Deborah Leslie

I teach courses on economic geography, labour geography, feminist geography and the cultural economy. My most recent research is on the social economy. In particular, I am researching Work Integration Social Enterprises and the role they play in integrating marginalized workers into the labour force in Toronto and Montreal. I am also conducting research on craft work, and on practices of commoning, collectivity and care in the craft sector. A lot of my work also concerns precarious work in cultural industries and on gendered and racial inequalities in this work. I have done research on industrial and graphic design, advertising, fashion, art, furniture and the circus. In addition to work on labour, I have an interest on urban cultural policies, the shift towards neoliberal regimes of urban governance and urban economic development policies designed to foster creativity. The spatial and temporal logic of commodity chains and networks, and ethical issues surrounding consumption, has also been a focus of my work.

Publications

Rantisi, N and Leslie, D. 2021. In and Against the Neoliberal State: the Precarious Siting of Work Integration Social Enterprises as a Counter-Movement in Montreal, Quebec. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space. 53(2): 349-370.

Black, S, Fox Miller, C, and Leslie, D. 2019, “Gender, Precarity and Hybrid Forms of Work Identity in the Virtual Domestic Arts and Crafts Industry in Canada and the U.S.”. Gender, Place and Culture. 26(2): 272-292.

Leslie, D and Rantisi, N. 2019. “Deskilling in Cultural Industries: Corporatization, Standardization and the Erosion of Creativity at the Cirque du Soleil”
Geoforum. 99: 257-266.