The Department of Sociology and Criminology at MMU offers a vibrant environment for postgraduate research, with students benefitting from a wide range of staff expertise in the study of social life. In the government-sponsored RAE 2008 over 35% of our research was recognised as ‘world leading’ and ‘internationally excellent’ (with 75% in total recognised as work of a quality that is ‘internationally recognised’ in terms of ‘originality, significance and rigour’.

Research in the Department reflects the strong interdisciplinary nature of its members, which we believe to be a source of vitality in addressing the nature of a social world seemingly in constant transformation, if not – indeed – the best means of grasping the nature of life in contemporary societies.

At MMU, you will find that the idea of the social is understood to embrace both local and global concerns, producing research that is historical and contemporary; concerned with the study of social structures and cultural phenomena; and that engages with its object of study through both theoretical and empirical work.

Research supervision towards the degree of PhD, reflecting the varied interests of staff, is available in the following areas:

• Art and culture
• Interpersonal relations
• Knowledge
• Creative industries
• Media and society
• Globalisation and migration
• Nature and environment
• Politics and social movement politics
• New media
• Immigration, ethnicity, multiculturalism and racism
• Gender and development
• Crime and deviance
• Social regulation
• ‘Race’ and ethnicity
• Class
• Social mobility
• Leisure, sport and consumption
• Modernity and Postmodernity
• Cultural memory
• The development of industrial society
• Popular culture and popular music
• Religion
• Childhood and youth culture
• The body and society
• Urban studies
• Gender and sexuality
• Culture and communications

Please see the directory of staff and their research interests for more information about particular areas of expertise.

Skills

Through the available research training covering a wide range of qualitative and quantitative sociological methods, you will underpin your independent research with a sound grasp of available methods in the social sciences. As a result of your work towards producing the completed thesis, you will develop advanced means of elaborating ideas, theories and arguments, in accordance with what is expected of excellence in scholarship.

Careers

PhD graduates are suited to a variety of careers, which include occupations in fields such as:

• Academia
• Applied social research
• Research consultancy
• The arts and cultural industries
• Media and publishing

Assessment

Assessment for the degree of PhD is through the completion of a written thesis and viva voce (an oral examination in which the candidate defends the written thesis)

If you wish to discuss studying for a PhD in the Department of Sociology and Criminology please contact the Department’s postgraduate research co-ordinator, Scott Poynting, in the first instance at: s.poynting@mmu.ac.uk