He worked at Loughton College (1975–79) and the University of Leicester (1979-2012) before joining the International Centre for Sports History and Culture at De Montfort[1] in October 2012.
Colls's first book The Collier's Rant (1977) explored popular song and image as expressed in 19th-century broadsheets and music hall.
The Pitmen of the Northern Coalfield 1790-1850 (1987) explored the relationship of miners to E P Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class.
David Evans in The Independent said that "Colls writes like an offbeat mixture of Isaiah Berlin and Clive James".
[3] It won the Aberdare Prize as, in the words of the judges, "a compelling, evocative and unique explication of what sport has meant to the English".
(on Alan Carr), Analysis (on the English Gentleman), The Verb (on intellectuals), In Our Time (on Animal Farm), From Our Own Correspondent (on France and the USA), Ramblings (with Clare Balding in the steps of the Jarrow Marchers), The Matter of the North (with Melvyn Bragg), Start the Week (on Orwell), Newsnight (on Brexit), A House Through Time (with David Olusuga), British Council (Durham Miners’ Gala), GNR Films (Great North Run), Unherd (on Levelling Up), The Rest is History (on Orwell), and Radio Free Europe (on Orwell).