Hello!
I am Liam Miles, a lecturer in criminology and I am delighted to be joining the teaching team here at Northampton. I am nearing the end of my PhD journey that I completed at Birmingham City University that explored how young people who live in Birmingham are affected by the Cost-of-Living Crisis. I conducted an ethnographic study and spent extensive time at two Birmingham based youth centres. As such, my research interests are diverse and broad. I hold research experience and aspirations in areas of youth and youth crime, cost of living and wider political economy. This is infused with criminological and social theory and qualitative research methods. I am always happy to have a coffee and a chat with any student and colleague who wishes to discuss such topics.

Alongside my PhD, I have completed two solo publications. The first is a journal article in the Sage Journal of Consumer Culture that explored how violent crime that occurs on British University Campuses can be explained through the lens of the Deviant Leisure perspective. An emerging theoretical framework, the Deviant Leisure perspective explores how social harms are perpetuated under the logics and entrenchment of free-market globalised capitalism and neoliberalism. As such, a fundamental source of culpability towards crime, violence and social harm more broadly is located within the logics of neoliberal capitalism under which a consumer culture has arisen and re-cultivated human subjectivity towards what is commonly discussed in the literature as a narcissistic and competitive individualism. My second publication was in an edited book titled Action on Poverty in the UK: Towards Sustainable Development. My chapter is titled ‘Communities of Rupture, Insecurity, and Risk: Inevitable and Necessary for Meaningful Political Change?’. My chapter explored how socio-political and economic moments of rupture to the status quo are necessary for the summoning of political activism; lobbying and subsequent change.

It is my intention to maintain a presence in the publishing field and to work collaboratively with colleagues to address issues of criminal and social justice as they present themselves. Through this, my focus is on a lens of political economy and historical materialism through which to make sense of local and global events as they unfold. I welcome conversation and collaboration with colleagues who are interested in these areas.

Equally, I am committed to expanding my knowledge basis and learning about the vital work undertaken by colleagues across a breadth of subject areas, where it is hoped we can learn from one another.

I am thoroughly looking forward to meeting everyone and getting to learn more!