Cities, Culture & Society

Primarily rooted in human geography, members of the Cities, Culture & Society research group make use of a wide variety of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary tools and perspectives to investigate some of the most pressing concerns of our increasingly urban planet. Working closely with collaborators and interlocutors in such cognate disciplines as urban planning, critical theory, urban studies, tourism studies, anthropology, sociology, cultural studies, economics, gender and sexuality studies, geospatial analytics, demography, and history, members of this group examine such issues as: 1) the variegated socio-spatial processes underlying the global urban revolution and their differential effects, with a particular focus on China and the Global South; 2) how place-based planning and smart technologies contribute to optimising the interactions between people and cities, reflected particularly in transport and mobility systems that generate sustainability, efficient energy use, safety, and social equity for the general public; 3) global patterns and local manifestations of different drivers of economic development in the contemporary world, inter alia land development, creativity, technological innovation, and multi-faceted global networks. Studies in this research domain both interrogate and seek to mitigate the diverse implications of urban and regional development for economic growth, social cohesion and locational conflict, the formation and maintenance of cultural identities, and the negotiation of state-society relations at multiple geographical scales. Individually and collectively, this group works through a diverse range of research topics and methodologies to produce new practical and theoretical knowledge of demonstrable value, propel innovation in social-scientific research and education at the highest levels of quality, and promote novel solutions to the most crucial problems of contemporary society.