Role
Dr Stovell has been a Research Fellow at the Centre for Diversity Policy Research and Practice since June 2021. Prior to this she was a Lecturer in Sociology at Oxford Brookes. Her research interests lie in the areas of gender, social inequalities, work and family intersections, fatherhood and masculinities, motherhood, and work life balance.
She has an ESRC-funded PhD from Lancaster University Management School, which investigated the process by which couples negotiate the division of paid work and childcare at the transition to parenthood. She also holds an MSc in Sociology from the University of Oxford and a first-class degree in French and Italian from UCL. As well as academic roles, Dr Stovell has worked in the charity sector and as a Social Researcher for the Department for Work and Pensions.
Teaching and supervision
Previously module leader on:
- Researching the Social World
- Gender & Society
- The Sociology of Emotions
- Sociology Dissertation
In addition, previously taught on:
- Social Differences and Divisions
- Foundations of Social Theory
Research
Dr Stovell is currently coordinating Oxford Brookes' contribution to the EU-funded RESISTIRE project, which draws together ten European partners and a wider network of researchers to analyse the impact of COVID-19 policies on gendered inequalities. She is also a co-investigator on the British Council funded Women in Science: UK-Brazil Gender Equality Partnership, supporting the development of an Athena SWAN inspired gender equality scheme among Brazilian partner universities. She also has involvement in GEARING roles, a European project seeking to implement gender equality plans in research institutions.
Alongside this, she is leading research with collaborators in the Netherlands that challenges common conceptualisations of employment status and part-time work. In the past, she has also collaborated on research looking at work-life balance in the creative industries; fathering practices in the UK; the division of domestic labour; and welfare support for older jobseekers.
Centres and institutes
Projects
Publications
Professional information
Memberships of professional bodies
Dr Stovell is an active contributor to the Government Equalities Office (GEO) Workplace and Gender Equality research network, and has presented her research on parental leave decision making to key stakeholders at the GEO, the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Department for Work and Pensions.