I’m a Lecturer in Education at the University of Manchester, where I contribute to the MA Digital Technologies, Communication and Education at the Institute of Education. I direct the Post-Pandemic University project which is an international network comprising an online magazine, podcast hub and conference series. I’m the author of Social Media for Academics, published by Sage and now in its second edition. My recent books The Public & Their Platforms (with Lambros Fatsis) and Post-Human Futures (with Douglas Porpora) explore the implications of digital platforms and emerging technologies for public scholarship and human personhood respectively. I’m currently working on an edited volume Building the Post-Pandemic University (with Hannah Moscovitz, Michele Martini and Susan Robertson) which brings together cutting edge scholarship concerning the changes within the sector driven by the pandemic.

I jointly lead a number of research networks which explore related issues: the British Sociological Association’s Digital Sociology group, the Accelerated Academy project and the Programming as Social Science network. I jointly edit the Critical Realism Network with Dave Elder-Vass. I’m an active member of the Centre for Social Ontology and a board member of the Centre for Critical Realism. I’m involved in a range of publications, as associate editor of Civic Sociology and editorial board member of Applied Social Theory, Digital Culture & Education and the Journal of Digital Social Research.

I was The Sociological Review’s first Digital Engagement Fellow where I led the development of their world leading online platform, as well as having been editor of The Sociological Imagination and LSE’s award winning British Politics & Policy blog. I’m widely recognised as a world leading expert on the role of social media within higher education, with regular invitations to speak on these issues internationally. I’ve also consulted for universities, publishers, journals and learned societies.