This section is concerned with the how of public sociology education, what public sociologists do and how this is shaped by – and in some ways works to transform – the contexts in which we do it. It is therefore also about the where of public sociology. In relation to which locations and institutions does the practice of public sociology education take place? Here we analyse the contexts of public sociology and how these mediate the practices and possibilities of public sociology education. The case studies in this section continue to explore what public sociologists actually do, and illuminate the ambivalent institutional locations of public sociology. This prompts dialogue on, and analysis of, how such located-ness and institutional status is marked by the power relations previously considered in the constitution of publics and the production and validation of knowledge in public sociology.

Turning to practice here, and asking where public sociology takes place, means raising and responding to the following questions:

Not all public sociology takes place within universities, and many cases in this volume acknowledge and aim to understand the different locations that shape and are shaped by public sociology practice – expanding and questioning assumptions about where public sociology takes place. However, much public sociology does have a connection to higher education institutions (HEIs), and the case studies in this section reflect upon public sociology education practices connected to HEIs, in Scotland and England in particular.

The marketisation of UK higher education (HE) is well established (for example Canaan and Shumar, 2008), and this raises some significant issues and challenges for the practice of public sociology education in increasingly neoliberal universities whose status as public institutions – despite resistance (eg Holmwood, 2011) – is being eroded.