Dr. Greti-Iulia Ivana is a senior lecturer within the Media, Culture and Society Subject Area (part of the Sociology Division) at the University of Glasgow. She is the PGR applications convenor for Sociology. She is one of the founders of the Digital Society MSc, on which she continues to teach a core course. 

Dr. Ivana is currently working on a book project entitled The Transformation of Worth: What Do We Value in Techno-Capitalism? (Bristol University Press, forthcoming) which reflects on the mix of evolving economic and moral value(s) which guide contemporary digital societies. 

A relational sociologist, Dr. Ivana is also the author of the book Social Ties in Online Networking (Palgrave 2018), which looks at the links between non-copresence, online communication and bond formation/maintenance.

Some of the main themes in Dr. Ivana's previous work are: negotiations of norms and boundaries in personal ties, physical and relational distance, virtual experiences of togetherness and digitally mediated meaning making. Some of her recent research analyses the ways in which data is monetised on streamling platforms, as well as the links between digital technologies and an increased reliance on data-driven quantification in various aspects of social life. 

Previously, Dr. Ivana was a based at the Department of Sociology in Uppsala University. She holds a PhD with the highest distinction in Information and Knowledge Society from the Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3-UOC) in Barcelona. 

My work focuses on two broad fields, with some specific areas of expertise within them.

1) Digital sociology, the politics of technology and critical approaches to the digital economy:

• the role of data markets in techno-capitalism;
• power and trust in human-machine interactions;
• the relationship between data protection policies and privacy breaches/data harms; 
• algorithms, digital inequality and social justice;
• technological futures and imaginaries;
• the functioning of digital platforms and infrastructures;
• the impacts of automation/AI on knowledge production, expertise and work environments. 

2) Relational sociology, everyday networks and social ties

• informal bonds and intimacy, especially with an online or mediated component;
• emotions;
• transnational social networks;
• the making and maintenance of social capital;
• friendship, family relations and close bonds. 

Research groups

• Media, Culture & Society

List by: Type | Date

- Carnegie Trust Research Incentive Grant: 'Settlement or Continued Trajectories of Migration - The case of Young Highly Skilled Europeans in Scotland and Germany' (2021-2022), PI

I am interested in supervising projects on:

• digital changes in work, organisations and everyday life;
• digital platforms and infrastructures;
• the role of algorithms, machine learning and AI in shaping social and political phenomena;
• data practices, as well as risks and harms; 
• digital surveillance and datafication, both through social media and through smart objects/sensing technologies;
• technological futures and innovation;
• AI and data regulations and their impacts;
• public/private uses of digital infrastructures;
• close bonds, intimacy and emotions. 

Current PhD Students:

• Brian Keenan 

Current teaching:

• Sociology of Knowledge and Cognition (hons);
• Digital Sociology (hons);
• Practicing Research and Working with Data in the Digital Age (PGT). 

Past teaching:

• Gender Relations, postgraduate level;
• Postgraduate dissertation workshop.

Membership in Professional Organisations

• European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST)
• Society for Social Studies of Science (4S)

Recent presentations

08/2024: "Smart device manufacturing and the trade-rentiership convergence", "Assetization as Techno-Economic Lock-in" panel at the EASST-4S Conference, Vrije Universitet Amsterdam;

03/2024: "Exploring the Cultural Significance of Financialised Digital Footprints", invited talk at the Sociology Seminar, University of St. Gallen;

06/2023: "Streaming and the Making of Socio-Technical Assets", "Sociotechnical Datastudies" panel at the 6th Nordic STS Conference, Oslo University;

10/2019: Highly skilled Romanians in Sweden and their technolgically mediated bonds", at the Digital Fortress Europe, Exploring Boundaries Between Media, Migration and Technology, Vrije Universiteit Brussels;

09/2018 “Media consumption and the lived experience of other people’s narratives”, at the ”Dis / connection: Conflicts, Activism and Reciprocity Online and Beyond”, Uppsala University;

07/2018 “Migrants’ emotional geographies and the resistance of the material world”, at the 19th Nordic Migration Research Conference 2018, Linköping University, Norrköping Campus;

11/2017 “Bonds and Balance in the Lives of Highly Skilled Migrants”, invited talk at CESSMIR, the Centre for the Social Study of Migration and Refugees, University of Ghent.