More About My Research

I am a sociologist and communications researcher who studies how forms of expertise are mediated and institutionally constructed, particularly in non-elite and quasi-professional settings. I am most interested, in other words, in bastardized  or “bad” forms of knowledge. My first book was an ethnographic study of journalistic knowledge-making under conditions of early digitalization in the 2000s, particularly the confrontation of professional journalists and populist amateurs.  My second book was a history of the adoption of statistical and social science techniques in media, activism, and journalism education in the 20th century. I am currently working on four major projects. The first (with Giorgia Aiello and Helen Kennedy) looks at how “generic visuals” contribute to political sense-making in an age of anti-elite populism. The second is an STS history of the artifacts of middlebrow culture in post-war United States. The third is an epistemological analysis of the social influence of watered-down or misunderstood philosophical systems. The fourth is a social history of the concept of ideology and “bad citizenship.” I specialize in qualitative methods, (primarily ethnography and historical and archival research) and have collaborated with others to conduct research using social network analysis and social semiotic research.