Marsha Rosengarten BA, MA, PhD

Staff details

Position Professor
Department Sociology
Email m.rosengarten (@gold.ac.uk)
Phone +44 (0)20 7919 7733
Marsha Rosengarten BA, MA, PhD

Marsha’s main interest is communicable infections and biomedicine. She has written extensively on the complex challenges posed by HIV infection. More recently, she has turned her attention to other infectious diseases and to the anticipation of novel infections on the horizon. Currently, she is working on the problematics of a taken-for-granted mechanistic conception of the time of infection. She is a Co-Investigator on an Australian-funded project on ‘implementation science.’ Her teaching engages with global health policy, pandemic preparedness and prevention, scientific research, local responses and environmental questions. She has been the Director of Postgraduate and Undergraduate Programmes, Co-Director of Centre for Social Invention and Process (CISP) as well as Chair of the Sociology Department Ethics Committee. Additionally, she is responsible for establishing the Unit of Play, Goldsmiths and the international Association for Social Sciences and Humanities in HIV (ASSHH).

Academic qualifications

  • PhD Humanities & Social Sciences, University of Technology, Sydney 1997
  • MA Humanities & Social Sciences, University of Technology, Sydney 1989
  • Bachelor of Arts, Social Anthropology & Government, University of Sydney 1981

Teaching and Supervision

  • Convenor and Lecturer Microbial Politics P/G
  • Convenor and Lecturer Sociology of Infection U/G
  • Convenor and Lecturer Undergraduate Dissertation

Research interests

Speculative Philosophy/Process Thought; Infection including Covid-19, HIV, Ebola, Hepatitis C, Tuberculosis; Science and Technology Studies; Sexuality/Queer Theory; Ethics and Biomedicine.

Publications and research outputs

Book

Michael, Mike and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2013. Innovation and Biomedicine: Ethics, Evidence and Expectation in HIV. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-230-30267-9

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2009. HIV Interventions: Biomedicine and the Traffic between Information and Flesh. Seattle: University of Washington Press. ISBN 978-0295989426

Edited Book

Dennis, Fay; Pienaar, Kiran and Rosengarten, Marsha, eds. 2023. Narcofeminisms: Revisioning drug use. London: SAGE Publications.

Wilkie, Alex; Savransky, Martin and Rosengarten, Marsha, eds. 2017. Speculative Research: The Lure of Possible Futures. Abingdon: Routledge. ISBN 9781138688360

Book Section

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2021. An unfinished history: a story of ongoing events and mutating HIV problems. In: Susan Kippax; Adam Bourne; Sarah Bernays; Peter Aggleton and Richard Parker, eds. Remaking HIV Prevention in the 21st Century: The Promise of TasP, U=U and PrEP. Cham, Switzerland: Springer, pp. 289-302. ISBN 9783030698188

Rosengarten, M.. 2018. The Sociality of Infectious Diseases. In: Noortje Marres; Michael Guggenheim and A. Wilkie, eds. Inventing the Social. UK: Mattering Press, pp. 234-252. ISBN 978-0-9955277-5-1

Wilkie, Alex; Savransky, Martin and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2017. Section Introduction: Speculative techniques. In: Alex Wilkie; Martin Savransky and Marsha Rosengarten, eds. Speculative research: The lure of possible futures. New York & London: Routledge. ISBN 1138688363

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2017. Pluralities of Action, a Lure for Speculative Thought. In: Alex Wilkie; Martin Savransky and Marsha Rosengarten, eds. Speculative Research: The Lure of Possible Futures. United Kingdom: CRESC series, Routledge. ISBN 9781138688360

Savransky, Martin; Wilkie, Alex and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2017. The Lure of Possible Futures: On Speculative Research. In: Alex Wilkie; Martin Savransky and Marsha Rosengarten, eds. Speculative Research: The Lure of Possible Futures. New York & London: Routledge. ISBN 1138688363

