Staff profile

I joined Durham University's Anthropology Department as Assistant Professor in 2020 (PhD 2019) after positions at the University of Edinburgh's Social Anthropology department, and the Centre for Biomedcine, Self and Society.

I co-lead the international 'Hormones Hub' that emerged out of collaborations with colleagues at the University of Edinburgh, University of Aberdeen and Australian National University. I co-founded and co-lead the 'Gender, Affective Injustice and Health' (GAIH) research strand within the world leading Institute for Medical Humanities (IMH). Within this strand I lead the Gender, Affective Injustice and Autism (GAIA) research project exploring the affective experiences missed and misdiagnosis of late diagnosed autistic women in the UK.

Through three interlocking research areas I seek to understand the stories we tell about selves, persons, bodies and environments, and the role biomedical knowledges play in models of functioning and flourishing across these scales.

The first focuses on autism, neurodivergence, embodiment, disability, empathy, and sensory experience. My forthcoming monograph, Rhythms of Care: Autistic Embodiment and Empathy in Equine Therapy with University of Minnesota Press, explores autistic embodiment, more-than-human sociality and care emerging through sympathetic embodiments of horses and humans in the context of autism-specific equine therapy and natural hoprsemanship practices in the UK and USA. Ultimately it delves deep into the anthropological question of what it is that makes us human.

The second strand is motivated by a fascination with the social lives of hormones. My co-edited book on the topic entitled Hormonal Theory: A Rebellious Glossary is now available with Bloomsbury, alongside articles in BioSocieties and Medical Anthropology. 

Nonhuman animals are the third strand of my research, including more-than-human sociality and health, with a particular emphasis on non-verbal and multispecies communication and animal assisted therapies. 

I teach across social and medical anthropology including the anthropology of the body, anthropology of reproduction, kinship and relatedness, and the social lives of hormones.

Prospective PhD students in the research areas below are welcome to get in touch.

• anthropology of autism and neurodivergence
• disability studies
• embodiment
• empathy
• gender and the body
• multispecies anthropology and ethnography
• posthumanism
• anthropology of the senses
• social lives of hormones
• substance and relatedness

Authored book

• Sensing Autism: Rhythms of More-Than-Human Sociality and Care
  
  Malcolm, R. (n.d.). Sensing Autism: Rhythms of More-Than-Human Sociality and Care [Contracted by publisher]. University of Minnesota Press.

Chapter in book

• Cortisol
  
  Malcolm, R. (2024). Cortisol. In A. Ford, R. Malcolm, S. Erikainen, L. Raeder, & C. Roberts (Eds.), Hormonal Theory: A Rebellious Glossary (pp. 37-45). Bloomsbury.
• Hormonal Cascades: An Introduction
  
  Malcolm, R., Erikainen, S., Ford, A., Raeder, L., & Roberts, C. (2024). Hormonal Cascades: An Introduction. In A. Ford, R. Malcolm, S. Erikainen, L. Raeder, & C. Roberts (Eds.), Hormonal Theory: A Rebellious Glossary (pp. 1-13). Bloomsbury Academic.
• 'Telling Hormonal Stories'.
  
  Erikainen, S., Ford, A., Malcolm, R., & Raeder, L. (n.d.). ’Telling Hormonal Stories’. In So Hormonal: Essays About Our Hormones. [Contracted by publisher] Monstrous Regiment.

Edited book

• Hormonal Theory: A Rebellious Glossary
  
  Ford, A., Malcolm, R., Erikainen, S., Raeder, L., & Roberts, C. (Eds.). (2024). Hormonal Theory: A Rebellious Glossary. Bloomsbury Academic.

Journal Article

• Hormonal stories: a new materialist exploration of hormonal emplotment in four case studies
  
  Erikainen, S., Ford, A., Malcolm, R., & Raeder, L. (2025). Hormonal stories: a new materialist exploration of hormonal emplotment in four case studies. BioSocieties, 20, 1-24. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41292-023-00317-8
• Milk’s Flows: Making and Transmitting Kinship, Health, and Personhood
  
  Malcolm, R. (2021). Milk’s Flows: Making and Transmitting Kinship, Health, and Personhood. Medical Humanities., 47(3), 375-379. https://doi.org/10.1136/medhum-2019-011829
• “There’s No Constant”: Oxytocin, Cortisol, and Balanced Proportionality in Hormonal Models of Autism
  
  Malcolm, R. (2021). “There’s No Constant”: Oxytocin, Cortisol, and Balanced Proportionality in Hormonal Models of Autism. Medical Anthropology, 40(4), 375-388. https://doi.org/10.1080/01459740.2021.1894558
• ‘It just opens up their world’: autism, empathy, and the therapeutic effects of equine interactions
  
  Malcolm, R., Ecks, S., & Pickersgill, M. (2018). ‘It just opens up their world’: autism, empathy, and the therapeutic effects of equine interactions. Anthropology and Medicine, 25(2), 220-234. https://doi.org/10.1080/13648470.2017.1291115

Other (Digital/Visual Media)

• Sensory-Rhythmic Attention as Neurodiverse Attunement: Rupturing Normative Communication and Method
  
  Malcolm, R. (2022, September 6). Sensory-Rhythmic Attention as Neurodiverse Attunement: Rupturing Normative Communication and Method [Cultural Anthropology]. Cultural Anthropology.
• "Our Bodies Electric." Theorizing the Contemporary.
  
  Malcolm, R., Gordon, T., & Slone, M. (2017, December 19). "Our Bodies Electric." Theorizing the Contemporary.