Beth Holden (she/her) is a PhD student in Sociology with a concentration in Criminology at the University of Tennessee. She is a Tennessee Fellowship for Graduate Excellence recipient and currently working as a Graduate Teaching Associate. Beth received her MA in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies from the University of Florida in 2023, where she wrote her thesis, “How Do We Reach Recovery? Autonomous Recovery as Liberatory Praxis.” She graduated from UTK with her BA in Women, Gender, and Sexuality in 2021 as well. 

Her current research focuses on substance use recovery broadly and, more specifically, how Alcoholics Anonymous, and other 12-step programs, have impacted incarcerated populations as they are legally mandated programs. She hopes to uncover how the criminal legal system continues to intersect with the 12 Step hegemony to produce more “crime” and incarceration. In this, she hopes to reveal how imperative a radical recovery framework is for movements of liberation.