Reality Check. May 9. http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2011/05/09/disastrous-effects-immigration-policy-women-lives/
FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS
2015—2016 Mellon/ ACLS Dissertation Completion Fellowship
2014 UCSB Affiliates Graduate Dissertation Fellowship
2014 Humanities and Social Sciences Research Grant, UCSB
2014 Feminist Studies Award for Best Article Submitted by a Graduate Student
2013 Graduate Affiliate, Interdisciplinary Humanities’ Center, UCSB
2013 Dean’s Fellowship, UCSB
2013 Excellence in Teaching Award, UCSB
2012 Stough Memorial Prize for research in feminist studies, UCSB Department of Feminist Studies
2011 Service to the Community of Women Award, George Washington University
2010—2011 Institute for Women’s Policy Research/ George Washington University Fellowship in
Women’s Public Policy Research
INVITED TALKS
2018 Panelist, GlobeMed Annual Conference, University of California, Southern California, forthcoming March 3.
2018 Keynote speaker, University of Tennessee Sex Week, forthcoming January 31.
2107 Panelist, Secular Student Fellowship, University of Southern California. Forthcoming April 6.
2017 “‘This is a Job, this is a Gig,” Center for Feminist Research, University of Southern California. February 6.
2016 “Labor in the Porn Industry,” Students Against Labor Exploitation club, University of Southern California. November 15.
2014 “Waiting is the Hardest Part: Adult Film at the Point of Production,” Newberry Library Labor History Seminar, Chicago. December 5.
2014 Panelist, “Precarity,” The Humanities and Changing Conceptions of Work. Berkeley, CA. May 9.
2014 “Sex Work in Public Policy,” Introduction to Women’s Studies, California Lutheran University Department of Sociology, Thousand Oaks, CA. February 27.
CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS
2017 Roundtable participant, “The Work that Makes All Other Work Possible: The
Pedagogies and Solidarities of Care Work,” American Studies Association, Chicago.
Forthcoming November 10.
2017 “If you don't Want to do it, They’ll Find Someone Who Will: Male Sex Work, Risk, and Protection in the Adult Film Industry,” Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Hempstead, NY. June 9.
2016 “‘Maybe the State Should Pay’: Porn Work and the Welfare State,” Policy History, Nashville, TN. June 3.
2015 “Porn Work, Flexible Labor, and State-Sanctioned Precarity,” National Women’s Studies Association, Milwaukee, WI. November 15.
2015 “Porn Work, Post Work,” American Studies Association, Toronto. October 8. Finalist, Wise-Susman Prize, American Studies Association.
2015 “‘I’m Popular from Here to Here’: Male Performers’ Emotion Work in the Adult Film Industry,” Labor and Working Class History Association and the Working Class Studies Association, Washington, DC. May 29.
2014 “The Wages of Playfulness: Labor and Identity in Porn Performance,” American Studies Association, Los Angeles, CA. November 9.
2014 “Labour at the Frontier: Porn Performance, Affect, and Late Capital,” Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Toronto. May 24.
2013 “An Honest Day’s Wage for a Dishonest Day’s Work: Sexual Labor and the Debt of Social Necessity,” American Studies Association, Washington, DC. November 21.
2013 “Laborist Perspectives on Los Angeles’ Measure B,” Desiree Alliance, Las Vegas. July 16.
2013 “Danger on the Set: Labor, Risk, and Health in the Adult Film Industry,” Labor and Working Class History Association, New York. June 7.
2013 “Rethinking Reproductivism.” Commoning Precarity: No Work, Refusal, Autonomy, Santa Barbara. May 10.
2013 “Down in the Valley: The Adult Film Industry as Hollywood’s South,” Southern Labor and Working Class History Association, New Orleans. March 7.
2012 “Risky Business: Labor, Stigma, and Health in Los Angeles’ Adult Film Industry,” National Women’s Studies Association, Oakland. November 11.
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
2013—2015 Assistant for the Center for Research on Women and Social Justice, UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA
2011—2013 Research Assistant to Eileen Boris, Chair of the Department of Feminist Studies,
UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA
2010—2011 Research Fellow, Institute for Women’s Policy Research, Washington, DC
2009—2010 Research Assistant, Institute for Women’s Policy Research, Washington, DC
TEACHING EXPERIENCE, INSTRUCTOR OF RECORD
Fall 2017 “Gender and Creative Labor,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Fall 2017 “Feminist Theory,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Fall 2017 “Gender and Social Justice,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Spring 2017 “Feminist Theory,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Spring 2017 “Gender and Social Justice,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Spring 2017 “Selling Sex: The Sex Work Industry,” University of Southern California Gender Studies Program
Fall 2016 “Feminist Theory,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Fall 2016 “Gender and Social Justice,” University of Southern California Gender Studies
Program
Spring 2015 “Labors,” UCSB Department of Feminist Studies, Santa Barbara
Spring 2015 “Feminist Theory,” UCSB Department of Feminist Studies, Santa Barbara
Summer 2012 “Sexual Cultures at the Margins of the State,” UCSB Department of Feminist Studies, Santa Barbara
Summer 2011 “Writing Social Justice,” College of the Redwoods Upward Bound Program, Eureka, CA
TEACHING EXPERIENCE, TEACHING ASSISTANT
2013 “Sex, Love, and Romance”
2013 “Women of Color”
2012 “Women, Representation, and Cultural Production”
PROFESSIONAL SERVICE
2016 Member, graduate program development committee, University of Southern California
2012-2015 Member, public speaker series planning committee, University of California, Santa
Barbara
EXTERNAL JOURNAL REVIEW
2017 External reviewer for Journal of Techno Ethics
2016-2017 External reviewer for Qualitative Sociology
2015-2017 External reviewer for Sexualities
2013-2017 External reviewer for Porn Studies
2016-2017 External reviewer for Culture, Health and Sexuality
2013-2015 External reviewer for Feminist Studies
2015 External reviewer for Melbourne Journal of Politics
2014 External reviewer for Women’s Studies International Forum
2013 External reviewer for Capital and Class
PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS
Labor and Working Class History Association
National Women’s Studies Association
American Studies Association
Berkshire Conference of Women Historians
Desiree Alliance