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Overview

Professor Catherine Alexander

Professor

Affiliations
AffiliationTelephone
Professor in the Department of Anthropology+44 (0) 191 33 41622

Biography

I read English Literature at Durham, later moving to social anthropology at Cambridge University. Inbetween I worked for a number of central government departments in Britain and Turkey. I moved to the Durham Anthropology Department in 2012 after ten years in Goldsmiths.

I’ve carried out fieldwork in Turkey, Kazakhstan, Britain and Tanzania. Most of that has been on changing relations between state, market and the third sector, the built environment, local and central bureaucracy, migration, and various forms of waste and recycling (repair, reuse, recovery etc). I've also explored how formerly elite closed ‘nuclear’ towns in Kazakhstan are trying to re-connect to broader economies.

I have just completed a Leverhulme Trust funded Major Research fellowship (2019-2022) thinking about how different forms and fears of failure affect complex organisations, such as large science collaborations, and how they are experienced by the people who work within them. The first publication from this is After Failure, a special issue of the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute.

Research interests

  • Urban anthropology
  • Social/public housing
  • post-socialism
  • Middle East (Turkey)
  • Central Asia (Kazakhstan)
  • Britain
  • Economic and political anthropology
  • Changing property regimes
  • Privatisation
  • Third / voluntary sector
  • wastes (including recycling)
  • Bureaucracy
  • Indeterminacy
  • Failure
  • Inequalities
  • Migration

Publications

Authored book

Chapter in book

  • Thrift, Anti-thrift, Scale and Paradox
    Alexander, C., & Sosna, D. (2022). Thrift, Anti-thrift, Scale and Paradox. In C. Alexander & D. Sosna (Eds.), Thrift and its Paradoxes: From Domestic to Political Economy. Berghahn Books.
  • At home with the waste scholar
    Gille, Z., Lepawsky, J., Alexander, C., & Gregson, N. (2022). At home with the waste scholar. In Z. Gille & J. Lepawsky (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Waste Studies. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003019077
  • Global Entanglements of Recycling Policy and Practice
    Alexander, C., & Reno, J. (2020). Global Entanglements of Recycling Policy and Practice. In M. Aldenderfer (Ed.), Oxford research encyclopaedia of anthropology.. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190854584.013.18
  • When the Statue is both Marble and Lime
    Duckworth, C., Wilson, A., Van Oyen, A., Alexander, C., Evans, J., Green, C., & Mattingley, D. (2020). When the Statue is both Marble and Lime. In C. Duckworth & A. Wilson (Eds.), Recycling and reuse in the Roman economy. (pp. 449-460). Oxford University Press.
  • Introduction: The Values of Indeterminacy
    Alexander, C., & Sanchez, A. (2019). Introduction: The Values of Indeterminacy. In C. Alexander & A. Sanchez (Eds.), Indeterminacy : waste, value, and the imagination. (pp. 1-30). Berghahn Books.
  • Indeterminate classifications: being ‘more than kin’ in Kazakhstan
    Alexander, C. (2019). Indeterminate classifications: being ‘more than kin’ in Kazakhstan. In C. Alexander & A. Sanchez (Eds.), Indeterminacy : waste, value, and the imagination. (pp. 134-160). Berghahn Books.
  • Charity and philanthropy
    Alexander, C. (2018). Charity and philanthropy. In H. Callan (Ed.), International encyclopaedia of anthropology : anthropology beyond text.. Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118924396.wbiea1689
  • Central Asia, Anthropology of
    Alexander, C. (2015). Central Asia, Anthropology of. In J. Wright (Ed.), International encyclopedia of the social and behavioral sciences. Second edition. (pp. 316-322). Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-08-097086-8.12177-4
  • Food waste
    Alexander, C., Gregson, N., & Gille, Z. (2013). Food waste. In A. Murcott, W. Belasco, & P. Jackson (Eds.), The Handbook of Food Research. (pp. 471-485). Bloomsbury.
  • The Garden as Occasional Domestic Space.
    Alexander, C. (2013). The Garden as Occasional Domestic Space. In C. Briganti & K. Mezei (Eds.), The Domestic Space Reader.. University of Toronto Press.
  • Soviet and Post-Soviet Planning in Almaty, Kazakhstan
    Alexander, C. (2013). Soviet and Post-Soviet Planning in Almaty, Kazakhstan. In A. Massey (Ed.), Public Sector Reform (pp. 165-181). Sage Publications Ltd.
  • Remont: works in progress.
    Alexander, C. (2012). Remont: works in progress. In C. Alexander & J. Reno (Eds.), Economies of recycling: the global transformation of materials, values and social relations. (pp. 255-275). Zed Books.
  • Introduction.
    Alexander, C., & Reno, J. (2012). Introduction. In C. Alexander & J. Reno (Eds.), Economies of recycling: the global transformation of materials, values and social relations. (pp. 1-34). Zed Books.
  • Economic valuations and environmental policy (Updated).
    Alexander, C. (2012). Economic valuations and environmental policy (Updated). In J. Carrier (Ed.), A Handbook of Economic Anthropology (pp. 451-468). Edward Elgar Publishing.
  • The Third Sector.
    Alexander, C. (2010). The Third Sector. In K. Hart, J.-L. Laville, & A. Cattani (Eds.), The Human Economy: a citizen’s guide. (pp. 213-224). Polity Press.
  • Privatization: jokes, scandal and absurdity in a time of rapid change.
    Alexander, C. (2009). Privatization: jokes, scandal and absurdity in a time of rapid change. In K. Sykes (Ed.), Ethnographies of moral reasoning: living paradoxes of a global age. (pp. 43-65). Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Illusions of freedom: Polanyi and the third sector
    Alexander, C. (2009). Illusions of freedom: Polanyi and the third sector. In C. Hann & K. Hart (Eds.), Market and society : the great transformation today. (pp. 221-239). Cambridge University Press.
  • Waste under socialism and after: a case-study from Almaty.
    Alexander, C. (2008). Waste under socialism and after: a case-study from Almaty. In H. West & P. Raman (Eds.), Enduring Socialism: Explorations of Revolution and Transformation, Restoration and Continuation. (pp. 148-168). Berghahn Books.
  • Almaty: rethinking the public sector.
    Alexander, C. (2007). Almaty: rethinking the public sector. In C. Alexander, V. Buchli, & C. Humphrey (Eds.), Urban life in post-Soviet Asia. (pp. 70-101). UCL Press (Routledge).
  • Introduction.
    Alexander, C., & Buchli, V. (2007). Introduction. In C. Alexander, V. Buchli, & C. Humphrey (Eds.), Urban Life in post-Soviet Asia. (pp. 1-39). UCL Press (Routledge).
  • Value: Economic Valuations and Environmental Policy
    Alexander, C. (2005). Value: Economic Valuations and Environmental Policy. In J. Carrier (Ed.), A Handbook of Economic Anthropology. Edward Elgar Publishing. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781845423469.00044
  • Values, Relations and Changing Bodies: Industrial Privatisation in Kazakhstan.
    Alexander, C. (2004). Values, Relations and Changing Bodies: Industrial Privatisation in Kazakhstan. In C. Humphrey & K. Verdery (Eds.), Property in Question: appropriation, recognition and value transformation in the global economy.. Berghahn Books.

Edited book

Journal Article

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