Dr Darren Powell

My scholarship is primarily focused on the interconnections between public health and public education. This includes research on:

• the global ‘war on childhood obesity’;
• the privatisation, corporatisation and commercialisation of public education;
• health and physical education policies and practices; and,
• the impact of marketing on children’s well-being.

I am currently the Principal Investigator on the Consuming Kids research project (funded by the Royal Society Te Apārangi Marsden Fund Fast-Start Grant) which is investigating how ‘healthy marketing’ shapes children’s health knowledge and identities.

I regularly write peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters on these areas of research and frequently present my work at national and international conferences and invited lectures. As a public academic, I regularly communicate my research findings via mainstream and social media outlets, including opinion pieces, blogs, and radio and television interviews.

As a researcher, teacher, and father of two children, my aim is to: continue to challenge dominant discourses of health, fitness, and fatness; contest unequal power relations that benefit the private sector at the expense of the public; and ultimately, strive for greater social justice for children and young people