Bryan Boyle

I am a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies in Cologne, where I work as a sociologist within the “Wealth and Social Inequality” research group. At the VUB, I remain a Voluntary Fellow at the sociology department, having previously been Guest Professor and Doctoral Researcher here. In September 2027, I will be moving to the UK to start a position as Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Manchester.

My research tends to lie at the intersection of the study of labour, culture, and elites, and is generally driven by the aim to understand and address issues pertaining to social class. Methodologically, I am specialised in qualitative methods and ethnographic research.

I previously conducted an ethnography of the ‘butler’ profession, a profession that has experienced a surprising revival as wealthy groups and other elites again seek their expertise in private service. In the spirit of a carnal ‘enactive ethnography’, I actually trained at a butler school and worked as a butler in the UK. As I illustrate through the notion of ‘the labour of distinction’, studying butlers allows us to see how the most powerful in our society depend on the efforts of others to cultivate a lifestyle that brings them status – something that we do not consider all that much when trying to understand cultural difference and elite formation. The book that resulted from this study is currently under contract and is expected to be released at the end of 2027.

My research has been published in the discipline’s leading journals, including American Sociological Review, The Sociological Review, British Journal of Sociology, and Work Organisation, Labour, and Globalisation. In public media, I have written for The Sociological Review Magazine and Knack, and my research on butlers has been covered in outlets such as The Economist, The Times, and the Frankfurter Allgemeine.

I have experience teaching classes across the social sciences. I previously led the course ‘Social Change and Inequality in Europe’ on the Bachelor of Social Sciences program here at the VUB, following smaller teaching roles on courses such as Critical Thinking in Sociology and Seminar Current Issues I & II. I aim to adopt a dialogical approach to teaching, and tend to stress the theoretical dimensions of sociology when discussing content with students.