Jonathan Wynn studies urban culture. His two major publications are The Tour Guide: Walking and Talking New York (2011, University of Chicago Press, Fieldwork Encounters and Discoveries Series) and Music/City: American Festivals and Placemaking in Austin, Nashville, and Newport (2015, University of Chicago Press). In addition to articles published in City & Community, Qualitative Sociology, Media, Culture and Society, Sociological Forum, Cultural Sociology, and Contexts Magazine, two of his articles are “Hobo to Doormen: The Characters of Qualitative Analysis, Past and Present” (in Ethnography), and "On the Sociology of Occasions" (in Sociological Theory). Pieces of public sociology have been placed in The Guardian, The Conversation, and The Washington Post.

Wynn's forthcoming book (Fall 2023, University of Chicago Press) focuses on a central puzzle: Why are a city’s worst health outcomes often found in the neighborhoods directly around prestigious hospitals? As large hospitals tower over urban neighborhoods and health policy pushes non-profit hospitals to do more to support local communities, we find a surprisingly complex story of two interlocking systems: disadvantaged urban communities and high tech health care facilities. The City and The Hospital: The paradox of medically overserved communities (co-authored with Daniel Skinner and Berkeley Franz) takes a closer look at the intertwined fates of these systems in three cities: Aurora, CO; Cleveland, OH; and Hartford, CT. He is also working on an Urban Culture primer (co-authored with Andrew Deener) that is under contract with Oxford University Press.

Since 2011 Wynn has been a regular contributor to the Everyday Sociology blog, and is a contributor to the UMass Prison Education Initiative. 

Listen to an interview on BBC Radio on The Tour Guide. Listen to "Death to Concrete Culture" on WGBH Boston/PRI's Innovation Hub, The Academic Minute and the Australian Broadcasting Company's Future Tense for discussions of Music/City.

Education

PhD, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2006

Research Areas

Urban and Cultural Sociology, Ethnography, Theory