Staff profile

I am a sociologist and a geographer of education with a strong commitment to the politics of education and envisaging alternative futures for education and society more broadly. My interests lie at the intersection of sociology, geography and history and the central theme running through my work is how structures and experiences of power and inequality in education are reproduced over time and through different local and regional geographies.

Before joining Durham sociology in January 2019, I was a postdoc at the University of Bath on the ESRC-funded project, the Geographies of Higher Education: spatial and social mobilities. With Mike Donnelly (PI), we developed an exciting programme of research on spatial inequalities of race and class in the transition to higher education and on inequalities in graduate recruitment. I was awarded my PhD in Geography from King’s College London in April 2017. It focussed on the geography of elite and middle-class schooling in England. Both my masters and undergraduate degrees were interdisciplinary, drawing on sociology, history, geography and languages (French and German) and this background plays out in my work which continues to span different disciplines.

I am keen to supervise PhD students with an interest in any aspect of educational inequality sociological, spatial or historical. I have particular expertise in secondary schooling, post-16 and higher education but I am also interested in lifelong learning and working-class education. I know the British systems of education best, though I have some more limited knowledge of education in France, the US and Chile and am keen to work with students and colleagues internationally. Theoretically my background is Bourdieusian with a good dose of Doreen Massey, Antonio Gramsci and Stuart Hall but I try to be theoretically open and heterodox.

I am also keen for my work to be politically engaged and engaging and to make my work publicly accessible. I regularly blog, tweet and write policy briefs around educational inequality. I have also been actively involved in education policy, notably around private schools as one of the co-founders of the Abolish Eton campaign group and in my capacity as an active member of the University and Colleges Union.

If I'm not doing that, then in normal times you might find me walking in the hills (preferably the Pennines), reading sci fi (preferably utopian) or travelling somewhere to keep up with my own diaspora of friends and family. These days I'm probably on zoom though.

• Regional and local geographies of education and how these combine with race, class and gender
• Elite education
• Secondary schooling, post-16 education and lifelong learning
• Access to higher education
• Politics of higher education
• History of education
• GIS and social network analysis, PCA, LCA and other interesting statistical methods (especially in R)
• Mixed methods research
• Education Policy

• Durham University Evidence Centre for Education (DECE)
• Higher Education and Social Inequalities

• Follow me on twitter here.
• Google Scholar Profile

• 2020: British Journal of Sociology of Education Best ECR Paper 2020: Each year, the ;Executive Editors ;of ;British Journal of Sociology of Education ;pick a winning article from a shortlist of articles by early career researchers. View shortlisted papers and previous winners here.
• 2020: SAGE Prize Winner Sociological Research Online Article of the year: Awarded for paper co-authored with Michael Donnelly and Alex Barratta.
  
  https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1360780418816335
• 0000: Editorial Board, The Sociological Review: Reviewer of papers, bursary awards for early career staff, seminar funding competitions.
• 0000: Invited speaker: Invitations to speak at various conferences, research seminars and public events. An indicative recent list:
  
  June 2021. Why are some children worth more? Economic inequality between state and private schools. Hosted by The World Transformed. Presentation of Common-Wealth research report and panel discussion with Prof. Rebecca Boden and councillor and teacher Stephen Longden.
  
  June 2021. Great mistakes in education policy: And how to avoid them. British Educational Research Association event and book launch. Discussant.
  
  April 2021. The material basis for elite education: capital, charity and the state. Special Session at the British Sociological Association Annual Conference.
  
  December 2020. Balloon Debate on ‘What is the right age to begin academic selection?’. Debate hosted by the Higher Education Policy Institute with politicians, key education stakeholders. I argued the case for no selection at any age which was the most popular position.
  
  July 2020. The sociology and history of Sheffield's schools. A presentation and discussion hosted by local campaign group, Sheffield Transformed.
  
  March 2020. Why we do not need elitism in education. TedX Newcastle College event.
  
  February 2020. Place, inequality and undergraduate mobilities in college-based and university-based higher education. Seminar organised by Holly Henderson, Society for Research and Higher Education, London.
  
  September 2019. Various speaking engagements at Labour Party Conference with the Centre for Labour and Social Studies and Comprehensive Future.
  
  September 2019. Widening Participation Research Seminar, UCL, London.
  
  May 2019. Research seminar at Uppsala University, Sociology of Education Research Group.

Available for media contact about:

• Education:
• General policy:
• Geography:
• Social and ethical inequality:
• Social sciences:
• Sociology:

Book review

• Liu, Ye, Gamsu, Sol & Allouch, Annabelle (2022). The Crisis of the Meritocracy: Britain’s transition to mass education since the Second World War. British Journal of Sociology of Education 970-978.
• Gamsu, Sol (2019). Miseducation: inequality, education and the working classes. International Studies in Sociology of Education
• Gamsu, Sol (2018). Fragile elite: the dilemmas of China’s top university students. Children's Geographies
• Gamsu, Sol (2015). Schools and Urban Revitalization: Rethinking Institutions and Community Development. Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science

Chapter in book

• Gamsu, Sol (2018). Aspirations and the Histories of Elite State Schools in London: Field Theory, Circuits of Education and the Embodiment of Symbolic Capital. In International Perspectives on Theorizing Aspirations. Stahl, Garth Wallace, Derron Burke, Ciaran & Threadgold, Steven London: Bloomsbury Academic.

