Andrea S. Boyles

Associate Professor of Sociology and Africana Studies, Tulane University of Louisiana

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About Andrea

Boyles’s research focuses on topics such as race and intersectionality, gender, systemic inequality, segregation and racial-spatial politics, poverty, Black citizen-police conflict, neighborhood violence, protests, and resilience. Overarching themes in Boyles’s writings include racial and socio-historical examinations of police-citizen relations; neighborhood disadvantage and disorder; community engagement and development; resistance and collective action. Boyles serves on the Executive Committee for Tulane's Violence Prevention Institute, as Co-Director for Tulane's Center for Community-Engaged Artificial Intelligence, and is a former Sociologists for Women in Society (SWS) delegate to the UN’s Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

Contributions | No Jargon Podcast | In the News | Publications

Contributions

Will Mayor Ella Jones Be Able to Turn Around Ferguson?

Commentary, June 2020

In the News

Quoted by Myron Thompson in "Knoxville’s Horseback Police Will Debut in March, and the Goal Is Community Engagement," Knoxville News Sentinel, February 27, 2025.

Quoted by Desiree Stennett in "A New Study Reveals a Massive Racial Gap in the New Orleans Area," The New Orleans Advocate, June 23, 2024.

Quoted by Aaron Morrison, Aisha I. Jefferson, and Kim Chandler in "Alabama Riverfront Brawl Videos Spark a Cultural Moment About Race, Solidarity and Justice," The Associated Press, August 12, 2023.

Quoted by Curtis Bunn in "The List of Things to Warn Black Children about Keeps Getting Longer," NBC News, April 20, 2023.

Quoted by John Simerman in "Among Young Black Men in New Orleans, Murder Exacts a Devastating Toll," The New Orleans Advocate, February 3, 2023.

Quoted by Liliana Segura and Jordan Smith in "Confession of Error: A Special Prosecutor Found Kevin Johnson’s Case was Tainted by Racism. Missouri is about to Kill Him Anyway," The Intercept, November 27, 2022.

Quoted by in "In a Country Where More Than 14,000 People Die Annually from Guns, Blacks are 14 Times More Affected Than Whites – Strengthen Investments in Minority Communities," The Tokyo Shimbun/Chunchi Shimbun, November 14, 2022.

Quoted by Adam Mahoney and Margo Snipe in "Officials Withheld Funds over an Abortion Ban. Black Louisianans are Most at Risk," Capital B, August 26, 2022.

Quoted by Stacy M. Brown in "Supreme Court Poised to Rule on Abortion, Gun Rights and Religious Freedom," The Washington Informer, June 8, 2022.

Quoted by Aaron Morrison, Kat Stafford in "After Buffalo, Civil Rights Leaders Pitch Anti-Hate Plans," AP News, May 19, 2022.

Quoted by Lateshia Beachum in "Black Female Athletes Are Setting Records — And Now Leading Conversations About Mental Health," The Washington Post, July 30, 2021.

Quoted by Stacy M. Brown in "America’s Widespread Police Brutality Problem Results In Tens Of Thousands Taken To Emergency Rooms," The Seattle Medium, June 24, 2021.

Quoted by Brittany Wallman, Mario Ariza and Megan O'Matz in "The Hunted: Police K-9s are meant to stop dangerous felons. More often they are unleashed on Black people accused of stealin," South Florida Sun Sentinel, June 9, 2021.

Opinion: "They Still Can’t Figure It Out: One Year After George Floyd’s Murder," Andrea S. Boyles, Opinion, Newsweek, June 1, 2021.

Quoted by Ramon Antonio Vargas in "NOPD Furloughs Could Make City’s Rise in Violent Crime Worse, Watchdog Warns," The New Orleans Advocate, November 9, 2020.

Opinion: "Breonna Taylor’s Case Says It Loud and Clear: Black Lives Don’t Matter," Andrea S. Boyles, Opinion, Newsweek, September 24, 2020.

Quoted by in "The Killing of Elijah McClain and the Silent Crisis of Racism in Suburban Policing," Yahoo News, September 11, 2020.

Quoted by in "Why People Loot," The Atlantic, June 2, 2020.

Publications

"Racial-Spatial Politics: Policing Black Citizens in White Spaces and a 21st-Century Uprising" American Ethnologist 47, no. 2 (2020): 150–154.

Researches extended traditional examinations of racialized policing in urban spaces to examine Black residents’ experiences of policing in suburban locations, such as Ferguson.

You Can't Stop the Revolution Community Disorder and Social Ties in Post-Ferguson America (University of California Press, 2019).

Vivid three-year participant ethnography of Ferguson protests. Offers an everyday montage of direct action, social ties, and empowerment and examines how black citizens work to combat disorder, crime, and police conflict, amid twenty-first century resistance.

"The Effects of De Facto Segregation: Socio-Economic and Political Alienation, Crime, and Contentious Black Citizen-Police Exchanges" in Segregation by Design, (Springer International Publishing, 2019), 450-463.

Explains de facto segregation as perpetual, cyclic, and institutionally linked to political alienation, crime, and black citizen-police conflict. Describes how cumulative factors show the residual effects of racial and ethnic construction, colonization, and enslavement.

Race, Place, and Suburban Policing: Too Close for Comfort (University of California Press, 2015).

Shows encounters between black citizens and police in urban communities, there have been limited analyses of such encounters in suburban settings. Examines a fraught police-citizen interface, where blacks are segregated and yet forced to negotiate overlapping spaces with their more affluent white counterparts.