About

Who am I?
Dr. Mark Paterson, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Pittsburgh. Previously I was Lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Exeter (2007-2011), and before that Lecturer in Philosophy and Cultural Studies at the University of the West of England (2003-2006). My Ph.D. was in Human Geography from the University of Bristol. I have an MA in Continental Philosophy from the University of Warwick, and a BA in Philosophy from the University of Reading, UK. Before academic employment I’ve been an English teacher in both Zimbabwe and Japan, and worked for the non-profit organisation the Directory of Social Change in London.

Where else can you find me?
My Faculty page at University of Pittsburgh, and author profile on Amazon. If you want to see my journal articles and book chapters, see my profiles on academia.edu | OrchidID | Mendeley. Not Google Scholar (Google-free since 2020!). You won’t find me on FaceBook, LinkedIn, Twitter, either.

What are some career highlights?
2005-6: Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Research Leave, writing my first monograph The Senses of Touch in Sydney, Australia.
2008-2011: GWR Fellowship award to look at human-robot interactions with OC Robotics, Bristol.
2010-2011: EPSRC-AHRC Science and Heritage Networking Grant (Co-I) ‘Touching the Untouchable’, on haptic modeling of prehistoric textiles
2016: Seeing With the Hands: Blindness, Vision and Touch After Descartes published with Edinburgh University Press.
2017-18: University of Pittsburgh Humanities Center Fellowship to work on book project, Movement, Measurement, Sensation [more here]
2018: Invited to curate a day of the conference-festival (Studium Generale) at Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Amsterdam, hosted by Stedelijk Museum.
2018: Elected Vice-President of Thematic Group 07: ‘Senses and Society’, International Sociological Association (ISA)
2018: Institute of Advanced Studies (IAS) ‘Vanguard Fellow’, University of Birmingham, working with ‘Embodied Geographies’ research group.
2020: Tenured at University of Pittsburgh, promoted to Associate Professor.
2022: Research Fellow, Institute of Advanced Studies in the Humanities (IASH) – School of Social and Political Science (SSPS), at University of Edinburgh, UK for a project on human-robot interaction