Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs

• PhD, Sociology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA
• MA, Sociology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA
• BA, Sociology and Education, University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, MA
  

Robert Granfield began his career in 1989 as an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Denver and was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 1995.  A noted scholar in the areas of law and society as well as addiction studies, Professor Granfield was recruited to UB in 2004 after serving fourteen years at the University of Denver. He was promoted to Full Professor in 2005 and served as chair of UB’s Department of Sociology from 2006 to 2012.   He is also an affiliated scientist at UB’s Research Institute on Addictions.  He is the author or editor of six books and over 80 articles, book chapters, and reviews.  He has been principal investigator or co-principal investigation on numerous grants from the National Institute of Health, US Department of Health and Human Services, Woodrow Wilson Foundation, and Law School Admissions Council, among others.  He has been a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School, Middlebury College, the Singapore Institute of Management, and the University of Ottawa where he served as the Fulbright Research Chair in International Humanitarian Law and Social Justice.

Professor Granfield has an extensive record of leadership at UB.  In addition to serving as department chair, he was the founder and former director of UB’s Civic Engagement and Public Policy strategic strength, a wide-reaching initiative with participants from 11 of UB’s 12 decanal units and the hub for UB’s community-based research activities.  He was also the founder and director of UB’s Institute for the Study of Law and Urban Justice.  In addition, Professor Granfield has served in numerous leadership positions in the department of sociology, in the College of Arts and Sciences, and in the wider university.  Granfield has also served on several editorial boards, on numerous professional association committees, and has been a faculty mentor on over 50 doctoral dissertations, master’s theses, and undergraduate honor’s theses.