Professor Jo Littler

Staff details

Position

Professor

Department

Media, Communications and Cultural Studies

Email

j.littler (@gold.ac.uk)

Jo's work analyses changing cultures of inequality in society in relation to gender, ‘race’ and class.

Jo’s work analyses changing cultures of inequality across media and society. Her books include Left Feminisms (2023); with The Care Collective, The Care Manifesto (2020); Against Meritocracy (2018); Radical Consumption (2008); and, with Roshi Naidoo, The Politics of Heritage (2005). She co-edits European Journal of Cultural Studies and is part of the editorial collective for Soundings: A Journal of Politics & Culture.

She is a regular invited speaker at public events. Besides academic conferences, these have included talks for the Equality Trust, an APPG group on social mobility in parliament, the Canadian Worldviews union lecture, the Barbican and the Young Vic. Her work has featured on ABC Radio Australia, US National Public Radio, The Guardian, Il Manifesto and El Pais. She is a Trustee for the Barry Amiel and Norman Melburn Trust and a judge of the 2023 Stuart Hall Essay Prize.

In 2023-4 she is working on a Leverhulme Research Fellowship on 'Ideologies of Inequality'.

Featured publications

2023: Left Feminisms: Conversations on the Personal and the Political
Interview book

2020: The Care Manifesto: The Politics of Interdependence
Book by The Care Collective

2018: Against Meritocracy: Culture, power and myths of mobility
Book

2009: Radical Consumption? Shopping for change in contemporary culture
Book

2005: The Politics of Heritage: the legacies of ‘race’
Book, edited by Roshi Naidoo and Jo Littler

Grants and awards

2024: Leverhulme Research Fellowship
Ideologies of Inequality

Publications and research outputs

Book Section

“Stay Woke. Make Moves” Branding for a Feminist Future Amidst Pandemic Precarity Curran-Troop, Hannah; Gill, Rosalind ; and Littler, Jo . 2022. “Stay Woke. Make Moves” Branding for a Feminist Future Amidst Pandemic Precarity. In: Joel Gwynne, ed. The Cultural Politics of Femvertising: Selling Empowerment. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 141-162.
Neoliberal meritocracy, racialization and transnationalism Littler, Jo . 2020. Neoliberal meritocracy, racialization and transnationalism. In: Eva Ulrike Pirker; Katja Hericks and Mandisa Mbali, eds. Forward, Upward, Onward? Narratives of Achievement in African and Afroeuropean Contexts. Düsseldorf: hhu books, pp. 17-20. ISBN 9783942412025
The Affective Life of Neoliberalism: Constructing (Un)Reasonableness on Mumsnet Ehrstein, Yvonne; Gill, Rosalind ; and Littler, Jo . 2019. The Affective Life of Neoliberalism: Constructing (Un)Reasonableness on Mumsnet. In: Simon Dawes and Marc Lenormand, eds. Neoliberalism in Context: Governance, Subjectivity and Knowledge. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 195-213. ISBN 9783030260163

Creative hubs: a co-operative space? Sandoval, Marisol; and Littler, Jo . 2019. Creative hubs: a co-operative space? In: Rosalind Gill; Andy C. Pratt and Tarek E. Virani, eds. Creative Hubs in Question: Place, Space and Work in the Creative Economy. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 155-168. ISBN 9783030106522
Rich TV. Poor TV: Work, Leisure and the Construction of "Deserved Inequality" in Contemporary Britain. Wiliamson, Milly ; and Littler, Jo . 2017. Rich TV. Poor TV: Work, Leisure and the Construction of "Deserved Inequality" in Contemporary Britain. In: June Deery and Andrea Press, eds. Media and Class: TV, Film, and Digital Culture. New York and London: Routledge, pp. 146-161. ISBN 9781315387970
Ideology Littler, Jo . 2017. Ideology. In: Laurie Ouellette and Jonathan Gray, eds. Keywords for Media Studies. New York: New York University Press, pp. 98-101. ISBN 9781479883653
On not being at CCCS Littler, Jo . 2016. On not being at CCCS. In: Kieran Connell and Matthew Hilton, eds. Cultural Studies 50 Years On: History, Practice and Politics. London: Rowman and Littlefield International, pp. 275-284. ISBN 9781783483921
Cultural Studies and Consumer Culture Littler, Jo . 2016. Cultural Studies and Consumer Culture. In: Deirdre Shaw; Andreas Chatzidakis and Michal Carrington, eds. Ethics and Morality in Consumption: Interdisciplinary Perspectives. New York: Routledge, pp. 233-247. ISBN 9781138790230
The Work of Work: Reality TV and the Negotiation of Neoliberal Labour in "The Apprentice" Couldry, Nick ; and Littler, Jo . 2008. The Work of Work: Reality TV and the Negotiation of Neoliberal Labour in "The Apprentice". In: Thomas Austin and Wilma De Jong, eds. Rethinking Documentary: New Perspectives and Practices. Maidenhead: Open University Press, pp. 258-267. ISBN 9780335221929
Celebrity CEOs and the cultural economy of tabloid intimacy Littler, Jo . 2007. Celebrity CEOs and the cultural economy of tabloid intimacy. In: Sean Redmond and Su Holmes, eds. Stardom and Celebrity: A Reader. London: SAGE Publications, pp. 230-243. ISBN 9781412923200
'Festering Britain': the 1951 Festival of Britain, decolonisation and the representation of the Commonwealth Littler, Jo . 2006. 'Festering Britain': the 1951 Festival of Britain, decolonisation and the representation of the Commonwealth. In: Simon Faulkner and Anandi Ramamurthy, eds. Visual Culture and Decolonisation in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate, pp. 21-42. ISBN 9780754640028
British heritage and the legacies of ‘race’ Littler, Jo . 2005. British heritage and the legacies of ‘race’. In: Jo Littler and Roshi Naidoo, eds. The Politics of Heritage: the legacies of ‘race’. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 1-20. ISBN 9780415322102
White past, multicultural present: heritage and national stories Littler, Jo ; and Naidoo, Roshi. 2004. White past, multicultural present: heritage and national stories. In: Helen Brocklehurst and Robert Phillips, eds. History, Nationhood and the Question of Britain. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 330-341. ISBN 9781403912961

Article

Social Mobility is a Joke: Working-class women and British TV comedy on ‘the social floor’ Littler, Jo ORCID logo ; and Skeggs, Bev . 2025. Social Mobility is a Joke: Working-class women and British TV comedy on ‘the social floor’. European Journal of Cultural Studies, ISSN 1367-5494
Preface: Space Invaders Revisited Littler, Jo ORCID logo ; and Saha, Anamik. 2025. Preface: Space Invaders Revisited. European Journal of Cultural Studies, 28(5), pp. 1203-1204. ISSN 1367-5494
Contributions, conjunctures and care: revisiting Formations of Class and Gender Wood, Helen; and Littler, Jo ORCID logo . 2025. Contributions, conjunctures and care: revisiting Formations of Class and Gender. The Sociological Review, 73(2), pp. 344-361. ISSN 0038-0261

Conference or Workshop Item

‘Rich TV/Poor TV’: Work, leisure and the construction of ‘deserved inequality’ Williamson, Milly ; and Littler, Jo . 2018. '‘Rich TV/Poor TV’: Work, leisure and the construction of ‘deserved inequality’'. In: 68th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association: Voices. Prague, Czech Republic 24 - 28 May 2018.