Jonathan Coley joined the Department of Sociology at Oklahoma State University in 2018. His research focuses on social movements, politics, religion, education, gender and sexuality, and race and ethnicity. His current research projects focus on LGBTQ activism at Christian colleges and universities; political, social, and religious activist groups at U.S. colleges and universities (with Dhruba Das, Gabby Gomez, Jericho McElroy, and Jessica Schachle); and local-level church-state relations in the United States (with Gary Adler, Damon Mayrl, and Rebecca Sager). His past research projects examined micromobilization in the Nashville civil rights movement (with Larry Isaac, Dan Cornfield, Dennis Dickerson, and James Lawson); culture and the early U.S. labor movement (with Larry Isaac, Quan Mai, and Anna Jacobs); and membership in the Sierra Club (with Quan Mai and Jessica Schachle).

Dr. Coley’s first book, Gay on God’s Campus: Mobilizing for LGBT Equality at Christian Colleges and Universities, was published by The University of North Carolina Press and received the 2018 Distinguished Book Award from the Mid-South Sociological Association. His research has also been published in journals such as American Journal of Sociology, Social Forces, Sociological Forum, Mobilization, Sociology of Religion, and Sociology of Education.