Patrick Watson

Patrick completed a PhD at the University of Manchester (UK) in 2010. His research interests include policing and civilian police oversight, municipal governance, and criminal proceedings. He conducts research predominately from an ethnomethodological framework, and is a board member of the International Institute of Ethnomethodology and Conversational Analysis. Patrick is the principal investigator of two SSHRC funded projects: the Partnership Development Grant "Charting the Reasonable Officer", a study of how civilian police oversight agencies account for lawful officer conduct in contested use-of-force incidents, and; the Open Research Area grant "Visions of Policing" a study of how video technology impacts police oversight and training. He would like to work with students who have an interest in the work routines in civic institutions.

Selected Publications

• Watson, P. G. (Forthcoming). "The Ethnomethods of Law and Order: Studying Cops and Courts." In A. Carlin, et al. (eds) Routledge International Handbook of Ethnomethodology & Conversation Analysis. London, UK: Routledge.  
• Watson, P. G. (2023). "Gestalt Contexture and Contested Motives: Understanding Video Evidence in the Murder Trial of Officer Michael Slager." Theoretical Criminology. 27(1): 105-125. (Winner of American Sociological Association EMCA Section Distinguished Paper Award 2022).  
• Watson, P. G. (2022). "Risk and Trust: Ethnomethodological Orientations to Risk Theorizing." In D. Curran (ed.) Handbook on Risk and Inequality. Cheltenham, UK: Elgar.  
• Watson, P. G. & Meehan, A. J. (2021). "Handling Video of [Police] Violence: Theoretical vs. Practical Analyses." In D. vom Lehn, N. Ruiz-Junco & W. Gibson (eds). Routledge International Handbook of Interactionism. London, UK: Routledge.
• Watson, P. G. (2018). "Common Sense Geography and the Elected Official: Technical Evidence and Conceptions of 'Trust' in Toronto's Gardiner Expressway Decision." Canadian Journal of Sociology. 43(1): 49-76.  
• Watson, P. G. (2018). "The Documentary Method of [Video] Interpretation: A Paradoxical Verdict in a Police-Involved Shooting and Its Consequences for Understanding Crime on Camera." Human Studies. 41(1): 121-125.

Presentations

• “Utilizing Ethnomethdological Strategies for the Study of Racism” (with Tandeep Sidhu). American Sociological Association – Regular Session on Racism and Anti-Racism. Philadelphia, PA: August 17-21, 2023.
• “Acts of Omission and Commission: The New Jim Crow, Ethnomethodology, and Perspicuous Sites for Understanding Racism” (with Tandeep Sidhu). Canadian Sociological Association Meetings. Toronto, ON: May 29-June 3, 2023.
• "Two Contrasting Visual Jurisprudences in the Adjudication of Police-Involved Shootings Caught on Video”. American Sociological Association Meeting. Regular Section on Ethnomethodology. Los Angeles, CA: August 5-9, 2022.