Mid-South Sociological Association invites APSU's Ogbonna-McGruder to discuss her book at annual conference

CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – Earlier this month, Dr. Chinyere Ogbonna-McGruder, Austin Peay State University professor of public management and criminal justice, accepted an invitation to North Charleston, South Carolina, to discuss her 2009 book, “Voices from the Inside: Case Studies from a Tennessee Women’s Prison,” at the Mid-South Sociological Association’s 42^nd Annual Conference. The organization’s president also invited Ogbonna-McGruder to chair a special panel during the conference on criminal justice and race.

The APSU professor’s book, completed with the help of a faculty research grant, “reveals the personal accounts of over 60 women that are incarcerated for drug crimes, in the Tennessee prison for women.” These intimate portraits provide added context to a subject often examined only through impersonal statistics.

Ogbonna-McGruder also is the author of the 2007 book, “TennCare and Disproportionate Share Hospitals in Tennessee,” and the 2013 book, “A Different Perspective on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.” The University Press of America published all three books.

Ogbonna-McGruder previously worked for the World Health Organization in Africa and as a bioterrorism epidemiologist for the Tennessee Department of Health. Last year, she presented a research paper, “Ebola 2014 Outbreak, Discourse and Policy,” at the Critical Issues roundtable at Oxford University, England. She also served as a member of the round table.

Her three books are currently available at amazon.com. For more information, contact Ogbonna-McGruder at ogbonnac@apsu.edu.