Dr Tony Sampson
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Email
tsamps@essex.ac.uk -
Telephone
+44 (0) 1206 874281
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Location
EBS.3.29, Colchester Campus
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Academic support hours
For arranging an in-person or Zoom meeting, please contact me through my Essex email.
Profile
Biography
Dr. Tony D. Sampson is a Reader in Digital Communication at the University of Essex's Essex Business School. His research and teaching address two interconnected strands that explore the emotional, sensory, and affective experiences of digital and analogue worlds. In the digital realm, Tony has published extensively on topics such as digital communications, marketing, labour, virality, neuroculture, and user experience (UX). In the analogue sphere, he applies concepts from “emotional geography” to inform local community development and activism projects. Across both strands of his work, Tony investigates how the spatio-temporal environments people inhabit evoke, shape, or suppress their experiences. These affective relationships with time and space, in turn, influence how experiences are understood, used, and transformed. This research contributes to a critical understanding of the dynamics of power, inclusion, and marginalization across digital and physical contexts of experience. Tony's main digital communication publications include: The Spam Book, co-edited with Jussi Parikka (Hampton Press, 2009) Virality: Contagion Theory in the Age of Networks (University of Minnesota Press, 2012) The Assemblage Brain: Sense Making in Neuroculture (University of Minnesota Press, 2017) Affect and Social Media (Rowman and Littlefield, 2018) A Sleepwalker's Guide to Social Media (Polity, 2020) The Struggle for User Experience: Experiments in Birth, School, Work, Death (University of Minnesota Press, forthcoming) Between 2014 and 2022, Tony organized seven successful Affect and Social Media annual conferences in East London. He welcomes MPhil/PhD applicants interested in: Critical perspectives on digital design labour/practices Digital design industry dynamics UX and HCI theory and practice Emerging technologies (AI, immersive, XR, etc.) Digital aesthetics, perception, and affect theory Cognitive, neuro, affective, and emotional labour Community Development and Emotional Geographies Tony is also a co-founder of the Cultural Engine Research Group (CERG), based in Essex and East London. CERG works across disciplines, directly engaging with communities, local authorities, charities, not-for-profit organizations, and students on projects related to: Place, Emotion, and Community (particularly in relation to Levelling-Up narratives and new policy initatives) Tourism and Heritage Public Realm Digital Cultures and Smart Cities Creative Industries Education Public Health Food Cultures See examples of CERG’s work on UoE's website. As part of CERG’s remit, Tony also welcomes MPhil/PhD applicants interested in community-based projects and critical theory research into concepts such as emotional geography, pride-in-place, levelling up, and community wealth building.
Qualifications
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PhD Sociology University of Essex, (2008)
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Masters Multimedia and Cultural Production University of East London, (2002)
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BSc Multimedia Technology University of Greenwich, (1998)
Research and professional activities
Research interests
User Experience Design (UX)
Understanding affect of UX on design and marketing labour and wider impact on public spheres (health, education etc.)
Community Development & Emotional Geographies
Researching, engaging, and co-creating (coastal) community development through understanding emotional and affective relationships to place, heritage, arts and culture.
Digital labour
Affective labour
Exploring affective labour as an addition/alternative to physical and cogntive labour theory in digital workplaces
Contagion (virality) theory & network culture
My interest in contagion (virality) theory & network culture is based on research and publication of my book: Sampson, T.D., 2012. Virality: Contagion theory in the age of networks. U of Minnesota Press.
Neurocultures
My interest in Neuroculture is based on research and publication of my book: Sampson, T.D., 2016. The assemblage brain: Sense making in neuroculture. U of Minnesota Press.
Current research
The Struggle for [USER] Experience
Book project - working title: The Struggle for [USER] Experience: How UX design thinking pervades the entire trajectory of contemporary life
Conferences and presentations
From Economic to Emotional Geography: Understanding the Importance of the Mezzolevel in Community Development.
