Dr Karis Campion
Contact details
Personal links
About
Overview
Karis is a Lecturer in Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice.
She joined City in September 2023. She previously worked as a Senior Research Fellow at the Stephen Lawrence Research Centre (De Montfort University), Research Associate at the University of Manchester and Lecturer in Sociology, at City. She has an MSc in Social Research Methods and Statistics, and a PhD in Sociology, both from the University of Manchester. Her thesis examined the macro and micro-politics of Black mixed-race experiences as a personal identity and an emerging social/ethnic category in Britain.
Karis' main research interests include the relationship between race, place, identity and the city (particularly Black place-making practices and belonging), urban ethnography as method, Black mixed-race identities/families, and race inequities in higher and secondary education. Her first book, Making Mixed Race: A Study of Time, Place and Identity, was published with Routledge in 2021.
Her current ethnographic research incorporates art and photography to explore how barbershops function as counter-hegemonic spaces and community assets for Black communities in South London. In the summer of 2023, she hosted the mini-pop up community exhibition "Black Barbershops in Focus" from the basement of a black-owned barbershop to showcase the artistic outputs and emerging findings from the project so far. Karis is currently supporting Lambeth Council to develop and deliver a borough-wide pop-up barbershop intervention in secondary schools.
She is Co-investigator for the UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship: 'Hair and Care: Black Children and Young People's Experiences of Belonging and Exclusion in Social Care and Education in England'. The project is exploring the relationship between Black hair and Black young peoples’ experiences of belonging and exclusion in English secondary schools.
Karis sits on the editorial board of The Sociological Review and Ethnic and Racial Studies.
Teaching
Karis teaches the following modules in the department:
- 'Race and Racism'
- 'Global Migration Processes'
- 'Public Sociolgoy and Racial Justice'
Qualifications
- PhD Sociology, University of Manchester, United Kingdom
- MSc Social Research Methods and Statistics, University of Manchester, United Kingdom
- BSocSci Sociology, University of Manchester, United Kingdom
Postgraduate training
- PG Cert in Academic Practice, City, University of London, United Kingdom
Employment
- Lecturer in Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice, City, University of London, United Kingdom, September 2023 - July 2025
- Senior Legacy in Action Research Fellow, De Montfort University, United Kingdom, 2020 - September 2023
- Research Associate, University of Manchester, United Kingdom, 2018 - 2020
- Lecturer in Sociology, City. University of London, United Kingdom, 2018
Publications
Publications by category
Book
- Campion, K. (2021). Making Mixed Race A Study of Time, Place and Identity. Routledge. ISBN 9781000482621.
Chapters (2)
- Campion, K. and Campion, K. (2026). Hiding in plain sight: walking through race and space on Brixton Station Road. In Bates, C. and Jackson, E. (Eds.), Walking: a sociological field guide Manchester: Manchester University Press. ISBN 9781526184917.
- Campion, K. and Joseph-Salisbury, R. (2021). Bringing Black Mixed-Race Pupils into Focus in British Schooling. In Schecter, S.R. and James, C.E. (Eds.), Critical Approaches Toward a Cosmopolitan Education Routledge. ISBN 9780429327780.
Exhibition
- Campion, K. Black Barbershops in Focus: a pop-up exhibition. Herne Hill.
Internet publications (6)
- Campion, K.(2022).Cutting through the pandemic: the value of Black barbershops.
- Campion, K.(2020).Universities must not forget about BAME students during this crisis. Wonkhe.
- Campion, K.(2019).What it’s like being the only woman in the barbershop. Gal Dem Magazine.
- Campion, K.(2019).Diane Abbott and ‘misogynoir’: colourism, anti-blackness and sexism in the UK. The Conversation.
- Campion, K. and Campion, K.(2018).Can British universities be sites for reparative justice? Policy@Manchester.
- Campion, K.Royal Baby Archie and Black mixed-race People in Britain. Discover Society.
Journal articles (6)
- O'Neill, S., Campion, K. and Rajan-Rankin, S. (2025). Hair Discrimination and the Racialization of Black Young People’s Bodies: A Critical Analysis of Racism in U.K. School Settings. Oxford Intersections: Racism by Context
- Rai, R. and Campion, K. (2022). Decoding “decoloniality” in the academy: tensions and challenges in “decolonising” as a “new” language and praxis in British history and geography. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 45(16), pp. 478-500. doi:10.1080/01419870.2022.2099750
- Campion, K. and Lewis, C.J. (2022). Racial Illiteracies and Whiteness: Exploring Black Mixed-Race Narrations of Race in the Family. Genealogy, 6(3), pp. 58-58. doi:10.3390/genealogy6030058
- Campion, K. and Clark, K. (2022). Revitalising race equality policy? Assessing the impact of the Race Equality Charter mark for British universities. Race Ethnicity and Education, 25(1), pp. 18-37. doi:10.1080/13613324.2021.1924133
- Campion, K. (2021). Mapping Black mixed-race Birmingham: Place, locality and identity. The Sociological Review, 69(5), pp. 937-955. doi:10.1177/00380261211006325
- Campion, K. (2019). “You think you’re Black?” Exploring Black mixed-race experiences of Black rejection. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 42(16), pp. 196-213. doi:10.1080/01419870.2019.1642503
Media
- Campion, K., Grover, S. and Begum, S.(2023). Uncommon Sense: Solidarity, with Suresh Grover, Shabna Begum & Karis Campion [Audio podcast episode].
Report
- Joseph-Salisbury, R., Ashe, S., Campion, K., Alexander, C. and Campion, K. (2020). Race and Ethnicity in British Sociology. British Sociological Association.