Dr Liz Moor

My research looks at the way different forms of communication shape our economic lives. My most recent book, ‘Communication and Economic Life’ (to be published in 2021 by Polity), argues that Media and Communications scholars have typically construed ‘the economy’ too narrowly: by focusing most attention on media representations of the macroeconomy, we often ignore the more subtle ways in which different communicative forms and media knit our economic lives together.

The book traces out a variety of these communicative forms – from bank notes to price personalisation algorithms, and from literary narratives to self-promotion in the workplace – to offer a more wide-ranging account of everyday economic communication.

I have also recently published work on the communicative history of money and payment, on price personalisation and discrimination, and on women’s talk about money and relationships. I also have a working paper on the way people talk about receiving financial help from family members (the ‘bank of mum and dad’).

My previous work on communication and economic activity focused on two main areas: brands and branding, and the design industry. My book The Rise of Brands (Berg, 2007) examined the emergence of the branding industry in the UK, and traced its connection to changing trade regimes, new modes of governance and a more developed media culture. The book also looked at the relationship between branding and intellectual property regimes, and at the global, national and local dynamics at play in various types of brand communications.

A second (edited) book, Design and Creativity: policy, management and practice (Berg, 2009, with Guy Julier), looked at the use of different design methods and practices by business and government, the forms of audit, management and accountability associated with this, and their implications for traditional understandings of creativity. I have also published work exploring the extension of market logics into the public realm, and the use of ‘social marketing’ techniques by governments. Before joining the department, I taught Media and Cultural Studies at Middlesex University. I did my PhD – about the spatial and architectural dimensions of branding, and the growth of the branding industry – in the Sociology department at Goldsmiths.

Areas of supervision

I am interested in supervising postgraduate research about the communicative aspects of economic activity, particularly from the perspectives of economic sociology and the sociology of markets. Previous PhD students have written about the rise of ‘embedded branding’ on television and online in the UK and Israel, the branding of Hezbollah, and the ‘economic imaginaries’ of civil servants and journalists.

I am part of the Charisma network, and on the editorial board of the Journal of Cultural Economy, and Valuation Studies.