Gëzim Alpion

Gëzim Alpion is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Birmingham’s School of Social Policy and Society, specializing in sociology of religion, nationalism, fame capital, media studies, and authorship. He is recognized as the founder of Mother Teresa Studies and currently serves as the Director of Employability for his school.

• University of Birmingham
• School of Social Policy and Society
• Department of Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology
• British Sociological Association
• Institute for Research into Superdiversity (IRiS)

Alpion earned his BA from Cairo University and PhD from the University of Durham (1997). He has lectured at the Universities of Huddersfield, Sheffield Hallam, and Newman before joining Birmingham in 2002.

His research explores charisma in public theology, fame capital as a sociological variable, and religion’s role in national identity. He analyzes media’s influence on celebrity culture, politics of representation, and social stratification in global contexts, including Egypt, India, and the Balkans.

Alpion’s recent peer-reviewed work includes critiques of Mother Teresa’s spiritual darkness, absence of spiritual icons in celebrity studies, and social closure in Western academia. His teaching includes modules on ‘Race’ and Ethnicity, Sociology of Success and Fame, and Media Stereotyping.

Scientific accolades include Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy (2022) and Honorary Fellowship from the University of Birmingham’s Institute for Advanced Research in Arts and Social Sciences (2000). He has reviewed book proposals for Palgrave Macmillan and SAGE Publications.

Alpion supervises PhD, MPhil, and MA students, with current advisee Ulviyya Khalilova (funded by Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Education). His future research includes projects on Unholy Politics, The Mother Teresa Conundrum, and The Sociology of Authorship.