Shannon Drysdale Walsh completed her Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame in 2011, having spent over 18 months conducting fieldwork in the Latin America researching how countries have (and have not) appropriately responded to increasing reported levels of violence against women. Her primary field of research explains the development and variation in practices within specialized justice system institutions (police and courts) that address violence against women in Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. She also produces scholarship on crime in Latin America and the impacts of women's representation. Dr. Drysdale Walsh is the recipient of several nationally competitive awards and fellowships, including a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellowship and a Mellon/ACLS (American Council of Learned Societies) Dissertation Completion Fellowship. Her work has been published in journals such as Latin American Politics and Society and Studies in Social Justice. She is currently working on a book manuscript entitled “Engendering State Institutions: State Response to Violence against Women in Latin America.” She holds a Ph.D. and M.A. from the University of Notre Dame and a B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.