Faculty Profiles

Brandon Hofstedt

Title: Assistant Professor of Sustainable Community Development
Office Location: Wheeler 322
Phone:(715) 682-1311
Email: bhofstedt@northland.edu

Education

Profile

After hopping around the Midwest, my family and I finally decided to settle down in Ashland when offered a job at Northland. We are very excited about returning to this area of the country, only a few hours away from where I grew and completed my undergraduate studies. We reside in the city of Ashland and love everything about the Northwoods (e.g., Lake Superior, outdoor activities, open-minded and accepting community, cold and snowy winters). Prior to joining the faculty at Northland in 2010, I held teaching appointments at the College of Mount St. Joseph (assistant professor of sociology) in Cincinnati, OH and at St. Norbert College (teaching fellow) in De Pere, WI. Prior to that, I lived and studied in Ames, Iowa where I earned my Ph.D. and M.S. in sociology.

Research

My interests and specialties include social movements, community/civic participation, political sociology, community development, rural/urban studies, and land use planning and policy. My dissertation combines several of these fields and is a comparison of three community “smart growth” movements with particular focus on the ways they attempted, with various degrees of success, to mobilize community capitals. My current research deals with community groups and civic participation around land-use planning and policy. In general, I am interested in how citizens mobilize around issues involving land-use (e.g., sprawl, urban renewal, large-scale resource extraction, and hazardous waste projects) and how these groups influence decision making within local communities.

I have taught a number of courses including: introduction to sociology; introduction to social responsibility; race, class, & gender; social problems; social movements in the United States; social stratification; sociological theory; political process; capitalism, justice, and sustainability; introduction to research methods; methods of sustainable community development; and senior capstone. I am currently preparing to teach two very exciting courses: citizen groups & sustainable communities (May 2011) and Humans in Place: Sustainable Business and Community in Vermont (June 2011).

Selected Publications:

Dobratz, Betty A. and Brandon Hofstedt. 2012. “Chapter 8: Social Movements.” In Power, Politics, and Society: An Introduction to Political Sociology by Betty Dobratz, Lisa Waldner, and Timothy L. Buzzell. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Hofstedt, Brandon. 2012. Instructor’s Manual, Test Bank, and Lecture PowerPoints for Power, Politics, and Society. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Besser, Terry, Peter Korsching, Nancy Miller, Bridget Diamond Welch, Brandon Hofstedt, and Ryan Orr. 2006. “Creating Business Networks.” CD Practice 14:1-12.

Research Experience:

Principal Investigator, “Mobilizing Community Capitals in Land-based Social Movements: Integrating Theories of Social Movements,” Midwest Sociological Society supported project, Betty A. Dobratz, Advisor, April 2007-May 2008.

Research Assistant, “Business Networks and Rural Community Economic Vitality,” National Science Foundation-supported, Nancy Miller and Terry L. Besser, Co-Principal Investigator, August 2005-August 2006.

Research Assistant, “Business Networks and Rural Community Economic Vitality,” Fund for Rural America, United States Department of Agriculture-supported, Terry L. Besser, Principal Investigator, June 2003-August 2005.

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