Ruth Penfold-Mounce
Biographic Data
| ID | 291518 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Ruth Penfold-Mounce |
| GIVEN NAMES | Ruth |
| FAMILY NAME | Penfold-Mounce |
| SIGNATURE | PENFOLD-MOUNCE R |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of York |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1344-460X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 81 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2009 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Public engagement, pedagogy and edgework in death studies: Ruth Penfold-Mounce in conversation with Bethan Michael-Fox
This conversation offers insights from Professor Ruth Penfold-Mounce into research with a cultural focus in Death Studies. It explores pedagogical approaches to teaching Death Studies and the development and use of learning on the move through digitally enhanced self guided walks for public engagement. Interdisciplinarity and disciplinary tensions and the development of Death Studies communities are discussed, and Professor Penfold-Mounce provide…
Walking amongst the dead: Learning on the Move
Mobile methodology has long been adopted in social science as a data collection tool and there is an established industry focused on cemeteries and ghost walks as a novel and appealing way to engage audiences in mortality. However, death studies have rarely sought to embrace mobile methods as an opportunity for innovation in teaching to enhance Higher Education (HE) student learning. This paper will reflect on the value and potential of adapting …
Creative Methodologies for a Mobile Criminology: Walking as Critical Pedagogy
In this article, we build upon research that combines walking as a research method alongside participatory and biographical research to teach criminology and generate criminological knowledge and understanding in sensory and corporeal ways. We argue for a mobile criminology that attends to space, place, and time to analyse theories and concepts in criminology, as well as to undertake and apply research. In this article we share a biographical wal…
Value, Bodily Capital, and Gender Inequality after Death
This article examines dead celebrities' posthumous careers and considers how gendered inequalities around possession, value, and bodily capital are produced and consumed even after death. The concept of capital plays a significant role in studies of culture, usually in relation to individual possession and personal, social, and material advantage. 'Bodily capital' sheds particular light upon the different ways bodies can possess value and how the…
Death, The Dead and Popular Culture
Portrayals of death and the dead are everywhere within popular culture revealing much about contemporary society’s engagement with mortality. Drawing upon celebrity posthumous careers, organ transplantation mythology and the fictional dead, this book considers how representations of the dead in popular culture exert powerful agency.
Churchyard and cemetery: Tradition and modernity in Rural North Yorkshire
Rugg has an established research reputation in death studies regarding the history of ownership and management of burial space. Cemeteries, it would seem, are her passion. Churchyard and Cemetery
Death, the Dead and Popular Culture
The celebration of death in contemporary culture
In The Celebration of Death in Contemporary Culture, Khapaeva (2017) explores the ascent of the cult of death in contemporary Western culture through literature, film, ritual and commodities. Khapa
William Corder and the Red Barn Murder: Journeys of the criminal body
William Corder and the Red Barn Murder: journeys of the criminal body." Mortality, 21(2), pp. 185–186
Corpses, popular culture and forensic science: Public obsession with death
The cadaver has been heralded as ‘pop culture’s new star’. Foltyn’s claim will be expanded in that it does not adequately consider the underlying components of the rise of the corpse in popular culture. It will be argued that forensic science portrayals in popular culture play a critical role in fuelling public obsession with death and cadavers. A particular focus will be taken upon the sociological concept of the gaze and using it to explore how…
Politicians, celebrities and social media: A case of informalisation
With electoral politics no longer organised by social class, politicians increasingly seek to relate to a broad spectrum of citizens and part of their relatability is conjured through more casual, informal performances aimed at cultivating authenticity. The various platforms of social media promote forms of authentic communication by blurring the public/private divide, creating ‘spontaneous’ and instant access to ‘real life’. This article seeks t…
Mediating and remediating death, studies in death, materiality and the origin of time volume 2
