Jorja Leap is an American anthropologist and adjunct professor in the social welfare department at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She is also Director of the Health and Social Justice Partnership at UCLA and is a nationally recognized gang expert.[1][2]
In 2011, Leap was named one of Los Angeles Magazine's Action Heroes for her policy work and gang intervention efforts in the Los Angeles area.[3]Los Angeles Magazine named her as one of the "50 Most Influential Women in Los Angeles" in 2012,
and in the same year she won the Joseph Nunn Alumna of the Year award at UCLA.[4]
Leap completed her undergraduate and graduate degrees from UCLA. In 1978, she received a B.A. in Sociology. In 1980, she earned a master's degree in social work, and in 1988 she received a Ph.D. in psychological anthropology.[6] Her dissertation, under the name Jorja Jeane Manos Prover, was Culture-makers: Hollywood writers as an American elite.
^See Leap's UCLA profile for Leap's connection to this book. Review of No One Knows Their Names:
De Brigard, Emilie (September 1995), "Hollywood: Mecca of the Movies/No One Knows Their Names: Screenwriters in Hollywood", Visual Anthropology Review, 11 (2): 112–113, doi:10.1525/var.1995.11.2.112
^Reviews of Jumped In: What Gangs Taught Me About Violence, Drugs, Love, and Redemption:
