When I was applying to graduate school, I had no family experience or professional networks, I didn’t understand what a PhD meant other than spending a very long time on a very specific project. I had recently told someone I’d never do a doctorate, for how could anyone want to study just one thing for the rest of their lives! I was an English undergrad, so my idea of this was narrow. But between that dismissive comment and finding myself looking through the printed book of sociology graduate programs, I had found myself sitting in an undergraduate theory course that was heavy on Marx—I was in a terminal Master’s program that did not offer theory, and I really wanted to understand the foundation. I was enraptured. I was transformed. This explained so much! 

And that was that. Suddenly, I wanted a doctorate so I could make sense of this world I found myself in, and by understanding the world maybe change it. I sat on my apartment floor with the borrowed book of graduate programs with yellow sticky notes and selected five programs (that was all I could afford) that had some combination of “Latin American” and “Marxist” sociology as a specialty. 

I’d heard people say to really have a chance, you needed to “follow” someone important in a department so they could vouch for you. So, as I was gathering my schools, I thought, I guess it’s time to follow someone. Folks, this is pre-social media days, so essentially it meant reading work you could find, talking to people who might have connections, and showing up at a conference, which also implied you already had these networks. I had none. I called Berkeley’s sociology department, and they gave me Michael Burawoy’s home phone number—he was the director of the graduate program at the time. So I called and he picked up. I have NO memory of what I said, but I can guarantee you that I sounded exceptionally green. He was gracious. At the end of the conversation, I apologized for calling him at home and told him that I thought I had to know someone personally before I could apply, which is why I had called. He then laughed loudly and said, “Oh, no, no, no. Can you imagine if everyone called me?!” Which I thought was a good point. Here is the thing: he picked up the phone and stayed on it to talk to someone who had no idea who he was. 

During my tenure at Berkeley, Michael was my teacher, my boss, and my dissertation chair. He was a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant teacher. He built a class and allowed the work to unfold in such a manner that gave students the joy of discovery. I often tried, unsuccessfully, to organize my thoughts in a Burawoy-esque way. A couple of highlights are: the 8×20 table that had something to do with Cuba and Gramsci. Or the flowchart I made of the first part of the German Ideology. I showed him both, and I can only describe his look as a combination of worry and terror. (Note: I still love my flowchart.) 

As a chair, he could be frustrating. There was a constant push and pull as I sought to develop my own center, and he pulled me back—maybe it was dialectical? But, he didn’t give up, even though I spent years expecting that an email would come dis-inviting me from the department. Years. I would get angry at him sometimes and let him know. One time, he sent me a dismissive email, and I stayed up for hours crafting the very strong response I sent about how the difference in power between us meant he couldn’t send something like that without recognizing its effect. I came to his office the next day, and when he saw me waiting, he came right out, pointed animatedly to the chair next to his desk, closed the door, and said emotionally, “I meant…” It was an email misunderstanding. His use of “periods” was erratic and sometimes hard to read. Another time during the last six months of my dissertation writing, I sent him a long letter about needing more from him. I remember one thing I wrote was, “I know I’m not that brilliant student of theory, but I still need you to show up for me.” It was a letter that was as much about my own fear as it was about our relationship. We sat together and had a long conversation about doing things differently. We both did better. 

After leaving grad school and applying to numerous jobs, I had an offer at a large university, the only one at that time. It was a job that, deep in my gut, I knew would not bring me joy. I turned it down and sent him an email, a bit worried about his response. He wrote: “I know you’ll be fine, you always land on your feet.” And something about that and the trust it implied meant everything. 

A number of years later, I was in my current sociological home, where I’d always imagined myself: an underfunded, urban state university. He was nearby, a guest of an elite university, and we were all back in person for the first time since the start of Covid. I invited him to talk and said, “We have no funds,” but could take him to lunch. He said, “I’d love to.” It was dynamic, it was so very Michael. The faculty said they felt like they were back in grad school, and students found him charmingly charismatic. After our lunch, as I dropped him off at the train station, he said, “You have the most extraordinary department.” He meant it, and I think he was letting me know I’d landed on my feet in a place I belonged. 

Here’s the thing: if you were going to stumble through graduate school and wonder the whole time if you belonged, there was no better person to have on your side than Michael. Because at his core, he believed the future of the discipline and maybe the world, depended on a new generation of organic intellectuals who didn’t come from elite spaces, but who developed their critical sociological understanding honed by their experience and despite those centers of power. 

Michael lived a truly ethical life centered on redistribution and collective power. He was driven by an optimistic force of will that change would happen. I hope it does.