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Sociology Research

 

Ali Meghji is an Associate Professor in Social Inequalities, having completed a research fellowship at Sidney Sussex College, a visiting fellowship at Harvard’s Weatherhead Centre, and a PhD, MPhil, and BA in sociology at Cambridge. He is the director for undergraduate education, the convenor of the MPhil in marginality and exclusion, the course organiser for SOC12 Empire, colonialism, imperialism, and the chair of 'Decolonising sociology'. He is the editor-in-chief of Sociology Compass, sits on the editorial board of the British Journal of Sociology, and Cultural Sociology, and is the co-founder and co-convenor of the Post/decolonial transformations subgroup of the British Sociological Association.  

Currently, Ali’s predominant research interests lie in bridging the epistemological, methodological, and empirical divergences between critical race theory and decolonial thought. Through this research, Ali intends to balance the study of national racialized social systems with the global process of coloniality.

Given his research interests, Ali is available to supervise graduate students in Critical race theory; Empire and imperialism; and decolonial approaches in social theory and the sociology of knowledge.

Research Interests

Decolonial thought; critical race theory; sociology of knowledge; social theory.

Teaching

Courses:

SOC1: Introduction to Sociology

SOC2: Social Theory

SOC4: Concepts and Arguments 

SOC6: Advanced Social Theory

SOC11: Racism, race and Ethnicity

SOC12: Empire, Colonialism, Imperialism (course organiser)

MPhil: Sociology (Co-ordinator for the marginality and exclusion pathway)

Graduate Supervision:

Ali is available to supervise graduate students working in the area of:
Critical race theory; Empire and imperialism; decolonial approaches in social theory and the sociology of knowledge. 

Key Publications - Books

Meghji, A. (2023). A critical synergy: race, decoloniality, and world crises. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

Meghji, A. (2021). The racialized social system: critical race theory as social theory. Cambridge: Polity.

Meghji, A. (2020) Decolonizing Sociology. Cambridge: Polity.

Meghji, A. (2019). Black middle class Britannia: identities, repertoires, cultural consumption. Racism, resistance and social change (series edited by John Solomos, Satnam Virdee, and Aaron Winter). Manchester: Manchester University Press.

Key Publications - Book Chapters

Meghji, A. (2019) ‘Post-racialism’. SAGE Encyclopaedia of Research Methods. London: SAGE.

Meghji, A. (Forthcoming). 'Race relations'. Routledge Encyclopaedia of Race and Racism. London: Routledge.

Key Publications - Journal Articles

Meghji, A. (2020). What can the sociology of race learn from the histories of anti-colonialism? Ethnicities.

Meghji, A. (2020). ‘Just what is critical race theory, and what is it doing in British sociology? From ‘BritCrit’ to the racialized social system approach’. British Journal of Sociology.

Meghji, Ali. 2019. 'White power, racialised regimes of truth, and (in)validity’ Sentio.

Meghji, A. (2018) 'Activating controlling images in the racialized interaction order: black middle-class interactions and the creativity of racist action'. Symbolic Interaction, Online First, 1-21.

Meghji, A. (2017). Encoding and decoding Black and White Cultural Capitals: Black Middle-Class ExperiencesCultural Sociology, Vol 13, Issue 1, 2019, Online First, pp. 1-17.

Key Publications - Other

Meghji, A. (2017). Politics then and now: the enduring legacy of Stuart Hall. Cultural Studies31(6), 1-3.

Meghji, A. (2022) ‘Stirring the sugar in the English cup of tea: more notes on the continuing relevance of Stuart Hall’, Cultural Studies, 0(0), pp. 1–10. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/09502386.2022.2108867.

Grants and Projects

Meghji, A. (PI) A new Black consciousness? Anti-racism among the Black elite in South Africa and the United States. Cambridge Humanities Research Grants Scheme (2019): £13,657.20

The Global roots of Black sociology, Cambridge Humanities Research Grants Scheme (£1425).

Research Groups & Affiliations

Job Title:
Associate Professor in Social Inequalities, Magdelene College
Dr Ali Meghji