The Media, Arts and Humanities Research Institute

About this talk:
Sophie Bishop’s book Influencer Creep: How Optimization, Authenticity and Self-Branding Transform Creative Culture (University of California Press) draws from in-depth ethnography and interviews with influencers and professional artists. Bishop argues that looking to the shifts within influencer culture can help us understand contemporary changes to labour conditions, compensation and representation within creative industries. Taking seriously the motivations that drive more and more people into the contest for online visibility, the book documents a creative workforce nervously conforming to the monopoly power of social media platforms—and occasionally resisting it. Influencer Creep is shortlisted for the British Sociological Association's Phillip Abrams Memorial Prize.

This free event is co-hosted by the Sussex Centre for Cultural Studies and the Department of Media, Journalism and Cultural Studies, University of Sussex as part of the 'Media@Sussex' research seminar series. All welcome, drinks and nibbles provided.

Speaker / respondent bios:

Sophie Bishop is an Associate Professor at the University of Leeds in Media and Communications who has been researching the social and cultural implications of the influencer industry for a decade. Sophie, has advised policy makers in UK Parliament and the European Union on influencer culture and has written for academic journals New Media & Society, Social Media + Society and Media, Culture & Society and has been interviewed in Paper, Real Life, Financial Times, BBC and The Atlantic. Influencer Creep is her first book.

Jodie Underwood (b. 2003) completed their BA in Fine Art: Painting at the University of Brighton in 2024 and has since exhibited in numerous group shows across the UK. Including the 'Dream this Silly' exhibition at Queer Circle, 'Spilt Milk' at VF Dalston, and most recently, the 'Unapologetic' exhibition at Roper Gallery in Bath. Their work explores the intersection of eroticism, gender, girlhood, and queerness through oil painting and focuses on the body, often using their own body, or fellow trans models, for reference imagery. Their pieces highlight profound, intimate moments in a humorous light and often push the limits on what is 'taboo', with pornographic elements and detailed imagery of the nude body being recurring subjects in their paintings

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By: Tanya Kant
Last updated: Thursday, 14 May 2026