What's a friend? The question has become increasingly pressing with the rise and rise of social media, when the word seems to capture intimates as well as near-strangers. Harry Blatterer's research centres on the changing meaning of one-on-one friendship as an intimate relationship, a relationship that is 'generative' - potentially life changing and invaluable for social integration. He has outlined his preliminary sociological perspective on friendship in Everyday Friendships: Intimacy as Freedom in a Complex World (Palgrave Macmillan 2015), has translated Francesco Alberoni's Friendship (Brill 2016, with Sveva Magaraggia) as well as having published a number of articles in journals such as The European Journal of Social Theory, Thesis Eleven and Critical Horizons. Current projects include an investigation of the status of one-on-one friendships in the sociology of childhood, the uses of friendship (solidarity) in political theory and how friendship articulates with the sociology of groups, especially as recently reinvigorated by German sociologists.

Harry is interested in supervising HDR candidates who want to pursue research in the areas of personal relationships and, more broadly, social trends in the private and semi-private spheres and questions of solidarity.

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