Research

My scholarship sits at the intersection of the sociology of gender, sexuality, race, culture, and migration. Broadly, I ask: how do people, particularly those with marginalized identities, make meaning and craft lives amid structural and social constraints? From positions of marginality and alienation, we might reasonably expect people to react with hopelessness, despair, and defeat. Yet, they often respond with creativity, strategy, and hope. My work explores how and why such responses emerge, their possibilities and limitations, and what they reveal about power and inequality. Methodologically, I use a mix of qualitative approaches, including ethnography, interviews, and content analysis. My research is transnational, with projects in both the United States and Latin America.

Fantasy

We are living in an age of widening inequality and fragmented social solidarity and trust. Simultaneously, our social connections and relationships are increasingly disperse. In this context, how do people understand and respond to their experiences of marginality and alienation? My book, Surfing Desire: Transnational Travel, Romance, and Fantasies, is currently under advanced contract with the University of California Press. It explore fantasy’s economic, symbolic, and erotic ability to imbue meaning within the material constraints of everyday life. I focus on transnational intimate relationships in a Peruvian beach town as a case study, drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, digital participant observation, interviews, and social media content analysis. This work draws from cultural and economic sociology (work on “imagined futures”), and from work in queer theory on futurity, to theorize fantasy as a response to marginality and alienation. It also looks at questions of masculinity, intimacy, heterosexuality, romance, travel and escapism.

While conducting research in Peru, I was a Visiting Researcher at Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú in the Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas, Económicas, Políticas y Antropológicas (CISEPA).

Related Publications:
Hidalgo, Anna. “Surfing Desire: Transnational Travel, Romance, and Fantasies.” Book under contract with University of California Press.

Hidalgo, Anna. “Towards a Sociology of Fantasy.” In preparation for submission to American Sociological Review. Draft manuscript available upon request.

Hidalgo, Anna. “Rethinking Female Sex/Romance Tourism.” In preparation for submission to Sexualities.

Latino Masculinity

While Latino masculinity is often understood through the paradigm of “machismo,” this paper explores a divergent expression of masculinity that I observed among a group of men in Peru. These men embraced a masculine subculture that emphasized a “good vibes only” mentality, and allowed them to garner respect, evade physical violence, and maintain a sense of esteem, despite experiences of marginalization tied to their race, gender, and class. This paper expands on and complicates the scholarly literature on hybrid and hegemonic masculinity and allows us to consider new expressions of Latino masculinity.

Related Publications:
Hidalgo, Anna. “Todo Bien: Alternative Expressions of Masculinity in a Latin American Context.” In preparation for submission to Men & Masculinities. Draft manuscript available upon request.

Venezuelan Migrant Experiences

My newest research project focuses on the experiences of Venezuelan migrants who arrived in the United States between 2022 and 2024, part of the largest migration wave in recent U.S. history. Many are “serial migrants,” having previously relocated to other countries in Latin America before embarking on journeys to the U.S.-Mexico border. Through ongoing ethnographic fieldwork and collaborations with community organizations, I follow individuals and families navigating heightened anti-immigrant rhetoric, increasingly restrictive policies, and a surge in migrant surveillance and policing. I ask how their identities, aspirations, and survival strategies—shaped by intersecting factors such as gender, race, class, and family—have shifted across different migratory stages: initial displacement in Latin America, journeys across the region, and resettlement in the United States.

Culture & Networks in Academia

In this project, I examine how faculty navigate the academy and counter experiences of social and cultural closure within academia. Drawing from interviews with 39 faculty members, I identified two strategies: leveraging networks to master a “hidden curriculum” for navigating institutional norms, and using institutions and individuals as “gatekeepers” and “brokers” to facilitate legibility and legitimacy, and gain access to opportunities. I conclude by analyzing accounts of failure in academia, showing how these individualized accounts can minimize or obscure the structural nature of social and cultural closure in academia, thus allowing for these processes to remain unchallenged. Taken together, these findings help us to gain a clearer understanding of the persistence of inequality in academia.

Related Publication: Hidalgo, Anna. “Cultural and Social Closure and the Persistence of Inequality in Academia.” For submission to Social Problems. Complete manuscript available upon request.

Qualitative Methodology

I am interested in exploring the boundaries and practices of qualitative research methods, and the need for more flexible and creative approaches and methods to support researchers as they carry out their work within an expanding and shifting interactional terrain, and in the face of personal and collective disruptions. This is a particularly salient issue for ethnographers, as our methods often call for close interaction and engagement with others. For example, in a paper co-authored with Shamus Khan, I explore how ethnographers might approach the challenge of conducting research in times of crisis, specifically during Covid-19.

Related Publication: Hidalgo, Anna and Shamus Khan. 2020. “Blindsight Ethnography and Exceptional Moments.” Etnografia e Ricerca Qualitativa 2: 185-193. doi: 10.3240/97804
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HIV

Prior to academia, I worked in public health research with a focus on HIV/AIDS. At the Fenway Institute, I collaborated with an interdisciplinary research team to implement clinical trials for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Adolescent Trials Network (ATN). ATN is a national network that conducts preventative and therapeutic research with HIV-infected and HIV-at-risk pre-adolescents, adolescents, and young adults. Alongside my regular duties as a member of the research team, I also administered HIV tests and conducted pre- and post-test counseling; revitalized and coordinated the institutional Youth Community Advisory Board (YCAB); and, engaged in Community Based Participatory Research (CPBR) through Connect2Protect, an initiative that sought to mobilize communities to examine the root causes of HIV among young people and address them through long-term structural change objectives.

Additionally, as a Behavioral Surveyor at the AIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts I worked on the National HIV Behavioral Surveillance Study (NHBS), a joint project of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. I conducted on-site and face-to-face surveys with populations labeled ‘high risk’ in order to assess demographics, social and sex networks, sexual risk, drug and alcohol use, and access to HIV treatment and prevention services.

Related Publication: White Hughto JM, Hidalgo A, Bazzi A, Reisner S, Mimiaga M. 2016. “Indicators of HIV-risk resilience among men who have sex with men: A content analysis of online profiles.” Sexual Health 13(5): 436-443. doi: 10.1071/SH16023