Biography
I am a lecturer in Sport Development and joined Abertay University in the summer of 2020. I previously worked as a Teaching Fellow in Sport Policy and Management at the University of Edinburgh, and as a Postdoctoral Research Assistant at the University of Wolverhampton.
I completed my PhD at the Open University, which was an ethnographic study of individuals' lived experiences of sport-for-development courses and the impact it had on their everyday lives. Prior to this I completed an MRes in Education at the Open University, an MSc in the Psychology of Sport at Liverpool John Moores University, and a BSc (Hons) in Sport and Exercise Science at York St. John University.
My research interests centre on the role of the sport within peoples' everyday lives and the meanings they attach to sport. I have explored this through various sectors, including sport-for-development, physical education, and professional sport. I am interested in the individual and social emotional attachements involved in sport, as well as how sport is used to as a tool to develop individuals and society. This has led to a keen interest in qualitative and participatory research methodologies.
I engage within the wider academic field through my pariticpation in a European-funded COST network called YOUNG-IN, as well as by being the membership officer for the Leisure Studies Association and on the editorial board for the Journal of Emerging Sports Studies. Other professional memberships include the British Sociological Association, British Educational Research Association, and the Sport and Society Network.