The poetics of crime: Understanding and researching crime and deviance through creative sources
It is perhaps this different perspective that enables him to identify a
Conducting frivolous research in neoliberal universities: What Is the Value of Glossy Topics
Back in 2010, for the launch of Celebrity Studies, David Beer and I wrote a Forum piece making the case for academic study of celebrity as an example of ‘researching glossy topics’, which are topic
Youth and media
"Youth and media." Information, Communication & Society, 17(2), pp. 281–282 Notes on contributorRuth Penfold-Mounce is a Lecturer in Criminology, University of York. Her research interests include celebrity, crime and deviance and dark tourism
The last laugh: Folk Humor, celebrity culture, and mass-mediated disasters in the digital age
"The last laugh: Folk Humor, celebrity culture, and mass-mediated disasters in the digital age." Information, Communication & Society, 17(7), pp. 915–916 Notes on contributorDr Ruth Penfold-Mounce is a lecturer in Criminology, University of York, UK. Her research interests are in celebrity and crime, as well as morbidity and culture
The Wire as Social Science-fiction
This article examines the HBO television series The Wire as an example of a popular cultural form that stimulates the sociological imagination. It provides some examples of how it functions to do this. A brief case study of one character - 'Snoop' - is examined to illustrate a set of more general observations. It is suggested that The Wire, although still containing strong narrative elements, provides an intriguing popular cultural example of wha…
Consuming criminal corpses: Fascination with the dead criminal body
The body of the criminal has long held a macabre fascination. From the earliest times to the nineteenth century, the public execution of criminals in Britain and America drew large crowds to witness the punishment being carried out. Even after the termination of public executions, the fascination with death through the criminal corpse has continued. This is demonstrated by a tourist-like interest and curiosity emerging to the extent of celebrated…
Researching glossy topics: The Case of the Academic Study of Celebrity
The launch of Celebrity Studies journal represents an ideal opportunity to reflect upon the general trajectory of celebrity as an academic topic. This is a particularly pressing task given the increasingly uncertain socio-economic conditions within which we find ourselves. To this end, we draw upon the recorded outputs of the academy to provide a quantitative visualisation of the study of celebrity. To complement this statistical overview we weav…
Celebrity Gossip and the New Melodramatic Imagination
This article uses a range of media sources to 'follow' or 'trace' the well-known celebrity Miley Cyrus. Through the development of the concept of a new melodramatic imagination the case study develops the methodological potentials of the types of online archives that now exist. In this instance the authors exercise their own melodramatic imaginations to draw out substantive issues relevant to the case of Miley Cyrus. The article therefore has two…
The Wire as Social Science-fiction
This article examines the HBO television series The Wire as an example of a popular cultural form that stimulates the sociological imagination. It provides some examples of how it functions to do this. A brief case study of one character - 'Snoop' - is examined to illustrate a set of more general observations. It is suggested that The Wire, although still containing strong narrative elements, provides an intriguing popular cultural example of wha…
Politicians, celebrities and social media: A case of informalisation
With electoral politics no longer organised by social class, politicians increasingly seek to relate to a broad spectrum of citizens and part of their relatability is conjured through more casual, informal performances aimed at cultivating authenticity. The various platforms of social media promote forms of authentic communication by blurring the public/private divide, creating ‘spontaneous’ and instant access to ‘real life’. This article seeks t…
Researching glossy topics: The Case of the Academic Study of Celebrity
The launch of Celebrity Studies journal represents an ideal opportunity to reflect upon the general trajectory of celebrity as an academic topic. This is a particularly pressing task given the increasingly uncertain socio-economic conditions within which we find ourselves. To this end, we draw upon the recorded outputs of the academy to provide a quantitative visualisation of the study of celebrity. To complement this statistical overview we weav…
Celebrity Gossip and the New Melodramatic Imagination
