Meet UCLA IRLE’s 2025 Visiting Scholars
The Visiting Scholars program at the UCLA IRLE hosts researchers from institutions around the world to study labor and workplace topics in Los Angeles
Willa Needham | October 23, 2025
The UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment (IRLE) introduces its 2025 cohort of visiting scholars, Brady Collins and Eli Revelle Yano Wilson. Collins is continuing his appointment as a visiting scholar last year, and Wilson is joining the IRLE for the second time after his last appointment as a visiting scholar in 2017.
The UCLA IRLE Visiting Scholars program hosts scholars from other institutions or universities to collaborate with IRLE units while they pursue a research project or advanced degree. Learn more about the 2024 cohort here. See an archived list of past IRLE visiting researchers here.
Brady Collins
Brady Collins is an associate professor at California State Polytechnic University-Pomona and a researcher who examines labor conditions in ethnic enclaves. His recent work focuses on retail workers in the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles. Collins is a former policy analyst at Korean Immigrant Workers Alliance (KIWA). He earned a Ph.D. in urban planning at UCLA and an MA in public policy at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
As part of the UCLA IRLE Visiting Scholars program, Collins is collaborating closely with UCLA Labor Center director Saba Waheed and a team of researchers to study work conditions in L.A.’s Koreatown neighborhood and emerging Korean enclaves in Southern California. The team previously co-authored the report “Overcooked & Underserved: The Challenges of Koreatown’s Restaurant Workers,” which examines the labor and housing conditions of immigrant workers in Koreatown restaurants. The findings shed light on challenges these workers face, such as low wages and housing insecurity.
Collins also co-taught UCLA Labor Studies’ Labor Summer Research Program in 2024, an experience he said was “extremely valuable.” Collins shared that the hands-on teaching aspect of his partnership with the IRLE has allowed him to draw curricular and pedagogical insights into the labor studies discipline that he hopes to one day apply in the creation of similar programs at other universities.
Eli Revelle Yano Wilson
Eli Revelle Yano Wilson is an associate professor at University of New Mexico and a sociologist who studies the intersection of work, identity, culture and social inequality in the modern economy. He earned a Ph.D. in sociology at UCLA studying inequalities in restaurant work. His recent projects include a book titled Handcrafted Careers: Working the Artisan Economy of Craft Beers, which uncovers the experiences of workers in the craft beer industry.
Wilson’s scholarship on artisanal and niche industries provides a unique lens to consider issues that impact all workers, like job satisfaction and labor conditions. He is informed by his background as an ethnographer and strives to capture the everyday experiences, perspectives and inter-relations of workers themselves in his research.
For his residency at the IRLE as part of the Visiting Scholars program, Wilson is conducting ethnographic research on the wellness industry in Los Angeles. Wilson is interested in the day-to-day experiences of workers in this emerging industry, many of whom operate in non-traditional settings without established models. Wilson hopes the perspectives of wellness workers will illuminate topics that are broadly felt as the nature of work continues to evolve in the 21st century, including identity, privilege and career stability.
To learn more about the Visiting Scholars Program, eligibility requirements and the application process, please see the UCLA Graduate Division.
