Department of Sociology and Criminology

Our academic staff

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Meet the academic staff of the Department of Sociology and Criminology

Our academic staff hold various posts within the Department of Sociology and Criminology. They deliver excellence in the teaching of our modules and conduct research in a wide range of specialisms.

Academic members of staff

Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Research Interests
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Algorithmic Power; Web Scraping; Text Mining; Digital Cultures; Software Studies; Hacker Subcultures; The Dark Web; Science and Technology Studies; Computational Social Science
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Critical theory; Historical sociology; Working-class heritage; Sociology of the media and modern culture; Intellectual history of ethical socialism and cultural criticism; Governmentality studies; Sociology of religion; Cultural policy studies
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: History of psychoanalysis; Twentieth-century 'psy' disciplines; Cultural history of the British welfare state; History and theory of childhood; Trauma studies; Feminism and psychoanalysis
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Indigenous studies; Latin America, especially the Andes; Gender and sexualities; Ethnic and racial identities; Bolivia, especially indigenous peoples; Gibraltar
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Crime and the Media; Cultural and Social Geography; Popular Music and Sociological Thinking; Punishment and Human Rights; Sociology of Imprisonment; Visual Sociology; Youth Culture
Reader, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Gender and sexuality; Sex work and sex industry studies; The intersection of sexual and economic citizenship; Fiscal sociology and critical taxation studies; Comparative methods and psycho-social methodologies
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Economic Sociology; Consumer Culture; New Media; Social Theory; STS
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: social cohesion; multiculturalism and civic integration; crime and neighbourhood effects; job search and labour market inclusion
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Migration, solidarity and trust; Migration and the climate crisis; Human Rights; Latin America; Migration and Health
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Human Rights; Indigenous Peoples; Sustainable Development; Social Movements; Refugees
Pro-Vice Chancellor Research and Professor (R), Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Trial by Media; Scandal; Serious Youth Violence; Victimology; Celebrity
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: police and tech ethics, digital policing, surveillance, security, criminal records, domestic abuse, vulnerabilities,, and human trafficking; Domestic abuse
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Gender and Sexuality; Economic and Feminist Anthropology (and Sociology); Development; Human Rights; Medical Anthropology; South Asia
Faculty Dean Undergraduate (Social Sciences) - Senior Lecturer (R), Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Social Psychology; Medical Sociology; Reproductive Health; Women's Health; Marriage and Family; Social Norms; Men and Masculinity; Qualitative and Quantitative Research Methods
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: media and gender; advertising and consumer culture; reality dating television; audience reception; postfeminism and popular feminism; family in contemporary China; feminism in China
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Experimental Sociology; Quantitative Methods; Trust; Sustainable Development and Climate Change; Migration, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: International Migration; Social Stratification
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Science and Technology Studies; Neuroscience and Society; Dual Use; Responsible Research and Innovation; Medical Anthropology
Head of Department - Professor (R), Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Social theories of knowledge and ignorance; Economic sociology; Global health governance; Human rights-based approaches to health and development
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Sociology of Rights; Cosmopolitanism; Citizenship; Human Rights; Trans-national migration; Asylum; Welfare
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Consumption and Commercial Cultures; Advertising and Market Devices; Cultural Studies; Television and the Natural World; Cultures of nature and human-animal relations
Executive Dean (Social Sciences) - Professor (R), Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Disasters; Class; Race / Ethnicity; Existential Threats; Post-compulsory education and training (PCET); Artificial Intelligence
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Subjectivity, testimony and memory; History of psychonalysis in Britain; Trauma and inter-generational transmission; Families and inter-generational relationships; Interviews, personal sources and research methods; War, memory and commemoration
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Gender, sexuality and citizenship, with particular reference to kinship, assisted reproduction and migration; feminist epistemology; research methodology; ESRC funded project about Sexuality, 'Citizenship and migration: the Irish Queer Diaspora in London'
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Indigenous Peoples; Human Rights; Ethnic Studies; Colonialism; American Studies; Environmental Issues; Arts and Literature
Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Armed Forces and Society; Criminal Policy; Cybersecurity and cyber defence; Policing; Security Governance; States and Organized Crime; Corruption
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Social class and stratification; economic sociology; migration, globalisation and governance; globalisation and policing; policing terrorism; the criminal justice system; social policy
Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Recycling and waste management; Moral economy and political economy; Sustainability and climate change; Qualitative interviewing; Sociology of consumption and consumer culture; Qualitative analysis

Emeritus Professors

Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: risk perception; social and political trust; survey methodology; public understanding of science; research integrity and questionable research practices
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Philosophy of the social sciences; Modern social theories, especially marxian and neo-marxian; Environmental sociology; Rural/urban divide; Some aspects of the history of the life-sciences (especially Darwin and Wallace).
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Race and Slavery; Development of Capitalism; Historical Sociology; Globalisation; Political Economy of pension funds
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Mental Disorder; Psychiatry, Gender and Mental Disorder; History of Psychiatry; Medicines and the Pharmaceutical Industry
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Transformations of work and employment; Global changes in the division of labour; The gendering of work and women's work and employment; Shifting boundaries between the work of production, distribution and consumption; The work of consumption; Food preparation work; Remotely located work
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: aim to develop the ‘new economic sociology’ using a neo-Polanyian framework of ‘instituted economic processes’ (IEP). An historical and comparative research agenda has been key here to an understanding of ‘varieties of capitalism’; the emergent bio-economy; food provisioning, supermarkets, and the sociology of food consumption; biotechnology and genomics; economics of knowledge; 'rights over resources' within 'welfare states'
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: urban ethnography; the sociology of London; organised and professional crime; the night-time economy; violence; drug markets; research methodology
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: (Im)Migration/Ethnicity (Policies, Settlement, Adaptation) in the Context of Globalization and in a Historical-Comparative Perspective (Europe and North America, 19th-21st C) Ground-level Multiculturalism Across Time and Space East European Societies in Transition; Comparative-Historical Sociology Classical and Contemporary Social Theory Qualitative Research Methods
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: environmental crime; green criminology and human rights; illegal and legal drug use and markets; crime, inequalities and citizenship; theoretical and comparative criminology; public health and community services
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Emeritus Professor, Department of Sociology and Criminology
Research interests: Child Protection; Childrens Rights; Children and Young People as Victims and Offenders; Professional Responses to Crime; Women as Offenders/Victims
Pam Cox, MP for Colchester and Honorary Professor at the University of Essex.
Meet Honorary Professor Pam Cox, Member of Parliament for Colchester

Pam Cox was elected as Colchester's first woman MP in September 2024. Previously a Professor and Head of the Department of Sociology and Criminology at Essex. The University have awarded her an Honorary Professorship in recognition of her continued support.

Visit Pam Cox's MP profile
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Contact us
Department of Sociology and Criminology University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, CO4 3SQ
Telephone: 01206 873275