Invited presentation, KEY CITIES INNOVATION NETWORK CONFERENCE 2024 Culture, Place and Development, University of Bradford, 27/11/2024
Emotional Geography and Community Development
Invited presentation, Key Cities Conference 2024, University of Bradford, 27/11/2024
The Struggle for [User] Experience - Funeral UX
Invited presentation, Decision after the Algorithmic Turn: Politics, ethics, ontology, 24/9/2024
The Struggle for [User] Experience: Overview and Action
Invited presentation, HCID2024 Conference - Design for All, City, University of London, 18/9/2024
From Economic to Emotional Geography: Understanding the Importance of the Mezzo-Level in Community Development
Royal Geographic Society 2024, London, London, United Kingdom, 29/8/2024
Return to Virality: Contagion Theory in the Age of Social Media
Keynote presentation, 11th European Conference on Social Media, The European Conference on Social Media at University of Brighton, UK, 30/5/2024
The Struggle for {User] Experience: Work - Where Flow can Thrive
Invited presentation, "'The ‘Data Pharmacy’: A Workshop on Wellness Media, Smart Drugs, and Other Therapeutic Transmissions", Goldsmiths, 26/3/2024
“Feeling Pride in Place Through Local Heritage Projects”
RGS-IBG Annual International Conference, Royal Geographic Society, London, 1/9/2023
Teaching and supervision
Current teaching responsibilities
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Digital Marketing and Social Media (BE518)
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Critical Marketing Perspectives (BE530)
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Consumer Behaviour (BE555)
Current supervision
Publications
Journal articles (17)
Sampson, A., Lengua, D. and Markelj, J., Stimulating Media: Cognitive and Sensory Approaches - Special Issue proposal. Media Theory
Sampson, A., Tofield, G. and Branch, A., From Economic to Emotional Geography: Understanding the Importance of the Mezzo-Level in Community Development. Geographical Journal, The
Sampson, A. and Markelj, J., (2023). The Perilous Potential of the Blur: Digital Cultures Within Zones of Indistinction. The Journal of Media Art Study and Theory. 4, 1-27
Sampson, A., (2023). The UX University: Emotionally Situating Student Experience in a Transition between Protest and Post-Protest Marketization. Persona Studies. 9 (1), 17-35
Sampson, TD., (2022). Robert J. Shiller, Narrative Economics: How Stories Go Viral and Drive Major Economic Events. American Literary History. 34 (2), 819-822
Sampson, TD. and Parikka, J., (2021). The Operational Loops of a Pandemic. Cultural Politics. 17 (1), 55-68
Sampson, TD., (2020). Affect, Cognition and the Neurosciences. Athenea Digital. Revista de pensamiento e investigación social. 20 (2), 2346-2346
Sampson, TD., (2020). A sleepwalker’s guide to the collective nonconscious. Parallax. 26 (1), 34-47
Sampson, A. and Markelj, J., (2020). Contagions, Sleepwalkers, and the Nonconscious of Social Media: An Interview with Tony D. Sampson. The Journal of Media Art Study and Theory. 1 (2), 23-45
Sampson, TD., (2019). Transitions in human–computer interaction: from data embodiment to experience capitalism. AI & SOCIETY. 34 (4), 835-845
Sampson, TD., (2019). Sergio Tonkonoff, From Tarde to Deleuze and Foucault: The Infinitesimal Revolution. International Sociology. 34 (5), 574-576
Sampson, TD., (2017). Cosmic Topologies of Imitation: From the Horror of Digital Autotoxicus to the Auto-Toxicity of the Social. Parallax. 23 (1), 61-76
Sampson, T., (2015). Booknote. New Formations. 84 (84), 265-266
Sampson, TD., (2014). Comment on Peckham: contagion-epidemiological models and financial crises. Journal of Public Health. 36 (1), 20-21
Sampson, TD., (2012). Tarde's phantom takes a deadly line of flight – from Obama Girl to the assassination of Bin Laden. Distinktion: Journal of Social Theory. 13 (3), 354-366
