Dr Olimpia Burchiellaro
-
Email
olimpia.burchiellaro@essex.ac.uk -
Location
EBS.3.126H, Colchester Campus
Profile
Biography
Olimpia Burchiellaro (she/her) is an anthropologist and senior lecturer at the University of Essex, where she teaches modules on ethnographic methods, social economies, and community organizing. Her research is on queer political economy, LGBTQ+ activism, gentrification and homocapitalism. She is the author of The Gentrification of Queer Activism (Bristol University Press, 2023) and has conducted research on corporations and queer value in cities such as London, São Paulo, Nairobi and Buenos Aires. Her work is published in journals including Sexualities, Organization Studies and the International Feminist Journal of Politics. Olimpia is the incoming co-Chair of the LGBTQA Caucus at the International Studies Association (ISA). Since 2022, she also sits on the Management Committee of The Friends of the Joiners Arms, an award-winning cooperative opening London’s first community-owned queer pub. Olimpia is member and communications lead for the Centre for Commons Organizing, Value Equalities and Resilience (COVER).
Qualifications
-
BA Social Anthropology and Politics SOAS University of London,
-
PhD University of Westminster,
Research and professional activities
Conferences and presentations
Queer Communism
Historical Materialism, 7/11/2025
Community-owned queer venues
Invited presentation, Community Business Conference on Social Clubs, Community Power, and Political Participation, 11/9/2025
Queer nightlife co-operatives
Invited presentation, Worker Co-ops annual gathering, 1/6/2025
Queer, gentrificação, militarização e formas indisciplinadas de fazer RI
Invited presentation, Keynote presentation, Campina Grande, Brazil, 8/5/2025
Teaching and supervision
Current teaching responsibilities
-
Research Methods in Management and Marketing (BE425)
-
Research Project with a Community-based Organisation (BE944)
-
Democracy in Action (BE947)
Publications
Journal articles (9)
Burchiellaro, O., (2025). Making Nairobi ‘open for business’: the economic case for LGBTQ+ rights, speculative governmentality, and corporate investments in the future at the (queer and economic) frontier. Review of International Political Economy : RIPE
Burchiellaro, O., (2025). The business of belonging: Homocapitalism, homonormativity, and cu/queer economic geographies in São Paulo, Brazil. Antipode. 58 (2)
Burchiellaro, O., (2024). A (queer) CEO society? Lesbians Who Tech and the politics of extra-ordinary homonormativity. Sexualities. 27 (4), 998-1015
Cheded, M., Hutton, M., Steinfield, L., Bettany, S., Burchiellaro, O. and Venkatraman, R., (2024). Moving gender across, between and beyond the binaries: In conversation with Shona Bettany, Olimpia Burchiellaro and Rohan Venkatraman. Journal of Consumer Affairs. 58 (1), 209-222
Burchiellaro, O., (2024). The homocapitalist politics of queer tourism: global LGBTQ+ activism, queer travel, and other queer mobilities in Buenos Aires, Argentina. International Feminist Journal of Politics. 26 (2), 240-263
Burchiellaro, O., (2021). ‘There’s nowhere wonky left to go’: Gentrification, queerness and class politics of inclusion in (East) London. Gender, Work & Organization. 28 (1), 24-38
Burchiellaro, O., (2021). Queering Control and Inclusion in the Contemporary Organization: On ‘LGBT-friendly control’ and the reproduction of (queer) value. Organization Studies. 42 (5), 761-785
Burchiellaro, O., (2021). Out of time: The queer politics of postcoloniality. Gender, Work & Organization. 28 (3), 1191-1194
Burchellaro, O., Amrouche, C., Breckenridge, J., Brewis, D., Breiding Hansen, M., Hee Pedersen, C., Plotnikof, M., Pullen, A. and Burchiellaro, O., (2018). Powerful writing. Ephemera: Theory and Politics in Organization. 18 (4), 881-900
Books (1)
Burchiellaro, O., (2023). The Gentrification of Queer Activism Diversity Politics and the Promise of Inclusion in London. Bristol University Press. 1529228565. 9781529228564
Book chapters (4)
Burchiellaro, O., Queering LGBT-Friendliness: Three Possibilities (and Problems) In a Multi-Sited Ethnographic Approach to Diversity. Editors: Nørholm Just, S., Risberg, A. and Villesèche, F., . Routledge
Burchiellaro, O., Putting LGBTQ+ to work: Queer labour and value in and against diversity management capitalism. In: International Handbook of Gender. Editors: Evans, M. and Steward, K., . SAGE
Burchiellaro, O., Commons. In: The Routledge Handbook on Sexualities and Space. Editors: De Craene, V., Hartal, G., Di Feliciantonio, C., Boulila, S., Filep, E., Silva, JM. and Browne, K., . Routledge
Burchiellaro, O. and Ammaturo, FR., (2021). The Queer House Party: Solidarity and LGBTQI+ Community-Making in Pandemic Times. In: Democracy in a Pandemic: Participation in Response to Crisis. Editors: Smith, G., Hughes, T., Adams, L. and Obijiaku, C., . University of Westminster Press. 978-1-914386-17-6
Reports and Papers (1)
Burchiellaro, O. and Pinheiro Minillo, X., (2026). RELATÓRIO DO WORKSHOP VIOLÊNCIA POLÍTICA SOB PERSPECTIVA QUEER FEMINISTA
Grants and funding
2026
Queer cooperatives: Lessons, networks, and futures for the social economy
University of Essex (QR Impact Fund)
Towards a queer communism: Past, present and future horizons of liberation
British Academy
2025
Queer/feminist understandings of political violence: Leveraging activist connections, experiences and knowledges
Economic and Social Research Council