WEI Research Conversations: Embedding intersectionality in research on work and employment

Description

Exploring intersectionality in research brings both challenges and exciting opportunities for understanding inequalities in work, employment, and labour markets. Because there are no established methodological protocols or standard methods, researchers adopt different approaches – some focus on collecting intersectional data, others analyse existing data through an intersectional perspective, and some combine the two. This Research Conversation invites us to reflect on how researchers navigate these choices and what we can learn from their experiences.

Chair: Jenny Rodriguez, Coordinator of the WEI EDI research stream

Participants:

Shreya Roy Choudhury, WEI PhD student. Shreya’s research focuses on the role of diversity networks or staff networks in tackling inequalities in UK organisations. Drawing on intersectionality, Shreya examines how networks’ position within power hierarchies shapes their legitimacy and capacity for change; how internal governance affects whose voices are represented; and effectiveness of these networks in advancing equality. Shreya’s work contributes to current debates on symbolic vs. substantive inclusion and the evolving role of EDI structures in organisations.

Laia Nualart Moratalla, PhD student in Sociology, Autonomous University of Barcelona. Laia research focuses on unemployment and social exclusion among young people, with a particular emphasis on social ties and sociability. She approaches these issues from an intersectional perspective and through qualitative methodology, based on interviews with unemployed youth in Barcelona.

Natalie Bennett, Research Fellow, Healthier Futures. Natalie joined the University of Manchester in 2025 as a Healthier Futures Research Fellow. Prior to this, she held research associate posts at Newcastle University and the University of Sheffield. At Sheffield, Natalie supported research developing a novel quantitative method for analysing intersectional inequalities called 'MAIHDA'. Natalie has a background in human geography and social epidemiology and has broad interests in inequality, intersectionality and the social and structural determinants of health.

Period	29 Oct 2025
Event type	Seminar
Location	Manchester, United KingdomShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International