Joseph Buckley is a social anthropologist whose research looks at the intersection of masculinity, neoliberalism and Islam. Following studies at SOAS and Oxford, he completed his PhD at University College London in 2025.
Joseph’s doctoral fieldwork took place in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, where he explored the everyday lives of working-class young men. His thesis considered how these men adapt to a rapidly liberalising economy and intensive urban transformation, their successes and failures in attempting to achieve a masculine ideal, and the ways in which their dreams and hopes for the future shape their everyday lives. As part of the INFRAEMPIRE project, Joseph will consider Turkish infrastructure projects in Tashkent. His research will explore the way in which local residents’ respond to large-scale infrastructure projects, and how these projects inflect everyday understandings of geopolitics.