PhD students

We have a number of PhD students studying in the Centre.

Johanna Knebel

Project Title: Peer (counselling) approaches in sexuality education for, by, and with people with learning difficulties in Germany
Johanna Knebel is a third-year postgraduate researcher in the School of Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Leeds. Her doctoral research explores peer-led sexuality education for, by, and with people with learning difficulties in Germany. Supported by the 1+3 WRDTP studentship funded by the ESRC, Johanna’s project contributes to inclusive and accessible sexuality education by centring the perspectives of peer educators with learning difficulties.

Using co-creational and visual methodologies, she collaborates with peer educators and their co-workers across three projects in Germany. Her work challenges deficit-based models and promotes socially inclusive frameworks that recognise the agency and expertise of disabled people.

Johanna’s research is informed by an interdisciplinary background in special education and disability studies across German and UK contexts.

Supervisors: Dr Andrea Hollomotz, Prof Roger Slee

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johanna-emma-knebel/

Luna Yihan Fu (she/they)

Project Title: Hierarchical Masculinities and Homosociality in China’s Workplaces
Luna Yihan Fu is a postgraduate researcher in the School of Sociology and Social Policy. Her research investigates the construction and reproduction of masculinities and homosociality in Chinese workplaces, focusing on men in the state and tech sectors.

Drawing on feminist post-structuralist and postcolonial perspectives, Luna explores gender performance and hierarchy through an indigenous conceptual framework. Her broader interests include gender, work, capitalism, and modernity. Luna also serves as Co-convenor of the British Sociological Association’s Postgraduate Forum.

Ruiyang Han

Project Title: Gender, Sexuality, and Cultural Transformation in Contemporary China
Ruiyang Han is a postgraduate researcher whose work focuses on how gender norms and queer identities are shaped through everyday life, emotional experience, and popular media in China.

Using creative and participatory methodologies, Ruiyang explores non-normative sexual and gender epistemologies. His broader interests include feminist theory, popular culture, and cross-cultural comparative studies.

Supervisors: Dr Yen Nee Wong, Dr Jessica Martin, Prof Ruth Holliday

Zhuoyu Chen

Project Title: Singlehood and Digital (Sub)culture in Contemporary China
Zhuoyu Chen is a PhD student in Sociology at the University of Leeds. Her research explores how single individuals in China construct identities, communities, and alternative lifestyles in response to dominant norms of marriage and coupledom.

Combining digital ethnography, discourse analysis, and qualitative interviews, Zhuoyu examines how online spaces enable new forms of gendered subjectivity and social belonging.

Supervisors: Prof Ruth Holliday, Dr Jessica Martin
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zhuoyu-chen-b2a4371a0

Christian Harrison (he/him/his) 

Project Title: Becoming Ourselves Online: disabled transgender identity construction and intersection through social media.

Using a qualitative interview-diary method, this research seeks to understand how transgender disabled people navigate online spaces and use social media in their daily lives to develop their identities, community and relationships to their bodies. Disabled and transgender people’s social media use have mainly been investigated in silos. However this research will investigate the intersectional ways in which transgender disabled people create meaning of their lived experience through interactions online.

Twitter: @CJHResearch; Instagram: @CJHResearch; Facebook: @CJHResearch; YouTube: CJHResearch

Taoyuan Luo (she/her)

Project Title: Identification or alienation: a study of Chinese young women’s attitudes towards feminism.

I have a BA in Journalism from Guangxi University and MA Cultural and Creative Industries from Cultural Media and Creative Industries, King’s College London. Before I started my PhD in October 2019 in CIGS, I worked as an intern journalist in Xinhua News Agency (Guangxi Branch) and People Daily (Guangxi Branch) in China. My research interests are primarily located in gender studies, attempting to explore the interrelationship of feminist theory, popular culture, mediated texts, youth, and identification. If you have any interests in my research areas, please contact me via my university email ([email protected]) or my Twitter account at @TaoyuanL.

Rebecca Simmons

I am currently undertaking a PhD in Gender Studies in the school of Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Leeds. My thesis is focussed on exploring the multiplicitous experiences of queer people who have experienced menopause, and how this interacts with their experience of their body, gender and sexuality. I have a BSc in Criminology and Psychology from Royal Holloway, University of London, and an MA in Gender, Violence and Conflict from the University of Sussex. My research interests include gender theory, queer theory, intersectional feminism, embodiment and corporeality, postfeminism, menopause, neoliberalism, sex work and pornography.

Supervisors: Prof Karen Throsby, Dr Patricio Simonetto

I completed my undergraduate degree in Clothing and Textile and History of Art at Ewha womans University in South Korea. After a few years of experience including working as a fashion designer, staying in the US and working in Malaysia, I decided to go back to school. Consequently, I earned a MA in Area Studies after studying in Yonsei University in South Korea.

Georgina Trace

I am currently a PhD student in the School of Sociology and Social Policy with connections to Work and Employment Relations within the Busness School. My research explores the experiences and working practices of young women and non-binary people selling sexual content on digital platforms like OnlyFans, AdultWork, Streamate, ManyVids, e.t.c.

My research takes an interdisciplinary approach, focusing on the material realities affecting digital platform workers, sex workers and content creators, alongside analysing the multiplicity of discourses that frame the experiences and subjectivities of these workers.

My main research interests include: gender, feminisms, popular culture, digital platform work, sex work, neoliberalism, digital consumer practices, self-presentation and the body.