Journal Article

• Donnelly, Michael & Gamsu, Sol (2022). Spatial Imaginaries and Geographic Division within the UK: Uneven Economic Development, Ethnicity and National Identity. Sociology 56(6): 1217–1235.
• Hall, Richard, Gill, Rajvir & Gamsu, Sol (2022). ‘Whiteness is an immoral choice’ the idea of the University at the intersection of crises. Higher Education
• Gamsu, Sol (2022). Financing elite education: economic capital and the maintenance of class power in English private schools. The Sociological Review 70(6): 1240–1266.
• Donnelly, Michael, Gamsu, Sol & Barratta, Alex (2022). Accent and the manifestation of spatialised class structure. The Sociological Review 70(6): 1100–1118.
• Ingram, Nicola & Gamsu, Sol (2022). Talking the Talk of Social Mobility: the political performance of a misguided agenda. Sociological Research Online 27(1): 189-206.
• Gamsu, Sol & Donnelly, Michael (2021). Social network analysis methods and the geography of education: regional divides and elite circuits in the school to university transition in the UK. Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie 112(4): 370-386.
• Gamsu, Sol, Allouch, Annabel & Nous, Camille (2020). S’engager contre les réformes néolibérales de l’Université. Savoir Agir
• Gamsu, Sol (2020). From assisted places to free schools: subsidizing private schools for the northern English middle classes. British Journal of Sociology of Education 41(8): 1093-1114.
• Donnelly, Michael & Gamsu, Sol (2020). Spatial structures of student mobility: Social, economic and ethnic ‘geometries of power’. Population, Space and Place 26(3): e2293.
• Donnelly, Michael, Gamsu, Sol & Whewall, Sam (2020). Mapping the relational construction of people and places. International Journal of Social Research Methodology 23(1): 91-108.
• Donnelly, Michael & Gamsu, Sol (2019). The field of graduate recruitment: leading financial and consultancy firms and elite class formation. The British Journal of Sociology 70(4): 1374-1401.
• Donnelly, Michael, Barratta, Alex & Gamsu, Sol (2019). A Sociolinguistic Perspective on Accent and Social Mobility in the UK Teaching Profession. Sociological Research Online 24(4): 496-513.
• Gamsu, Sol, Donnelly, Michael & Harris, Richard (2019). The spatial dynamics of race in the transition to university: Diverse cities and White campuses in U.K. higher education. Population, Space and Place 25(5): e2222.
• Gamsu, S. (2018). The ‘other’ London effect: the diversification of London's suburban grammar schools and the rise of hyper‐selective elite state schools. The British Journal of Sociology 69(4): 1155-1174.
• Donnelly, Michael & Gamsu, Sol (2018). Regional structures of feeling? A spatially and socially differentiated analysis of UK student im/mobility. British Journal of Sociology of Education 39(7): 961-981.
• Gamsu, Sol (2016). Moving up and moving out: The re-location of elite and middle-class schools from central London to the suburbs. Urban Studies 53(14): 2921-2938.

Newspaper/Magazine Article

• Gamsu, Sol (2021). Elite educators have milked the system for long enough. Open Democracy
• Gamsu, Sol (2020). Private school integration must mean more than the state subsidising middle-class schools. Private Schools Policy Reform
• Gamsu, Sol (2020). Universities in Crisis. Centre for Labour and Social Studies
• Gamsu, Sol (2020). A focus on access to elite institutions distracts from more fundamental inequities in HE. Research Intelligence 143: 16-17.
• Gamsu, Sol & Hall, Richard (2019). Better policymaking needs democracy: Who is education policy for? WonkHE
• Gamsu, Sol (2019). Eton or Charterhouse? On the Labour Campaign Against Private Schools. Verso Books Blog
• Gamsu, Sol (2019). Obsessing over Oxbridge is not the way to beat inequality. The Guardian
• Gamsu, Sol (2019). Educational elitism isn’t going away without a fight – so Labour must step up. Open Democracy
• Gamsu, Sol & Donnelly, Michael (2017). Oxbridge Diversity is Important, But Inequality in Higher Education Runs Much Deeper. Centre for Labour and Social Studies
• Gamsu, Sol & Donnelly, Michael (2017). Diversity troubles – comprehensive solutions to HE’s racial segregation. WonkHE
• Gamsu, Sol (2016). Education Not Segregation: A Serious Strategy for Educational Reform for the Labour Party. Novara Media
• Gamsu, Sol (2016). How Rising London Rents are Funding Elite Private Schools. Novara Media
• Gamsu, Sol (2015). Why the 11+ isn’t the form of selection we should be worrying about. Open Democracy

Report

• Gamsu, Sol (2021). Why are some children worth more than others? The private-state school funding gap in England. Common-Wealth Thinktank.
• Gamsu, Sol & Hall, Richard (2019). A New Vision for Further and Higher Education. Centre for Labour and Social Studies.
• Donnelly, Michael & Gamsu, Sol (2018). HOME AND AWAY: Social, ethnic and spatial inequalities in student mobility. London, The Sutton Trust.
• Gamsu, Sol & Donnelly, Michael (2017). Diverse Places of Learning? Home neighbourhood ethnic diversity and the ethnic composition of universities. Institute of Policy Research, University of Bath.