Dr Caroline Gatrell
PhD Lancaster, MBA Lancaster (awarded with Distinction), MA London, BA Manchester
Senior Lecturer
Department
Management Learning and Leadership
Current Teaching
I enjoy supervising PhDs on sociologies of health, work and family in the context of management practices.
I undertake full spectrum teaching: lectures, seminars, dissertation supervision face-to-face and on-line. I teach research methods on DMLL's MA programmes, the School's research training programme and the MSc in Managment. I convene the module 'Sociology of Childbirth' on Lancaster's undergraduate Medicine degree programme.
Research Interests
My research centres on sociologies of health, work and family. Through researching personal lives and relationships, I examine interrelations between the reproductive labour of parenting and the productive labour of paid work. I undertake these investigations through theoretically informed empirical research, drawing upon notions of the body and gender. Specifically, I explore the embodied and emotional experiences of mothers and fathers in relation to health, household labour, paid work and childcare. In particular, I focus on the ‘leaky’ maternal body and the gendered nature of management practices. I investigate the dynamics of everyday lives using mixed research methods including the collection and analysis of netnographic data.
Recent publications include:
Gatrell C. (2011) 'I'm a bad mum' Pregnant Presenteeism and Poor Health at Work, Social Science and Medicine, Vol 72: 478 - 485
Gatrell C. (2011) Managing the Maternal Body, International Journal of Management Reviews, Vol 13: 97 - 112
Gatrell C. (2011) Policy and the Pregnant Body at Work: Strategies of Secrecy, Silence and Supra Performance, Gender, Work and Organization, Vol 18 (2): 158 - 181
Gatrell C. (2011) Putting Pregnancy in its Place: Conceiving Pregnancy as Carework in the Workplace Health and Place Vol 17 (2): 395 - 402
Burnett, S., Gatrell, C., Cooper, CLC., and Sparrow, P (2010), Well balanced Families: A gendered analysis of work-life balance policies and work-family practices, Gender in Management, an International Journal Vol 25 (7): 534 - 549
Current Research
In addition to the research project 'Work Life Balance: Working for Fathers', I am developing research on the interralations between the maternal body, employment and health. I currently have three research monographs in progress:
1. Peyton, N. and Gatrell, C. Managing Clergy Lives: Obedience, Sacrifice, Intimacy.
2. Bevan, V. and Gatrell, C. Knowing her Place: Positioning Women in Science.
3. Gatrell, C. Managing the Maternal Body: Paid work, personal labour and motherhood
Research Grants
'Work Life Balance: Working for Fathers? Lottery Research Fund (2009 – 2011): Awarded £332,000 jointly with the charity Working Families from the Lottery Research Fund.Purpose: As P.I. in collaboration with ‘Working Families’. and with Simon Burnett, Cary Cooper and Paul Sparrow, I am exploring paternal well-being in the context of employment and workplace stress.
Embodying Maternal Management (2007 – 2008): Awarded £3,259 in 2007 from University’s Small Grants CommitteePurpose: A qualitative research project investigating the conflict between mothers’ professional productive labour and the labour of maternity. This research will inform policy and HR practices in a climate which seeks to retain the talent of highly qualified women.
Staying the course? How part-time PhD students manage their own learning (2007 – 2009)Awarded £2929 from the LUMS Pump Priming SchemePurpose: to explore how professionally and/or managerially employed part-time PhD students manage their own learning.
Hard Labour: The cultural politics of reproduction (with Imogen Tyler, Sociology) awarded £2,000 from Lancaster University Institute for Advanced Studies.Purpose: development of a significant cross-departmental research project and network
Workshop: Maternal bodies November 2, 2005
Conference: Birth March 6 & 7, 2007
Profile
2005 Lancaster University Research Prize.
Awarded in recognition of pioneering research on the sociology of mothers, fathers and employment
2005 Lancaster University Media and Communications Prize.
Awarded in recognition of successful dissemination of research on parenting and employment to a wide set of audiences
Publications
- Gatrell C J, Cooper C L, Sparrow P R and Burnett S, 2011, 'Fatherhood and flexible working: a contradiction in terms?', in Work-life Integration of Professionals, Springer, Berlin
View details - Gatrell C J, 2011, 'Managing the maternal body: a comprehensive review and transdisciplinary analysis', International Journal of Management Reviews
View details - Gatrell C J, 2010, 'Policy and the pregnant body at work: strategies of secrecy, silence and supra-performance', Gender, Work and Organisation
View details - Gatrell C J, 2010, 'Putting pregnancy in its place: conceiving pregnancy as carework in the workplace', Health and Place
View details - Gatrell C J, 2009, 'Safeguarding subjects? A reflexive appraisal of researcher accountability in qualitative interviews', Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management, vol 4, no. 2, pp. 110-122.
View details - Gatrell C J and Cooper C L, 2008, 'Work-life balance: working for whom?', European Journal of International Management, vol 2, no. 1, pp. 71-86.
View details - Gatrell C J and Cooper C L, 2007, '(No) cracks in the glass ceiling: women managers, stress and the barriers to success', in The Handbook on Women in Business and Management, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, pp. 57-77, ISBN: 1845424328
View details - Gatrell C J, 2007, 'A fractional commitment? Part-time employment and the maternal body', The International Journal of Human Resource Management, vol 18, no. 3, pp. 462-475.
View details - Gatrell C J, 2007, 'Whose child is it anyway? The negotiation of parental entitlements within marriage', The Sociological Review, vol 55, no. 2, pp. 353-373.
View details - Gatrell C J, 2007, 'Secrets and lies: breastfeeding and professional paid work', Social Science and Medicine, pp. 393-404.
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