Savransky, Martin; Rosengarten, Marsha and Wilkie, Alex. 2017. Section Introduction: Speculative Propositions. In: Alex Wilkie; Martin Savransky and Marsha Rosengarten, eds. Speculative Research: The Lure of Possible Futures. Oxon; New York: Routledge. ISBN 9781138688360

Rosengarten, Marsha; Savransky, Martin and Wilkie, Alex. 2017. Section 2: Speculative lures. In: Alex Wilkie; Martin Savransky and Marsha Rosengarten, eds. Speculative Research The Lure of Possible Futures. Routledge. ISBN 9781138688360

Savransky, Martin; Wilkie, Alex and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2017. Section Introduction: Speculative implications. In: Alex Wilkie; Martin Savransky and Marsha Rosengarten, eds. Speculative Research The Lure of Possible Futures. (236) Routledge. ISBN 9781138688360

Michael, Mike and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2014. Quantitative Objects and Qualitative Things: Ethics and HIV Biomedical Prevention. In: Eleanor Casella; Gillian Evans; Penelope Harvey; Hannah Knox; Chris McLean; Elizabeth Silva; Nick Thoburn and Kath Woodward, eds. Objects and Materials. A Routledge Companion. Great Britain: Routledge, pp. 349-358. ISBN 0415678803

Rosengarten, Marsha and Michael, Mike. 2010. HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and the complexities of biomedical prevention: ontological openness and the prevention assemblage. In: , ed. HIV Treatment and Prevention Technologies in International Perspective. Great Britain: Palgrave MacMillan, pp. 167-183. ISBN 978-0-230-23819-0

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2005. The Measure of HIV as a Matter of Bioethics. In: M Shildrick and R Mykitiuk, eds. Ethics of the body: postconventional challenges. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, pp. 71-90. ISBN 0-262-69320-8

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2001. A Pig's Tale: Porcine Viruses and Species Boundaries'. In: Alison Bashford and Claire Hooker, eds. Contagion: Historical and cultural studies. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 168-182. ISBN 978-0-415-24671-2

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2001. Transmigrating Organs: Identity and Medical Technology. In: J Docker and G Fischer, eds. Adventures of Identity: Constructing Multicultural Identities. 15 Tuebingen: Stauffenburg, pp. 61-72. ISBN 3-86057-043-9

Article

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2023. Perplexity as a provocation: revisiting the role of metaphor as a ‘place holder’ for the potential of COVID-19 antibodies. Medical Humanities, 49, pp. 64-69. ISSN 1468-215X

Bessonova, Alla; Byelyayeva, Olga; Kurcevič, Eliza; Plotko, Maria; Dennis, Fay; Pienaar, Kiran and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2023. Living and responding at the margins: A conversation with narcofeminist activists. The Sociological Review, 71(4), pp. 742-759. ISSN 0038-0261

Dennis, Fay; Pienaar, Kiran and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2023. Afterword: Tensions and possibilities for a narcofeminist sociology. The Sociological Review, 71(4), pp. 945-954. ISSN 0038-0261

Dennis, Fay; Pienaar, Kiran and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2023. Narcofeminism and its multiples: From activism to everyday minoritarian worldbuilding. The Sociological Review, 71(4), 723 -740. ISSN 0038-0261

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2021. COVID-19 diagnoses: a source of immanent values and novelty. Medical Anthropology Theory, 8(2), pp. 1-10.

