Rate My Professor Signe Ravn

Associate Professor Signe Ravn serves in the School of Social and Political Sciences within the Faculty of Arts at the University of Melbourne. She obtained her PhD from Aarhus University in Denmark in 2012. Before joining the University of Melbourne in 2015, Ravn held positions at the Danish National Centre for Social Research, including Senior Researcher from April to September 2015 and Researcher from August 2012 to March 2015. At Melbourne, she advanced from Senior Lecturer to her current appointment as Associate Professor in Sociology.

Ravn's research specializations include the sociology of youth, focusing on processes of marginalisation, young people and risk, gender, disadvantage, and transitions to adulthood. She studies how young individuals in complex and disadvantaged situations navigate their present and imagine their futures. Her methodological expertise encompasses qualitative interviews, focus groups, and creative visual methods such as photo-elicitation, life charts, and drawings. Ravn co-hosts the Narrative Now podcast and contributes to advancements in narrative research methodologies. Key publications feature "What Is 'publicly available data'? Exploring blurred public–private boundaries and ethical practices through a case study on Instagram" (2020, Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics), "From recreational to regular drug use: qualitative interviews with young clubbers" (2011, Sociology of Health & Illness), "Cannabis careers revisited: Applying Howard S. Becker's theory to present-day cannabis use" (2014, Social Science & Medicine), "The currency of images: Risk, value and gendered power dynamics in young men’s accounts of sexting" (2021, Feminist Media Studies), "Towards a sociological understanding of sexting as a social practice: a case study of university undergraduate men" (2020, Sociology), "Narrative sense-making and prospective social action: methodological challenges and new directions" (2020, International Journal of Social Research Methodology), and "Captured and captioned: Representing family life on Instagram" (2023, New Media & Society). With 46 publications documented on ResearchGate, her scholarship impacts understandings of youth risk cultures, gendered practices, digital ethics, and qualitative inquiry. She teaches subjects including Sociology of Youth (SOCI20014) and Talking with People: Doing Interviews (SOCI20019).