Sonja Mackenzie

Sonja Mackenzie is an Associate Professor at the Department of Public Health, College of Arts and Sciences, Santa Clara University. She is conducting sabbatical research as Affiliate Faculty with the Reproductive Sociology Research Group (ReproSoc) and Department of Sociology at Cambridge University (2021). Her work bridges public health and sociology to address social and structural inequities in health among racial/ethnic and sexual/gender minorities.

• Research Interests: Social determinants of health, LGBTQ kinship, HIV prevention, structural racism, reproductive justice, and health social movements.
• Grants: NIMH-funded K01 award (5 years) on HIV prevention among Black men who have sex with men and women.
• Publications: Author of the 2013 book Structural Intimacies: Sexual Stories in the Black AIDS Epidemic (Rutgers Press).

Public Scholarship includes commentary on pandemic grief (2020) in The New York Times and KQED, as well as advocacy for racial and gender justice in media outlets like Daily Kos and The Advocate. She teaches courses on race/class/gender intersections, community health, and structural racism (PHSC 3, 125, 131, 187, 190).

Scientific Awards:

• National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH) K01 award

Leadership: Senior Academic Advisor for the Santa Clara County Child Health Needs Assessment (2015–2016). She contributes to transdisciplinary public health education and collaborative research frameworks.