This article uses a range of media sources to 'follow' or 'trace' the well-known celebrity Miley Cyrus. Through the development of the concept of a new melodramatic imagination the case study develops the methodological potentials of the types of online archives that now exist. In this instance the authors exercise their own melodramatic imaginations to draw out substantive issues relevant to the case of Miley Cyrus. The article therefore has two…
Creative Methodologies for a Mobile Criminology: Walking as Critical Pedagogy
In this article, we build upon research that combines walking as a research method alongside participatory and biographical research to teach criminology and generate criminological knowledge and understanding in sensory and corporeal ways. We argue for a mobile criminology that attends to space, place, and time to analyse theories and concepts in criminology, as well as to undertake and apply research. In this article we share a biographical wal…
Value, Bodily Capital, and Gender Inequality after Death
This article examines dead celebrities' posthumous careers and considers how gendered inequalities around possession, value, and bodily capital are produced and consumed even after death. The concept of capital plays a significant role in studies of culture, usually in relation to individual possession and personal, social, and material advantage. 'Bodily capital' sheds particular light upon the different ways bodies can possess value and how the…
Conducting frivolous research in neoliberal universities: What Is the Value of Glossy Topics
Back in 2010, for the launch of Celebrity Studies, David Beer and I wrote a Forum piece making the case for academic study of celebrity as an example of ‘researching glossy topics’, which are topic
The celebration of death in contemporary culture
In The Celebration of Death in Contemporary Culture, Khapaeva (2017) explores the ascent of the cult of death in contemporary Western culture through literature, film, ritual and commodities. Khapa
The poetics of crime: Understanding and researching crime and deviance through creative sources
It is perhaps this different perspective that enables him to identify a
Celebrity Gossip and the New Melodramatic Imagination
This article uses a range of media sources to 'follow' or 'trace' the well-known celebrity Miley Cyrus. Through the development of the concept of a new melodramatic imagination the case study develops the methodological potentials of the types of online archives that now exist. In this instance the authors exercise their own melodramatic imaginations to draw out substantive issues relevant to the case of Miley Cyrus. The article therefore has two…
Consuming criminal corpses: Fascination with the dead criminal body
The body of the criminal has long held a macabre fascination. From the earliest times to the nineteenth century, the public execution of criminals in Britain and America drew large crowds to witness the punishment being carried out. Even after the termination of public executions, the fascination with death through the criminal corpse has continued. This is demonstrated by a tourist-like interest and curiosity emerging to the extent of celebrated…
Researching glossy topics: The Case of the Academic Study of Celebrity
The launch of Celebrity Studies journal represents an ideal opportunity to reflect upon the general trajectory of celebrity as an academic topic. This is a particularly pressing task given the increasingly uncertain socio-economic conditions within which we find ourselves. To this end, we draw upon the recorded outputs of the academy to provide a quantitative visualisation of the study of celebrity. To complement this statistical overview we weav…
The Wire as Social Science-fiction
This article examines the HBO television series The Wire as an example of a popular cultural form that stimulates the sociological imagination. It provides some examples of how it functions to do this. A brief case study of one character - 'Snoop' - is examined to illustrate a set of more general observations. It is suggested that The Wire, although still containing strong narrative elements, provides an intriguing popular cultural example of wha…
Youth and media
"Youth and media." Information, Communication & Society, 17(2), pp. 281–282 Notes on contributorRuth Penfold-Mounce is a Lecturer in Criminology, University of York. Her research interests include celebrity, crime and deviance and dark tourism
The last laugh: Folk Humor, celebrity culture, and mass-mediated disasters in the digital age
"The last laugh: Folk Humor, celebrity culture, and mass-mediated disasters in the digital age." Information, Communication & Society, 17(7), pp. 915–916 Notes on contributorDr Ruth Penfold-Mounce is a lecturer in Criminology, University of York, UK. Her research interests are in celebrity and crime, as well as morbidity and culture
Mediating and remediating death, studies in death, materiality and the origin of time volume 2
The poetics of crime: Understanding and researching crime and deviance through creative sources
