Patricia Hamilton
Lecturer

Profile

Biography

I was born in the UK and raised in South Africa, where I completed my undergraduate degree, majoring in English and Sociology. I later moved to the UK for an MA in Gender Studies, funded by a Commonwealth scholarship.

For my PhD at the University of Western Ontario, I interviewed black mothers living in the UK and Canada and explored their engagements with attachment parenting, a popular parenting philosophy that emphasises secure attachment between mother and child and is promoted as a ‘natural’ and ‘instinctive’ approach to raising children.

I have taught and conducted research in South Africa, Canada and the UK and was previously a lecturer in the Sociology and Social Anthropology department at Stellenbosch University and a Marie Curie Research Fellow at the Thomas Coram Research Unit in UCL’s Social Research Institute. 

I joined York's Department of Sociology as a lecturer in 2022.

Departmental Roles

• Sociology EDI Lead

Research

Overview

My research sits at the intersection of black feminist theory, parenting culture studies and reproduction, particularly examining how everyday experiences of family are shaped by the intersection of racism, sexism and capitalism. I am interested in the reproductive experiences of racially minoritised (and in other ways marginalised) communities and families and how changes in policy, technology and ideology shape family-making.

I'm currently working on a project that examines the fertility sector in the UK and abroad and its intersection with race.

Previous projects include an intersectional analysis of parental leave policy-making in the UK. I have also examined natural birth practices in South Africa and breastfeeding promotion in the UK.

Publications

Selected publications

• Hamilton, P. (2026). “We do this too”: Alternative futures of black motherhood. American Anthropologist, OnlineFirst.
• Tarrant, A., Ladlow, L., Koslowski, A., Churchill, H., Finch, N. and Hamilton, P. (2026). Appraising the UK Labour government’s early approach to reforming parental leave: The limits of incrementalism for gender equality and social inclusion. Social Policy & Society, 25(2), 397-410.
• Hamilton, P. and Faircloth, C. (2026). Race and neoliberal citizenship in the construction of good (attachment) parents: Parenting Culture Studies and beyond. Sociological Review, 74(3), 528-545.
• Coleman-Fountain, E., Falcetta, S., Hamilton, P., Tutton, R., Camps, R., Gilbourne, J., Molina, P. and Murphy, P. (2025). Cultivating collaboration: Reflections on introducing Problem-Based Learning in the ‘wicked world’ of contemporary Higher Education. Sociology, OnlineFirst.
• Hamilton, P. (2020). Black mothers and attachment parenting: A black feminist analysis of intensive mothering in Britain and Canada. Bristol: Bristol University Press.
  - Shortlisted for the 2021 British Sociological Association’s Philip Abrams Memorial Prize
• Hamilton, P. (2020). ‘Now that I know what you’re about’: Black feminist reflections on power in the research relationship. Qualitative Research, 20(5), 519-533. 

Teaching

Overview

I teach across a range of areas in Sociology including gender, sexuality and inequalities, race and ethnicity, research methodologies and health and well-being. I also supervise undergraduate and postgraduate dissertations in these related areas.

My teaching is shaped by feminist and critical race pedagogies that value collaboration and co-creation. For me, the ideal classroom is one where ideas are exchanged, lived experience is recognised and we engage with each other respectfully.

Supervision

I currently supervise 3 PhD students:

• Yijun Ren: ‘A comparative study of policy frameworks affecting parental leave implementation in the UK and Japan’
• Lindiwe Seotsanyana: ‘Fertility, motherhood, family and transgender people in South Africa’
• Stephanie Richards: ‘What bitter struggles have our spirits known: Recognising the Caribbean female legacy of empowerment and oppression’

I welcome applicants interested in reproduction and its intersection with race, sexuality, migration and/or disability.

External Activity

Memberships

• 2023 - co-founder of the Radical Mothering Research Collective with Sarah Werner Boada (University of Warwick)
• 2023 - core member of the Families and Social Policy group, Social Policy Association 
• 2023-2026 - member of the Working Families Academic Advisory Board

Editorial duties

• 2023 - Editorial board member, Sociology
• 2021-2025 - Associate editor, Families, Relationships and Societies 
• 2016-2020 - Editorial assistant and book reviews editor, Feminist Encounters: A Journal of Critical Studies in Culture and Politics