Wesley James is the Founding Executive Director of the Center for Community Research and Evaluation (CCRE), Interim Chair of the Department of Anthropology, Pat E. Burlison Professor in the Department of Sociology, and Faculty Affiliate in the UofM School of Public Health, Division of Social and Behavioral Sciences. He received his Ph.D. in Sociology with a concentration in Demography from Mississippi State University in 2009.

Dr. James' primary research areas are medical sociology, demography, and rural health. He has been involved in several state and federally funded grants and contracts exploring a variety of health, education, and workforce-related issues. Presently, his research agenda is focused in three areas: (1) U.S. mortality disparities across time and place, (2) social determinants of health, mortality, and life expectancy in rural America, and (3) access to health care in the Mississippi Delta and the Southern U.S. He has received recognition in research and teaching as the recipient of the Distinguished Research Award in the Social Sciences, Business, and Law from the UofM Alumni Association (2023), Distinguished Research Award in the Social Sciences from the College of Arts & Sciences (2022), Pat E. Burlison Faculty Award (2021), P.I. Millionaire Award (2020), and the W. Russell Smith Award for Teaching Excellence (2013).

Dr. James is an active member of the Southern Sociological Society (SSS), Population Association of America (PAA), and Southern Demographic Association (SDA), where he served as President in 2022. Dr. James has delivered talks on rural health around the nation, highlighted by invited presentations at a Congressional Briefing on Capitol Hill, National Cancer Institute, and Gulf Coast Center for Law & Policy, among others. His work has been published in American Journal of Public Health, Social Science and Medicine Population Health, Demographic Research, N-IUSSP, Population Research and Policy Review, Journal of Rural Health, Frontiers of Public Health, Frontiers of Epidemiology, Population Health Management, and many others.

Education

Ph.D., Sociology, Mississippi State University, 2009.
M.S., Sociology, Mississippi State University, 2004.
B.A., Sociology, University of Missouri - Columbia, 2001.