It is perhaps this different perspective that enables him to identify a
Conducting frivolous research in neoliberal universities: What Is the Value of Glossy Topics
Back in 2010, for the launch of Celebrity Studies, David Beer and I wrote a Forum piece making the case for academic study of celebrity as an example of ‘researching glossy topics’, which are topic
William Corder and the Red Barn Murder: Journeys of the criminal body
William Corder and the Red Barn Murder: journeys of the criminal body." Mortality, 21(2), pp. 185–186
Corpses, popular culture and forensic science: Public obsession with death
The cadaver has been heralded as ‘pop culture’s new star’. Foltyn’s claim will be expanded in that it does not adequately consider the underlying components of the rise of the corpse in popular culture. It will be argued that forensic science portrayals in popular culture play a critical role in fuelling public obsession with death and cadavers. A particular focus will be taken upon the sociological concept of the gaze and using it to explore how…
Politicians, celebrities and social media: A case of informalisation
With electoral politics no longer organised by social class, politicians increasingly seek to relate to a broad spectrum of citizens and part of their relatability is conjured through more casual, informal performances aimed at cultivating authenticity. The various platforms of social media promote forms of authentic communication by blurring the public/private divide, creating ‘spontaneous’ and instant access to ‘real life’. This article seeks t…
The celebration of death in contemporary culture
In The Celebration of Death in Contemporary Culture, Khapaeva (2017) explores the ascent of the cult of death in contemporary Western culture through literature, film, ritual and commodities. Khapa
Death, The Dead and Popular Culture
Portrayals of death and the dead are everywhere within popular culture revealing much about contemporary society’s engagement with mortality. Drawing upon celebrity posthumous careers, organ transplantation mythology and the fictional dead, this book considers how representations of the dead in popular culture exert powerful agency.
Churchyard and cemetery: Tradition and modernity in Rural North Yorkshire
Rugg has an established research reputation in death studies regarding the history of ownership and management of burial space. Cemeteries, it would seem, are her passion. Churchyard and Cemetery
Death, the Dead and Popular Culture
Value, Bodily Capital, and Gender Inequality after Death
This article examines dead celebrities' posthumous careers and considers how gendered inequalities around possession, value, and bodily capital are produced and consumed even after death. The concept of capital plays a significant role in studies of culture, usually in relation to individual possession and personal, social, and material advantage. 'Bodily capital' sheds particular light upon the different ways bodies can possess value and how the…
Creative Methodologies for a Mobile Criminology: Walking as Critical Pedagogy
In this article, we build upon research that combines walking as a research method alongside participatory and biographical research to teach criminology and generate criminological knowledge and understanding in sensory and corporeal ways. We argue for a mobile criminology that attends to space, place, and time to analyse theories and concepts in criminology, as well as to undertake and apply research. In this article we share a biographical wal…
Public engagement, pedagogy and edgework in death studies: Ruth Penfold-Mounce in conversation with Bethan Michael-Fox
This conversation offers insights from Professor Ruth Penfold-Mounce into research with a cultural focus in Death Studies. It explores pedagogical approaches to teaching Death Studies and the development and use of learning on the move through digitally enhanced self guided walks for public engagement. Interdisciplinarity and disciplinary tensions and the development of Death Studies communities are discussed, and Professor Penfold-Mounce provide…
Walking amongst the dead: Learning on the Move
Mobile methodology has long been adopted in social science as a data collection tool and there is an established industry focused on cemeteries and ghost walks as a novel and appealing way to engage audiences in mortality. However, death studies have rarely sought to embrace mobile methods as an opportunity for innovation in teaching to enhance Higher Education (HE) student learning. This paper will reflect on the value and potential of adapting …
Sociology (15 works) · Art (12 works) · History (9 works) · Media studies (9 works) · Criminology (7 works) · Law (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Psychology (7 works) · Aesthetics (6 works) · Computer Science (6 works)