Dr Rebecca F Taylor BA MA PhD (Essex)

Lecturer in Sociology, Teaching, Learning and Assessment Lead

Rebecca Taylor joined the Department of Sociology Social Policy and Criminology in 2015 as a Lecturer in Sociology with an interest in work and employment and expertise in qualitative methodology.

My main focus is on the diversity of forms of unpaid work; not only volunteering but internships, working for free, and the development of open source software.

Prior to her role at Southampton Rebecca was a Lecturer in Sociology at Oxford Brookes University, a research fellow at the University of Birmingham at the ESRC funded Third Sector Research Centre (TSRC) and before that at the Policy Studies Institute (PSI) in London. She is sociologist of work, employment and organisations with broad interests that span conceptual debates about paid and unpaid work; the nature of careers, occupations, and professions; employment policies and programmes; digital labour and digital transformation.

She is a co- director of the Work Futures Research Centre an interdisciplinary research and consultancy hub which draws on experts from across the University of Southampton. The centre aims to disseminate research, influence policy and practice though seminars, briefings, blogs and events and showcase cutting edge research on work and its futures.

Recent publications have included a chapter on Unpaid work for the Sage Handbook of the Sociology of Work and Employment, an article on the reproduction of inequality in the online labour market for Work Employment and Society, and another on Employee driven innovation in Health for Public Money and Management.

Rebecca has 20  years research experience and a longstanding interest in qualitative methodology, particularly qualitative longitudinal research, digital ethnography and research ethics. She is member of Quest, a group that brings together staff from across the University of Southampton who have expertise in the development, application and teaching of qualitative methods.