Rosengarten, Marsha; Sekuler, Todd; Binder, Beate; Dzuiban, Agata and Baenziger, Peter-Paul. 2021. Beyond Biological Citizenship: HIV/AIDS, Health, and Activism in Europe Reconsidered. Critical Public Health, 31(1), pp. 1-4. ISSN 0958-1596

Nicholls, Emily Jay and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2020. PrEP (HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis) and its possibilities for clinical practice. Sexualities, 23(8), pp. 1327-1342. ISSN 1363-4607

Lancaster, Kari; Rhodes, Tim and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2020. Making evidence and policy in public health emergencies: Lessons from COVID-19 for adaptive evidence-making and intervention. Evidence and Policy, 16(3), pp. 477-490. ISSN 1744-2648

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2020. The Challenge of Breath: Toward an 'after' COVID-19. Social Anthropology, 28(2), pp. 342-343. ISSN 0964-0282

Rosengarten, Marsha; Lancaster, Kari and Rhodes, Tim. 2020. Covid-19: asymptomatic infection and the question of face masks for how we live this pandemic. Discover Society,

Rosengarten, Marsha and Murphy, Dean A.. 2020. A wager on the future: a practicable response to HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and the stubborn fact of process. Social Theory & Health, 18(1), pp. 1-15. ISSN 1477-8211

Rhodes, Tim; Lancaster, Kari and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2020. A model society: maths, models and expertise in viral outbreaks. Critical Public Health, 30(3), pp. 253-256. ISSN 0958-1596

Rosengarten, Marsha and Savransky, Martin. 2019. A Careful Biomedicine? Generalization and Abstraction in RCTs. Critical Public Health, 29(2), pp. 181-191. ISSN 0958-1596

Savransky, Martin and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2016. What is nature capable of? Evidence, ontology and speculative medical humanities. Medical Humanities, 42, pp. 166-172. ISSN 1468-215X

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2016. Connective adventures in the work of Ebola: Science and Speculation - Review of 'David Quammen ' Ebola: The Natural and Human History of a Deadly Virus'. Biosocieties, 11, pp. 129-133. ISSN 1745-8552

Rosengarten, Marsha and Pfingst, Annie. 2012. Medicine as a Tactic of War: Palestinian Precarity. Body & Society, 18(3-4), pp. 99-125. ISSN 1357-034X

Michael, Mike and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2012. HIV, Globalization and Topology: Of Prepositions and Propositions. Theory, Culture & Society, 29(4-5), pp. 93-115. ISSN 0263-2764

Holt, Martin; Murphy, Dean, A.; Callander, Denton; Ellard, Jeanne; Rosengarten, Marsha; Kippax, Susan and de Wit, John. 2012. Willingness to use HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis and the likelihood of decreased condom use are both associated with unprotected anal intercourse and the perceived likelihood of becoming HIV positive among Australian gay and bisexual men. Sexually Transmitted Infections, 88(4), pp. 258-263. ISSN 1368-4973

Michael, Mike and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2012. Introduction to special issue of Body & Society, 'Medicine, Bodies, Politics: Experimentation and Emergence'. Body & Society, pp. 1-17.

Rosengarten, Marsha and Michael, Mike. 2009. The performative function of expectations in translating treatment to prevention: The case of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP. Social Science and Medicine, 69(7), pp. 1049-1055. ISSN 0277-9536

Mykhalovskiy, Eric and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2009. HIV/AIDS in its third decade: Renewed critique in social and cultural analysis – An introduction. Social Theory & Health, 7(3), ISSN 1477-8211

Mykhalovskiy, Eric and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2009. Special Issue on HIV/AIDS in its third decade: renewed critique in social and cultural analysis Social Theory & Health. Social Theory & Health, 7(3), pp. 187-195. ISSN 1477-8211

Rosengarten, Marsha and Mykhalovskiy, Eric. 2009. Commentaries on the nature of social and cultural research: Interviews on HIV/AIDS with Judy Auerbach, Susan Kippax, Steven Epstein, Didier Fassin, Barry Adam and Dennis Altman. Social Theory & Health, 7(3), pp. 284-304. ISSN 1477-8211

Rosengarten, Marsha and Michael, Mike. 2009. Rethinking the bioethical enactment of drugged bodies: On the paradoxes of using anti-HIV drug therapy as a technology for prevention (PrEP). Science as Culture, 18(2), pp. 183-199. ISSN 0950-5431

Rosengarten, Marsha; Michael, Mike; Mykhalovskiy, Eric and Imrie, J.. 2008. The challenges of technological innovation in HIV. The Lancet, 372(9636), pp. 357-358. ISSN 0140-6736

Michael, Mike; Rosengarten, Marsha; Mykhalovskiy, Eric and Imrie, John. 2008. Dealing with the challenges of technological innovation in HIV prevention and treatment. The Lancet, 372(9636), pp. 357-358.

