“This is a provocative, critical inquiry into a topic too often ignored. Neilsen has produced a meticulous, creative methodology.” • Nicole Vitellone, University of Liverpool
“This is an incredible book that makes truly field-shifting advances in the sociology of work and labour, as well as contributing exciting creative methodological innovations.” • Maddie Breeze, University of Stirling
People employed at sites of precarious work such as call centres or retail warehouses often live precarious lives. Drawing on ethnographic research in a London hostel for precarious workers, the book explores the political, analytical and practical limitations of using traditional methods of trying to make sense of life in these settings. Traditional methods are rooted in practices that emerge from privileged social positions and their enactment is deeply entangled with the processes that create these conditions in the first place. This book responds to this by experimenting with ‘precarious methods’ to enable greater agency to those placed in these precarious situations.
Jacob A. E. Nielsen has worked in a variety of precarious academic and non-academic jobs. He experiments with precarious methods and writes about precarious life with all its uncertainties, interdependencies and vulnerabilities.
LC: HD5854.2.G7 N54 2025
BISAC: SOC002010 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Anthropology/Cultural & Social; SOC026040 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Sociology/Social Theory; POL013000 POLITICAL SCIENCE/Labor & Industrial Relations
