Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Chair Emeritus
Research Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Maryland
Dr. William Cockerham received his PhD. from the University of California, Berkeley and served as chairperson of UAB's Department of Sociology from 1994-2000 and 2011-2017. He is now Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Chair Emeritus at UAB and Research Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Maryland at College Park. He is also affiliated with the Obesity Health Disparities Research Center (OHDRC) in the Division of Preventive Medicine at the UAB Heersink School of Medicine. He led the sociology department in the initial period of its PhD program in medical sociology and later oversaw the development of the online MA in sociology and the BS in medical sociology. While at UAB, he was an Edge of Chaos Scholar, Sparkman Scholar, and recipient of the Connors Prize in the History of Ideas and the Ireland Award for Scholarly Distinction. He is the 2026 recipient of the Reeder Award for distinguished contributions to the field of medical sociology from the Medical Sociology Section of the American Sociological Association.
Additionally, Dr. Cockerham was President of the Research Committee on Health Sociology of the International Sociological Association from 2006-2010 and served on the editorial boards of the American Sociological Review, the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Society and Mental Health, Social Currents, Current Sociology Monographs, Social Science Quarterly, and others.
Dr. Cockerham’s recent books include The Sociology of Mental Disorder, 12th ed. (Routledge, 2024); Medical Sociology, 16th ed. (Routledge, 2025); Medical Sociology on the Move, Revised Edition, including New Directions in Theory, 2nd edition (Springer Nature, 2025); and Social Causes of Health and Disease, 4th ed. (Polity, 2026). He is also the editor-in-chief of the Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Health, Illness, Behavior, and Society, 2nd ed. (Wiley Blackwell, 2026). His newest book is The Sociology of Pandemics, which will be published by Polity in the UK in February 2027 and in the US in April 2027.