(Sociology, November 2010)
Thesis Title: A Modern Religion?: The State, The People, and the Remaking of Buddhism in Urban China Today 
Committee: Martin K. Whyte (Chair), Christopher Winship, and Nancy T. Ammerman (Boston University)
Initial Placement: Harvard College Fellow / Lecturer on Social Studies, Harvard University
Current Position: Lecturer on Social Studies, Harvard University

Alison Denton Jones is a sociologist and currently a Lecturer on Social Studies. Her areas of interest include cultural and organizational sociology, religion, social movements, civil society, development, globalization, China and East Asia, and research methodology, especially qualitative methods. Jones received a B.A. in Asian Studies and Sociology from Pomona College, Claremont, CA (1998), a certificate in Chinese Studies from the Johns Hopkins - Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies at Nanjing University in the PRC (2000), and an M.A. (2006) and Ph.D. (2010) in Sociology from Harvard University. She speaks Mandarin Chinese fluently and has lived in China and Taiwan for a total of over four years since 1997.