Newcastle University

Roles and Responsibilities

I am currently Admissions Tutor for Sociology at Newcastle University.

Research Interests

My research interests cover three main areas:

1) Sociology of the environment and cultural constructions of nature. I'm interested in how Western societies imagine nature, the environment, and different entanglements of the natural and the social, especially in narrative and visual cultural forms. My particular concern is with the resources that contemporary societies have for envisaging better social/natural futures, and the relationship between this hope and narratives of environmental crisis and catastrophe.

2) Utopia, society and sociology: The concept and function of utopian thought, especially in relation to contemporary social theory. I've worked extensively on environmental utopianism, particularly in literary and science fictions, but also in relation to other aspects of aesthetics and popular culture.

3) Gender and knowledge production. My recent work has concerned the role of women in scientific cultures and institutions, focusing particularly on how different kinds of knowledge work are valued and gendered. I'm interested in feminist epistemologies and contemporary science studies, and more specifically in the relationships between practices of knowing and the organisational contexts in which they take place. I'm also interested in the social science methodologies through which we can study knowledge production in action.

Current Work

I am currently working on issues of everyday and career times for knowledge workers. A am also looking at what the icon, script and idea of the carbon footprint can tell us about current conceptions of climate change and environmental responsibility.

Undergraduate Teaching

I lecture on the Level 2 module SOC2058 'Understanding Social Change and Transformation', and am module leader on the Level 3 module SOC3073 'Social Theory'. I am also the module leader for the Sociology dissertation module.

• Garforth L, Kerr A. Let's Get Organised: Practicing and Valuing Scientific Work Inside and Outside the Laboratory. Sociological Research Online 2010, 15(2).
• Garforth L, Kraftl P. Introduction: Utopia and the “Problem” of Intention. Journal for Cultural Research 2009, 13(1), 1-4.
• Garforth L. No Intentions? Utopian Theory After the Future. Journal for Cultural Research 2009, 13(1), 5-27.
• Garforth L, Kerr A. Constructing Careers, Creating Communities: Findings of the UK KNOWING Research on Knowledge, Institutions and Gender. Leeds: University of Leeds, 2009.
• Garforth L, Cervinkova A. Times and Trajectories in Academic Knowledge Production. In: Felt, U, ed. Knowing and Living in Academic Research: Convergence and Heterogeneity in Research Cultures in the European Context. Prague: Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, 2009, pp. 169-226.
• Garforth L, Kerr A. Women and Science: What's the Problem?. Social Politics 2009, 16(3), 379-403.
• Garforth L. Ideal Nature: Utopias of Landscape and Loss. Spaces of Utopia, An Electronic Journal 2006,3 5-26.
• Garforth L. Green utopias: beyond apocalypse, progress, and pastoral.. Utopian Studies 2005, 16(1), 1-37.
• Garforth L. Ecotopian Fiction and the Sustainable Society. In: Parham, J, ed. The Environmental Tradition in English Literature. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003, pp.100-116.