Dr Harrison Smith

BA, MA, PhD

School of Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations

Lecturer in Digital Media & Society

(He/him)

harrison.smith@sheffield.ac.uk
+44 114 222 6477

The Wave

Full contact details

Dr Harrison Smith
School of Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations
The Wave
2 Whitham Road
Sheffield
S10 2AH

Profile: Harrison is a Lecturer in Digital Media & Society and serves as the programme lead for the MA Digital Media & Society course.

Harrison holds a PhD in Information Studies from the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information, and an MA and BA (Hons) in Sociology from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Harrison also holds a diploma in photojournalism with work experience in several Canadian newspapers.

Research interests: Harrison’s research broadly examines the political economies of digital technologies with a particular interest in understanding their impacts on contemporary consumer cultures and digital marketing practices through industrial modes of surveillance and data analytics that track, measure, and categorize consumers in everyday life.

His research synthesizes a wide range of theoretical approaches that connect digital platforms, infrastructures, and contemporary environments into new kinds of digital interactivities and modalities. Harrison has a particular interest in understanding the social shaping of digital futures, including the ways that emerging technologies such as AI are connected with larger social imaginaries, politics, and market arrangements.

Publications

Smith H (2024) The metaverse-industrial complex. Information, Communication & Society, 28(5), 797-814. View this article in WRRO
Dylag M & Smith H (2023) From cryptocurrencies to cryptocourts: blockchain and the financialization of dispute resolution platforms. Information, Communication & Society, 26(2), 372-387. View this article in WRRO
Hoover KC, Crampton JW, Smith H & Berbesque JC (2022) Surveillance, trust, and policing at music festivals. Canadian Geographies / Géographies canadiennes, 66(2), 202-219. View this article in WRRO
Smith H & Burrows R (2021) Software, sovereignty and the post-neoliberal politics of exit. Theory, Culture and Society, 38(6), 143-166.
Smith H (2020) The locative imaginary: Classification, context and relevance in location analytics. The Sociological Review, 68(3), 641-658. View this article in WRRO
Crampton JW, Hoover KC, Smith H, Graham S & Berbesque JC (2020) Smart Festivals? Security and Freedom for Well-Being in Urban Smart Spaces. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 110(2), 360-370.
Smith H (2019) People-based marketing and the cultural economies of attribution metrics. Journal of Cultural Economy, 12(3), 201-214. View this article in WRRO
Smith H (2019) Metrics, locations, and lift: mobile location analytics and the production of second-order geodemographics. Information, Communication & Society, 22(8), 1044-1061. View this article in WRRO

Crampton JW, Hoover KC, Smith H, Graham S & Berbesque JC (2021) Smart Festivals? Security and Freedom for Well-Being in Urban Smart Spaces, Smart Spaces and Places (pp. 27-37). Routledge

Hoover KC, Crampton JW, Smith H & Berbesque C (2018) An Empirical Study of Surveillance Anxiety, Center for Open Science.

Teaching activities: Harrison’s teaching broadly examines the ways that digital platforms, interfaces, and infrastructures are connected to various social institutions of consumer culture and digital marketing. His modules introduce students to a wide range of theoretical and conceptual approaches to critically understanding the social shaping and impacts of digital technologies and media on everyday consumer cultures and practices. He is currently the module convenor for:

SPR211 – The Sociology of Media & Consumer Culture
SPR322 – Digital Marketing and Consumer Culture
SPR425 – Mobile Media & Digital Futures