LUGO, J. and SAMPSON, T., (2008). E‐Informality in Venezuela: The ‘Other Path’ of Technology. Bulletin of Latin American Research. 27 (1), 102-118
Lugo, J., Sampson, T. and Lossada, M., (2002). Latin America's new cultural industries still play old games - From the Banana Republic to Donkey Kong. Game Studies. 2 (2)
Books (7)
Sampson, A., The Struggle for [User] Experience: Experiments in Birth, School, Work, Death. University of Minnesota Press
Sampson, A., (2022). Experience Capitalism: Selected Texts English / Spanish Translated by Ana Fabbri. Rizosfera
Sampson, TD., (2020). A Sleepwalker's Guide to Social Media. John Wiley & Sons. 1509537422. 9781509537426
Sampson, TD., Maddison, S. and Ellis, D., (2018). Affect and Social Media Emotion, Mediation, Anxiety and Contagion. Radical Cultural Studies. 1786604396. 9781786604392
Sampson, TD., (2016). The Assemblage Brain Sense Making in Neuroculture. U of Minnesota Press. 1452953295. 9781452953298
Sampson, TD., (2012). Virality Contagion Theory in the Age of Networks. U of Minnesota Press. 0816670056. 9780816670055
Parikka, J. and Sampson, TD., (2009). The Spam Book On Viruses, Porn, and Other Anomalies from the Dark Side of Digital Culture. Hampton Press (NJ). 1572739150. 9781572739154
Book chapters (10)
Sampson, A., (2025). "Myśląc z wirusami. Trzy propozycje teoretyczne," translated by Mateusz Chaberski.. In: Myśląc z wirusami. Editors: Borowski, M. and Sugiera, M., . Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego 2024. 978-83-233-5462-8
Sampson, A., (2024). New Punctums, Proto- Perceptions, and Animated Entanglements. In: Human Perception and Digital Information Technologies: Animation, the Body and Affect. Editors: Tamari, T., . Bristol University Press. 978-1529226188
Sampson, A. and Parikka, J., (2024). As Novas Lógicas da Mídia Viral. In: Arte, Cultura e o Mundo Contemporâneo Digital. Belo Horizonte: LPF Edições. 9786501025117
Sampson, T., (2023). Nonconscious Affect: Cognitive, Embodied, or Nonbifurcated Experience?. In: The Affect Theory Reader 2: Worldings, Tensions, Futures. Editors: Seigworth, GJ. and Pedwell, C., . Duke University Press. 295- 314. 978-1-4780-2491-0
Sampson, TD., (2019). Collapsing Boundaries. In: Theater. transcript Verlag. 189- 210. 9783837649062
Sampson, TD., (2017). The Self–Other Topology. In: Boundaries of Self and Reality Online. Elsevier. 123- 139. 9780128041574
Sampson, TD. and Parikka, J., (2013). Learning from Network Dysfunctionality. Wiley. 450- 460. 9781444332247
Sampson, TD. and Parikka, J., (2013). Learning from Network Dysfunctionality: Accidents, Enterprise, and Small Worlds of Infection. In: A Companion to New Media Dynamics. 450- 460
Sampson, TD., (2013). Contagion theory: Beyond the microbe. In: Critical Digital Studies: A Reader. 120- 143
Sampson, TD., (2010). Error-Contagion: Network Hypnosis and Collective Culpability. In: Error: Glitch, Noise, and Jam in New Media Cultures. 232- 253
Conferences (2)
Sampson, A., Tofield, G., Branch, A. and Tucker, I., Feeling Pride in Place Through Local Heritage Projects: An Academic-Non-Academic Dialogue on the Emotional and Economic Geographies of Levelling Up
Sampson, A., Branch, A. and Tofield, G., From Economic to Emotional Geography: Understanding the Importance of the Mezzo-Level in Community Development
Reports and Papers (2)
Sampson, A., Leveraging Emotional Geographies of Heritage to Boost Community Empowerment at the Mezzolevel
Sampson, A., (2024). Re-imagining Pride-in-Place at the Mezzolevel: : Although Labour Admit Boris Talked a “Good Game” on Levelling Up, the Tories Haven’t Delivered. What Next?
Contact
Academic support hours:
For arranging an in-person or Zoom meeting, please contact me through my Essex email.
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