Dr Emma Watkins

Dr Emma Watkins

Department of Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology
Associate Professor in Criminology

Contact details

Twitter
@emmadwatkins
Address
School of Social Policy and Society
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Emma is an Associate Professor in Criminology and an AHRC Research, Development & Engagement Fellow (2023-25) working on ‘Institutional Abuse: Reformatory Schools and the use of physical force’. As an historical criminologist, Emma uses a social harm perspective in her work to explore the use of institutions and policy to control marginalised populations. Emma was awarded her PhD at University of Liverpool. That thesis led to the monograph: Life Courses of Young Convicts Transported to Van Diemen's Land . Out of that project came her work on pauper-emancipists and the criminalisation of poverty, which can be heard for free here

Qualifications

  • 2020: Fellow of the HEA
  • 2014-2018: University of Liverpool - Doctor of Philosophy

Teaching

UG Criminology Programme modules including:

  • Histories of Criminology Justice & Empire
  • Violence in a Global Context
  • UG & PGT Dissertation Supervision

Postgraduate supervision

SEDA Accredited: Supervising Doctoral Research

Emma would be interested in supervising PhD theses related to Historical Criminology and Crime History in the following areas:

  • Institutional history
  • The history of the criminal justice system
  • Colonial history
  • Juvenile offending and justice
  • Nineteenth-century crime and punishment
  • Other related topics

Research

As an historical criminologist, Emma uses a social harm perspective in her work to explore the use of institutions and policy to control marginalised populations.

Emma was awarded an AHRC Research, Development & Engagement Fellowship 2023-25 working on ‘Institutional Abuse: Reformatory Schools and the use of physical force’. For more information see her blog.

Emma was awarded Australian Bicentennial Fellowship at Kings College London (2018), HEIF Small Grant Funding from Middlesex University (2019), and Southlands Methodist Trust Funding University of Roehampton (2020) to underpin her research into the life courses of pauper-emancipists. For more information, please see her blog and podcast.

After completing her PhD at the University of Liverpool, with the historical criminological project The Digital Panopticon, her thesis led to the monograph: Life Courses of Young Convicts Transported to Van Diemen's Land , and public facing publication Criminal Children

Publications

Watkins, E. (forthcoming) Transportation, Post-Penal Identity and the Life Course. (Emerald Advances in Historical Research). 

Watkins, E. & Bland, E (eds.) (forthcoming) Imperial Crime & Punishment: Approaches from Historical Criminology (Emerald Advances in Historical Research).  

Watkins E. (2023) ‘Path Dependency: Investigating Institutional Continuity and Change Across the Tasmanian Convict & Pauper System’, The Howard Journal of Crime and Justice.  

Watkins, E. (2021) ‘Juvenile Convicts and their Vandemonian Criminal Careers’, The Journal of Australian Colonial History, vol.23 87-102. ISSN:1441-0370  

Lightowlers, C., Sanchez, J. P. & Watkins, E. (2020)‘Contextual culpability: How drinking and social context impact upon sentencing of violence’, Criminology & Criminal Justice 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895820972160  

Watkins, E. (2020) Book Review: Children’s voices from the past: new historical and interdisciplinary perspectives (eds.) Moruzi, K., Musgrove, N. & Leahy, C. In Childhood in the Past. https://doi.org/10.1080/17585716.2020.1791493 

Watkins, E. (2020) Life Courses of Young Convicts Transported to Van Diemen's Land, (London: Bloomsbury). ISBN 9781350081260  

Watkins, E. & Godfrey, B. (2018) Criminal Children: Researching Juvenile Offenders 1820-1920, (Pen & Sword). ISBN 9781526738080  

Watkins, E. (2018) ‘Transported Beyond the Seas: Criminal Juveniles’, In Nineteenth Century Childhoods in Interdisciplinary and International Perspectives, Series: Childhood in the Past Vol 6 (eds.) Baxter J E. & Ellis, M. (Oxford: Oxbow). ISBN: 9781785708435 

Alker, Z. & Watkins, E. (2018) ‘History, life course criminology and digital methods: new directions for conceptualizing juvenile justice in Europe’ In Juvenile Justice in Europe: Past, Present and Future (ed.) Goldson, B. (Oxon: Routledge). ISBN 9781138721371  

Watkins, E. (2018) ‘Juvenile convicts and their colonial familial lives’, The History of the Family, 23(2) 307-328. https://doi.org/10.1080/1081602X.2017.1417882  

Watkins, E. (2017) “The Criminal Class” and “Life Course Analysis”, In Companion to Crime and Criminal Justice History (eds.) Turner, J., Taylor, T., Morley, S. & Corteen, K A. (Bristol: Policy Press). ISBN 978-1447325871