Viterna on verdict for Teodora Vasquez, one of El Salvador's Las 17

"In El Salvadoran courts, women are only valued as mothers, and any woman who doesn't somehow measure up to these impossible standards of motherhood are punished to the fullest extent of the law,” said Jocelyn Viterna, a sociology professor at Harvard who has been following Vásquez’s case and was present in the courtroom.

"El Salvador Court Upholds 30-year Prison Sentence for Woman Whose Baby Died During Childbirth,” by Andrea Patiño and Patricia Clarembaux," Univision, 12/14/2017, background and quotes.

Viterna in the News

JOCELYN VITERNA

Jocelyn Viterna is Professor of Sociology at Harvard University. Her current research examines how the passage of anti-abortion legislation in El Salvador transformed the Salvadoran legal, judicial, and medical systems, with powerful and negative...

SOCIOL 1000: Introduction to Sociology

Spring 2025 This course introduces students to the complicated, conflictual, and often contradictory theoretical origins of sociology as a discipline. We begin by reading the standard sociological “canon”—Marx, Weber, and Durkheim—and interrogating why...

SOCIOL 3316: Politics and Social Change

Fall 2024 and Spring 2025 The Politics and Social Change Workshop promotes the development of a community of scholars interested in how power relations shape social patterns in societies around the world. We define ‘politics’ broadly to include everything...

JOCELYN VITERNA

Professor of Sociology, Chair of Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Harvard University

Contact Prof. Viterna

jviterna@wjh.harvard.edu

Office Hours Sign-up

Department of Sociology
33 Kirkland Street
William James Hall 480
Cambridge, MA 02138

Faculty Assistant:
Sandra Llewellyn