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2008. The challenges of technological innovation in HIV. Sociology Working Papers, pp. 1-4.

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2006. AIDS, Rhetoric, and Medical Knowledge - Alex Preda (book review). British Journal of Sociology, 57(4), pp. 728-730. ISSN 0007-1315

Flowers, Paul; Davis, Mark; Hart, Graham; Rosengarten, Marsha and Imrie, John. 2006. Diagnosis and stigma and identity amongst HIV positive Black Africans living in the UK. Psychology and Health, 21(1), pp. 109-122. ISSN 0887-0446

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2004. The Challenge of HIV for Feminist Theory. Feminist Theory, 5(2), pp. 205-222. ISSN 14647001

Rosengarten, Marsha; Hart, G.; Flowers, P. and Imrie, J.. 2004. After the Euphoria: HIV medical technologies from the perspective of their prescribers. Sociology of Health and Illness, 26(5), pp. 575-596. ISSN 01419889

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2004. Consumer activism in the pharmacology of HIV. Body & Society, 10(1), pp. 91-107. ISSN 1357034X

Waldby, C.; Rosengarten, Marsha; Treloar, C. and Fraser, S.. 2004. Blood and bioidentity: ideas about self, boundaries and risk among blood donors and people living with Hepatitis C. Social Science & Medicine, 59(7), pp. 1461-1471. ISSN 02779536

Rosengarten, Marsha and Keane, H.. 2002. On the biology of sexed subjects. Australian Feminist Studies, 17(39), pp. 261-277. ISSN 08164649

Rosengarten, Marsha. 2000. Thinking menstrual blood. Australian Feminist Studies, 15(31), pp. 91-101. ISSN 0816-4649

Project

Savransky, Martin; Gabrys, Jennifer; Rosengarten, Marsha and Wilkie, Alex. 2014. 'Speculation and Speculative Research Workshop', International Workshop with participants from UK, US, and Australia on speculation in social and cultural research and STS.

Report

Nicholls, Emily Jay and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2019. Witness Seminar: Antiretroviral Drugs up to and Including the Proposition of TasP and PrEP in the UK. Other. Disentangling European HIV/AIDS Policies: Activism, Citizenship and Health (EUROPACH).

Nicholls, Emily Jay and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2019. Witness Seminar: The Criminalisation of HIV Transmission in the UK. Other. Disentangling European HIV/AIDS Policies: Activism, Citizenship and Health (EUROPACH).

Nicholls, Emily Jay and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2019. Witness Seminar: HIV Prevention and Health Promotion in the UK. Other. Disentangling European HIV/AIDS Policies: Activism, Citizenship and Health (EUROPACH).

Nicholls, Emily Jay and Rosengarten, Marsha. 2019. Witness Seminar: Women and HIV in the UK. Other. Disentangling European HIV/AIDS Policies: Activism, Citizenship and Health (EUROPACH).

Rosengarten, Marsha; Race, K. and Kippax, S.. 2000. "Touch Wood, Everything Will Be Ok": Gay Men’s Understandings of Clinical Markers in Sexual Practice. Project Report. National Centre in HIV Social Research, Sydney.

Further profile content

Goldsmiths Research Centres/Groups

Grants and awards

2019: Distinguished Visiting Fellowship University of New South Wales, Australia

2010: Sociology of Health & Illness Book Prize 2010. British Medical Sociology Association

Honorary Posts

Honorary Professor, Centre for Social Research in Health, UNSW Australia
Honorary Professor, Centre for Healthy Societies, University of Sydney, Australia