Dr Megan Todd

As Course Leader for Sociology, Megan is responsible for ensuring the course meets the changing needs of today’s students; she has many years’ experience of curriculum development. Her broad interests in the field of feminist theory and sociological understandings of sexuality and gender, including theorising the relationships sexuality, gender and violence, have informed the specialised modules she teaches to final year students. Fostering a culture of academic enquiry and engagement is an important aspect of any successful degree programme, as such, soon after joining the university, Megan established a Gender and Sexualities Reading Group for staff and postgraduate students across the university. She has also invited guest speakers, such as Beatrix Campbell and Hibo Wardere, to talk to staff and students, has co-organised the showing of films such as The Hunting Ground - with a discussion panel - and had the pleasure of interviewing Nira Yuval-Davis and Pragna Patel for the 2018 Women's Spring Conference, organised by UCLan's Institute for Black Atlantic Research. She has also established journal and film clubs for undergraduate students.

Megan has over twenty years’ teaching experience. Prior to working at UCLan, she was a lecturer in the School of Applied Social Studies at Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen. Whilst completing her ESRC-funded PhD at Newcastle University, she taught at the universities of Newcastle and Sunderland. Before returning to higher education, Megan was a teacher in English at a secondary school in Cumbria, where she established a new A Level in English Language. In the years before training to teach, she worked for the National Trust, where she was research assistant for the Historic Buildings Representative East Anglia. Megan has been invited to contribute to several public engagement events – she was an invited panel member for ‘Righting the Wrongs? The Legacy of Alan Turing’ at Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre. Megan was also invited by the University of Warwick’s debating union to be a panel member of ‘This House Would Boycott the Sochi Winter Olympics’. She has made a contribution, on invitation, to The Conversation, entitled ‘New data shows sexual boundaries are changing – but what do we really know?’. Megan has also appeared in a Fixers production for Granada TV on girls in sport, as well as speaking on BBC Radio Lancashire. She has also been consulted for various media print articles, including for The Telegraph, IBTimes and Women’s Health.

Megan has recently co-developed an anti-discrimination toolkit for tackling online abuse directed at LGBTQ+ communities. It is part of a project aimed at working towards online inclusivity. Visit the LGBTQ+ online inclusivity toolkit