Rate My Professor Rachel Billington

Dr. Rachel Billington is a Lecturer in the Media, Film and Communication programme at the University of Otago, School of Social Sciences, Humanities Division. Of Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki descent and born and raised in Auckland, New Zealand, her academic background comprises a Bachelor of Arts with double majors in Philosophy and Art History, a Graduate Diploma of Science in Psychology, a Master of Politics with Distinction, and a PhD from the University of Otago awarded in 2024. The PhD thesis, submitted to the Departments of Politics and Social Anthropology and titled “ ‘Social media gave me my life.’ Recognition, adolescence, and political identity in the algorithmic era: Coming of age online in Aotearoa,” employed interpretive phenomenological analysis informed by critical theory and continental philosophy traditions. It examined the ways in which adolescents’ identities and political worldviews are informed by their relationships with others and by the online spheres they inhabit, underpinned by the political theory of recognition à la Hegel and Honneth. This work was placed on the Otago Division of Humanities list of Exceptional Theses 2024.

Billington's research specializations are recognition theory, critical phenomenology, adolescent identity development, social media personalisation and polarisation, and epistemic injustice in the algorithmic era. She is listed as part-time academic staff in the Politics programme. Major publications include her authored book Adolescence, identity, and the politics of recognition in the social media era: Being and becoming after the algorithmic turn (Routledge, 2026, 256p), the co-authored research article “All that from two symbols?!': An Adolescence roundtable” (Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, 2026, advance online publication, with R. Overell, B. Nicholls, M.S. Daubs, and C. Fowler), verbal conference contribution “Recognition, identity, and technojustice in the Algorithmic Age: The affective politics of young people in Aotearoa New Zealand” at the New Zealand Political Studies Association (NZPSA/TKTToA) 2023/24 Annual Conference in Auckland (2024), and published proceedings “Recognition and identity in the digital age: The affective politics of young people on social media” from the Tilburg School of Humanities and Digital Sciences Annual Conference (2023).