A sociologist by training, Dr. Fonow's research interests include gender and social movements, feminist transnational labor activism and feminist methodology and pedagogy. She is dedicated in both her teaching and research to an understanding of the intersections of gender, race and class. Her scholarship is both multi-disciplinary and international. She has done research in Amsterdam, Geneva, Brussels, and most recently in Australia where she served as a visiting scholar at the University of South Australia in Adelaide.

Dr. Fonow's recent book, Union Women: Forging Feminism in the United Steelworkers of America (University of Minnesota Press in 2003) examines how a feminist agenda took hold in a male-dominated union. Fonow studies how feminism and labor politics intersect – how women in the union developed a collective identity as “Women of Steel” and how that political identity was related to their involvement in both the labor movement and the women‘s movement. She has also been the editor or co-editor of three collections of scholarship in women’s studies and has published 18 articles in the field.

Before coming to ASU, Dr. Fonow was associate professor and assistant director of the Center for Women’s Studies at Ohio State University. She has also taught at Otterbein College and Denison University.