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Dr Amanda Atkinson

Nursing and Advanced Practice

Faculty of Health

Email: A.M.Atkinson@ljmu.ac.uk

Telephone: 0151 231 4284

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Dr Amanda Marie Atkinson is a Reader in the Sociology of Public Health. She joined LJMU in 2006 and has worked on a range of research projects, predominantly relating to young people's (gendered) drinking cultures, (gendered) substance use and the role and influence of media and marketing. Her general research interests relate to consumption and identity, media representations and gender relations. She is Principle Investigator on an ESRC grant which explores the nature, creation, impact and regulation of gendered alcohol brand and nightlife marketing in the age of contemporary feminism(s) and social activism (https://equalisenightlifeproject.com/). It considers the role of brand and venue marketing that reproduces gender stereotypes and the sexualisation of women, as well as the use of 'social cause' marketing which is said to promote equality, on identity making and experiences of drinking and the night time environment. This includes the inequalities that exist in these spaces such as unwanted sexual attention and exclusion. Methods include an analysis of alcohol brand and venue marketing, group discussions and interviews with women and LGTBQ+ people using photo elicitation, interviews with those working in brand and venue marketing and regulation (e.g. marketers, managers, dancers and 'hostesses' (i.e. embodied marketing) and arts based participatory work shops (using photography, sculpture, illustration). Related studies include an exploration of women's experiences of working in the craft beer industry and how this compares to the image of craft beer as 'progressive', and a study exploring the sobriety journeys of female sober bloggers/influencers, how they negotiate alcohol marketing within their lived experiences of sobriety, and their content as counter narratives to marketing messages.

Her research uses both qualitative and quantitative methods (with a specialism in the former), creative/artistic research dissemination and she has conducted research with a range of groups, including children and young people, people who use drugs, people in prison, survivors of domestic violence, health practitioners, policy makers and media professionals. She is supervisor for a number of PhDs related to the NPS market; drug user identity; drug risk communication and harm reduction; and young peoples health and social media, and teaches on the BSci Public Health and MSci Public Health (Addictions).

Amanda is a reviewer for a number of journals including Drugs: Education Prevention and Policy, Addiction Research and Theory, International Journal of Drug Policy, Drug and Alcohol Review, BMC Public Health and the Journal of Gender Studies. She has also acted as an academic reviwer for organisations such as the National Institute of Health Research and Cancer Research UK. She is a member of the BSA Alcohol Study Group, LJMU Uses of the Arts Lab and the LJMU Women in Research Working Group.

She is also a volunteer for the Real Love street team, a group of volunteers who go out weekly to help meet the needs of people who are homeless and living on the streets of Liverpool. She also works with The Period Project, an initiative that provides sanitary items those who need them across Merseyside, and is an artist creating art works informed by her research findings as part of public engagement.

Co-module leader BSci Media and Public Health 5010
Co-module leader MSci Addictions: Policy and Interventions 7011


Art exhibitions (public engagement):

'Equalise Nightlife: Exploring Femininity, Sexuality and Gender Relations in Nightlife'. Art works prodcued as part of an ESRC funded project (ES/T007443). LJMU John Lennon Art and Design gallery, Liverpool. February-March 2023.

Commissioned work entitled '$' and 'Gender sensitive support Now!'. As part of the TurningTides Group exhibtion curated by Audrey Cappell and Alicia Ritson. Pen & Brush, Manhatten, New York City, United States, July-Sept 2022.


£306, displayed at 'The Periodical Exhibition' (curated by Bee Hughes), LJMU John Lennon Art and Design gallery, as part of the Being Human Festival, November 2018.

'Reflections of a Nasty Woman'. As part of Nasty Woman, a group exhibtin curated by Nasty Women Liverpool. Constellations, Liverpool. March, 2018


'Reflections of a Nasty Woman'. As part of Nasty Woman: Enpowerment group exhibtion. Creative Debits, London, February 2018.


Gender Dilemmas: negotiating femininity and masculinity in contemporary nightlife. Art exhibition with Q and A, Club Health conference, 24th- 26th May, 2017, Dublin.

Homeless: the human cost of austerity. Road studios, LJMU Avril Robarts Library, Liverpool Central Library, November 2016- April-2018.

'Liverpool: a city of protest'. Group show curated by Amanda. Constallations, Liverpool, August, 2017.

Gender Dilemmas: negotiating femininity and masculinity in contemporary nightlife. Art Exhibition. ROAD Studios Liverpool Biennial programme, Carlisle Buildings, Victoria Street, Liverpool, Friday 26th-28th August 2016.

Post-feminist ‘façade’: young women’s negotiation of night life drinking spaces and the hypersexual self. Art Exhibition. ROAD Studios Liverpool Light Night programme, Carlisle Buildings, Victoria Street, Liverpool, Friday 16th May, 2016.

Degrees

University of Manchester, United Kingdom, MRes Crime and Criminal Justice Research
University of Liverpool, United Kingdom, BA Criminology and Sociology
LJMU, United Kingdom, PhD

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