The British Library

Engagement Development Manager, Social Science Collections

Thesis Title: Becoming Somebody: Higher Education and the Aspirations of Working-class Girls

About

I am the Engagement Development Manager for Social Sciences at The British Library. Part of my work at the British Library involves promoting the value of the collections to social scientists through publications, events and collaborative research work. I have organised academic conferences and seminars; written learning resources, bibliographies and web resources and; worked with HEIs on collaboratively producing research bids. The extensive oral history collections, 'zines and maps collections are particular areas of interest to me in my work here. I value collaborative research and part of my role involves encouraging and supporting collegiate approaches to research and knowledge exchange.

In my spare time I write academic pieces about social class, gender and higher education. My doctorate was an ethnography of progress in education which examined the aspirations of young working-class women with respect to higher education and employment. I carried this out at the University of Kent where I also taught sociology and social research methods to undergraduate students.

I'm interested in the intersections of gender, social class and ethnicity, particularly with respect to education. I have connected research interests in intimate and personal relationships, psychosocial methods, feminism and social and cultural theory.

My publications include:

Evans, S. (2009) ‘In a different place: working-class girls and higher education’
Sociology, 2009, 43(2) pp. 340 - 355

Evans, S. (2010) ‘‘Becoming somebody’: working-class girls and higher education’ in Yvette Taylor
(ed.) Classed Intersections: Spaces, Selves, Knowledges. Ashgate Publishing

Evans. S. (2012, forthcoming) 'Unpicking that 'something special': student background and the university application process' in Yvette Taylor (ed.) Educational Diversity. Palgrave Macmillan

Evans. S. & Roberts. S. (2012, forthcoming) 'Aspirations and imagined futures: the im/possibilities for Britain's young working-class' in Will Atkinson, Mike Savage and Steve Roberts (eds.) Class Inequality in Neoliberal Britain. Palgrave Macmillan

I have been involved with this project:

http://www.sussex.ac.uk/clhlwr/research/sisterhoodafter

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