Sarah Brayne is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at The University of Texas at Austin. In her research, Brayne uses qualitative and quantitative methods to understand data-intensive surveillance in the criminal justice system. Her forthcoming book (2020, Oxford University Press) draws on fieldwork with the Los Angeles Police Department to examine how predictive analytics and surveillance technologies are used by law enforcement, and to what social consequence. In previous research, she studied the relationship between individuals’ contact with the criminal justice system and their involvement in medical, financial, labor market and educational institutions. Brayne’s research has appeared in the American Sociological Review, Social Problems, Law and Social Inquiry, and the Annual Review of Law and Social Science and has been supported by Horowitz Foundation for Social Policy.

Prior to joining the faulty at UT-Austin, Brayne was a Postdoctoral Researcher at Microsoft Research. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology and Social Policy from Princeton University.

Brayne has volunteer-taught college-credit sociology classes in prisons since 2012. In 2017, she founded the Texas Prison Education Initiative.