Professor Fran Tonkiss

Professor Fran Tonkiss

Professor in Sociology

Department of Sociology

Room No
OLD.M3.05
Languages
English
Key Expertise
Urban Sociology, Inequalities, Urban Economies, Spatial Divisions

About me

Fran Tonkiss is Professor of Sociology. Her research and teaching are in the fields of urban and economic sociology. Her work focuses on urban inequalities, urban design and development, social and spatial divisions, and the socio-economic organisation of urban space. She is a member of the editorial boards of the British Journal of Sociology, City and Economy and Society.

Fran Tonkiss, Cities by design Fran Tonkiss, Contemporary Economic Sociology  Fran Tonkiss, Space, the city and social theory

Expertise Details

Urban Sociology; Inequalities; Urban Economies; Spatial Divisions

Selected publications

Books

Cities by Design: The Social Life of Urban Form (2013) Cambridge: Polity.

Contemporary Economic Sociology: Globalisation, Work and Inequality (2006) London: Routledge.

Space, the City and Social Theory (2005) Cambridge: Polity.

Market Society: Markets and Modern Social Thought, with Don Slater (2001) Cambridge: Polity.

Trust and Civil Society, edited with Andrew Passey (2000) London: Macmillan.

Selected Articles and Chapters 

(2024) ‘Gendering urban public space’, in L. Peake, A. Datta and G. Adeniyi-Ogunyankin (eds) Handbook on Gender and Cities. Cheltenham: Elgar. pp. 47-55.

(2024) ‘Informalities of exchange’, in N. Amorós Elorduy, N. Sinha and C. Marx (eds) Urban Informality and the Built Environment: Infrastructure, Exchange and Image. London: UCL Press. pp. 33-39.

(2023) ‘Unequal cities, divided spaces’, in T. Haas (ed.) Women Reclaiming the City: International Research on Urbanism, Architecture, and Planning. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. Pp. 23-30.

(2020) ‘City government and urban inequalities’, City 24/1-2: 286-301.

(2019) ‘Comparative urbanism: design in translation’, in T. Banerjee and A. Loukaitou-Sideris (eds) The New Companion to Urban Design. New York: Routledge. pp. 15-27.

(2018) ‘Gendering urban protest: politics, bodies and space’, in K. Ward, et al. (eds) The Routledge Handbook on Spaces of Urban Politics. London: Routledge. 518-527.

(2018) ‘Other gentrifications: law, capital and spatial politics in Beirut’, Introduction to edited special feature, City 22/3: 321-323.

(2018) 'Focus groups', in C. Seale (ed.) Researching Society and Culture (4th edition). London: Sage. 237-256.

(2018) 'Discourse analysis', in C. Seale (ed.) Researching Society and Culture (4th edition). London: Sage. 477-92.

(2018) 'Content and text analysis' (co-authored with Clive Seale), in C. Seale (ed.) Researching Society and Culture (4th edition). London: Sage. 403-428.

(2017) 'Socialising design? From consumption to production.' City, 21/6: 872-882.

(2017) 'Urban economies and social inequalities', in S. Hall and R. Burdett (eds) The SAGE Handbook of the 21st Century City. London: Sage Publishing, pp. 187-200.

(2017) 'Commodity or commons? Knowledge, inequality, and the city'. In. T. Haas and H. Westlund (eds) In the Post-urban World. London: Taylor and Francis. pp.210-221.

(2015) ‘Afterword: economies of infrastructure’, City 19/2-3: 384-91.

(2015) 'Aural postcards: sound, memory and the city', in M. Bull and L. Back (eds) The Auditory Culture Reader (2nd edition). London: Routledge.

(2015) ‘Radical inclusivity: interview with Fran Tonkiss’, in K. Nawratek (ed.) Radical Inclusivity: architecture and urbanism. Barcelona: dpr-barcelona.

(2014) ‘From austerity to audacity: make-shift urbanism and the post-crisis city’, in F. Ferguson (ed.) Make_Shift City: Renegotiating the Urban Commons. Berlin: Jovis Verlag.

(2013) ‘Austerity urbanism and the makeshift city’, City 17/3: 312-24.

(2012) 'Informality and its discontents', in M.Angélil and R.Hehl (eds) Informalize! Essays on the Political Economy of Urban Form. Berlin: Ruby Press, pp. 55-70.

(2012) ‘The one-dimensional city’City, 16/1-2: 216-19.

(2011) ‘Template urbanism: four points about assemblage’, City, 15/5: 584-88.

(2011) 'Spatial causes, social effects: A response to Soja', City, 15/1: 85-86.

(2010) 'The market and the plan: Housing, urban renewal and socio-economic change in London', (co-authored with Jamie Keddie) City, Culture and Society 1/3: 57-67.

(2010) 'Urban poverty and gender in advanced economies: the persistence of feminised disadvantage', in S. Chant (ed.) The International Handbook of Gender and Poverty: concepts, research, policy. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, pp. 153-8.

(2010) ‘The British Journal of Sociology in the 2000s: Sociology in a new century’British Journal of Sociology, 61 (s1): 343-345.

(2010) ‘The British Journal of Sociology in the 1970s: continuity and crisis’ British Journal of Sociology, 61 (s1): 141-145.

(2009) ‘Trust, confidence and economic crisis’, Intereconomics 44/4: 196-202. 

(2009) 'Globalization, migration, labour', Sociology 43/1: 179-85.

(2008) 'New manifestations: Paris, Seattle and after', New Formations 65/4: 67-77.

(2008) 'Postcapitalist politics?Economy and Society 37/2: 304-12.

(2008) 'Global political economy: power, labour, politics', Sociology Compass 2/2: 577-593.

(2007) 'Re-writing equality: difference, social justice and "postsocialist" politics’, in E. D. Ermath (ed.) Rewriting Democracy. Aldershot: Ashgate. pp. 66-81.

(2006) 'Is economic sociology "ready" for globalization?Economic Sociology The European Electronic Newsletter 7/3: 3-8. 

(2003) 'The ethics of indifference: community and solitude in the city'. International Journal of Cultural Studies 6/3, pp. 297-311.

Research

Fran's research interests focus on urban inequalities, urban design and development, social and spatial divisions, and the socio-economic organisation of urban space.  Publications in these fields include Cities by Design: The Social Life of Urban Form (Polity, 2013), Space, the City and Social Theory (Polity, 2005), and Contemporary Economic Sociology: Globalisation, Production, Inequality (Routledge, 2006). She is the co-author of Market Society: Markets and Modern Social Theory (Polity, 2001, with Don Slater), and co-editor of Trust and Civil Society (Macmillan, 2000, with Andrew Passey). 

Fran is part of the Urban Sociology cluster.

Teaching and PhD supervision

Fran Tonkiss teaches on the MSc City Design and Social Science Programme, and convenes a graduate course on Urban Inequalities.

Fran Tonkiss supervises doctoral students undertaking research in urban and spatial sociology.