Harry Hamilton, Ph.D.

Dr. Harry Hamilton is an applied sociologist having spent more than thirty years in the field of mental health services. After helping establish a private residential program for adults with mental retardation, he served for ten years as its Operations Director followed another twenty-one years as Executive Director. Prior to this experience he worked for two years counseling and supervising emotionally disturbed adolescents living in a residential treatment center. This work experience allowed for participation in and observation of a wide range of social behavior as well as opportunity to apply sociological concepts and principles to a rich array of social phenomena, including but not limited to thousands of small group interactions, organizational behavior, stigmatization, labeling, resocialization, deviance, issues of class and race, etc. Dr. Hamilton has also served as consultant to one of the first programs in Alabama to provide housing for persons with AIDS and has been a trainer/leader in various mental health and management workshops.

For more than twenty years Dr. Hamilton was a member of the adjunct faculty of the UAB department of sociology and in that capacity taught a variety of courses: introduction to sociology, marriage and family, human sexuality, social change, aging, and drugs and society. Since joining the full-time faculty he has added social psychology, race and ehtnic relations, and symbolic interactionism to this list.

As an instructor, Dr. Hamilton is not directly involved in research, but his interests are in the areas of applied sociology, teaching, comparative studies and social theory. Dr. Hamilton earned both his masters and doctorate in sociology from UAB and is a native of Birmingham.

Dr. Hamilton was the winner in the faculty category of the first annual UAB Discussion Book essay contest on Anne Fadiman's The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. A copy of this essay, along with the other winning essays, may be found by going to the UAB home page and following the links to Discussion Book Essay Contest.