Sophina Choudry is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Manchester, Manchester Institute of Education. Her PhD received the BERA prize for best thesis in Education in Britain (2017), leading to a Presidential Fellowship at Manchester — though this success has come in between many rejections and failures. From a Pakistani-British, working-class background, her research examines social and educational inequality as mediated by race, gender and class. Her current work explores collective action to challenge systemic inequalities in racialised communities in England, bringing Bourdieu’s field theory and Cultural Historical Activity Theory into dialogue. Sophina is the Principal Lead Investigator of this project.
Contact: Sophina.choudry@manchester.ac.uk | Research Profile
Erica Burman is Professor of Education at the University of Manchester. Her research has focused on critical developmental and educational psychology, feminist and postcolonial theory, antiracist practice, childhood studies, and on critical mental health practice (particularly around gender, ‘race’ and cultural issues). Much of her current work addresses the connections between emotions, mental health and (social as well as individual) change, in particular as anchored by representations of, and appeals to, childhood. She is author of Child as method: othering, interiority and materialism (Routledge, 2024); Fanon, education, action: child as method (Routledge, 2019a), Deconstructing Developmental Psychology (Routledge, 3rd edition, 2017), Developments: child, image, nation (Routledge, 2020), and was Associate Editor of the SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies (2020).
As a Professor of Education, I pursued many research projects in which quality and equity have been focal, from ‘widening access to HE’ (several ESRC projects) to studies in ethnicity and gender. I have long been interested in cultural-historical theory, following Hegel, Marx, Vygotsky and colleagues, and more recently CHAT and ‘Mind, culture, and activity’ with Cultural Praxis (www.culturalpraxis.org). I am the Co-Investigator on this project.
Our dear friend and colleague Prof Julian Williams is no longer with us but keeps inspiring us in multitude of ways. He is dearly missed.
Artemis Christinaki is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Manchester and on this project. Her PhD research, from the University of Manchester, critically explored the politics, or the role, of psychosocial support in the refugee camps of Greece. Her main research interests lie at the intersection of migration and refugee studies, critical social theory, critical psychology, psychoanalysis, feminism, and postcolonialism.
Contact: Artemis.Christinaki@manchester.ac.uk | Research Profile
CCoact.co.uk 