TEACHING 

Dr Philip McDermott is a senior lecturer in Sociology within the School of Applied Social and Policy Sciences.

Philip teaches modules on the popular undergraduate programme in Sociology and currently acts as the year two tutor. He teaches an optional module on Media Sociology for year threes and a core module, also for final year students, relating to dissertation preparation and research methods. His research specialisms are especially embedded in a core module on Contemporary Irish Society for second years. 

At postgraduate level he has regularly contributed to masters programmes including the MA in Museums and Cultural Heritage where he has disseminated his expertise to students in the area of identity, heritage and multiculturalism. For several years he lectured on the MSc in Peace and Conflict Studies, a programme of which he is a proud graduate.  

In addition, he currently teaches Sociology of Health within the Graduate Entry Medical School. Philip has produced several pedagogical reports and textbook materials utilising sociological ideas for the teaching of Youth Work (With Breda Friel). This was part of an ERASMUS Plus Programme (Youth Work and You) which developed online tools for Youth Workers relating to identity in diverse settings which are now used at universities across Ireland, Australia, Finland and Estonia.

More recently, he has worked on textbook materials on global business and the use of the English language (With colleagues from Heriot-Watt University and the University of Liverpool), published by Palgrave and now used as teaching aids at several global business schools in Edinburgh, Dubai and Kuala Lumpur. 

Philip has supervised several PhD researchers to completion and is currently the external examiner for Masters programmes in cultural studies at Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh. He has also acted as an external PhD examiner for the Universities of Cardiff and Aberdeen. In 2018, he achieved Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy. 

RESEARCH

Philip’s research is concerned with the broad field of cultural identity and heritage. His work focuses specifically on the relationship between the state and the heritage of minority groups – especially linguistic and migrant minorities.

In 2021-2022, Philip was Ulster University's Distinguished Research Fellow in the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences. 

One key strand of Philip’s work is in the area of language policy and planning for (and by) migrant communities. He has a specific interest in the perception of migrant languages in public places, the ways that government and communities deal with such linguistic diversity and the manner in which multilingualism and bilingualism are dealt with in policy contexts. This work formed a central component of a highly-rated REF 2021 impact case study for the Modern Languages Unit of Assessment (Unit 26)

A second element of Philip’s research relates to concepts of heritage and identity in diverse settings. He has researched on the political dynamics of Derry’s year as UK City of Culture, and also on the context of heritage, migration and memory in Northern Ireland. 

Philip has received funding from sources such as the British Academy, the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the National Trust and the Department for International Development to support his research. Recently he was the PI on an AHRC/Living Legacies-sponsored project on the dynamics of commemorating WWI amongst migrant communities living in Northern Ireland. He was also a Co Investigator and Work Package lead on a multi-tiered AHRC project on Museums, Crisis and Covid-19. His grant income for the institution totals +£330,000 

In addition to a single authored book on migrant community languages in Northern Ireland, Dr McDermott's work has also appeared in top-ranking international journals. These include, English Today; Current Issues in Language Planning; Identities, Global Studies in Culture and Power; Ethnicities; Language Problems and Language Planning; and Ethnopolitics. He is the editor/co-editor of several collections including an edited book, three special journal editions, and a collection with the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation on the legacy of the conflict in Northern Ireland.

From 2015-16 he was the holder of a prestigious Charlemont Scholarship from the Royal Irish Academy. He has also given/been invited to deliver keynote presentations for the British Association of Applied Linguistics (University College London), for the Cambridge Bilingualism network (University of Cambridge), the Finnish Learned Society /Youth Research Network (Helsinki), and the Irish Museums Association's Museums in the City conference (Belfast).

In recognition of his international esteem, Philip has also acted as an independent research expert for the European Commission, the National Academy of Poland and he has also reviewed for the UK's Arts and Humanities Research Council. He acted as an independent expert on the Indylan project which developed mobile technologies for the teaching of indigenous languages in several regions of Europe. 

Philip's research continues to be impact-focused. He works closely with a number of NGOs representing ethnic minorities in Northern Ireland and was awarded a Breaking Barriers Award at the Northern Ireland Race Equality Awards in 2021. He was appointed, in a voluntary capacity, as policy and strategic planning advisor for the North West Migrants Forum.