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This is my last post as Chair of the Social and Cultural Geography Research Group, so I hope you will excuse the indulgence of some closing reflections and heartfelt thanks.

I have been involved in the group as secretary and then chair for six very enjoyable years. The SCGRG has been a pleasure to work with.  The committee has always been excellent and supportive.  I can’t name everyone here, but over 6 years there are many people who have helped organise events, set up and run up the dissertation prize, welcome new members to the group and keep finances, communications and conference administration on track. I am grateful to you all and have learnt so much from you.  I would also like to acknowledge the enormous input and continued support from the RGS-IBG, particularly from Catherine Souch, Stephanie Wyse and Joy Hayward in the Research and Higher Education Division.

The wider group has also been an inspiration too. It has considerable strengths through its size and diversity, which can be seen as challenges, but enthusiasm has always been able to turn these into opportunities for dialogue and debate.  This dynamism is important and I hope it will continue.  There are new challenges too.  The group is beginning to explore the implications of the changing environment in higher education, with more demands and less funding, through sessions at this year’s RGS-IBG annual conference on ‘crisis’ and ‘impact’.  I think discussion needs to continue in the group as well about how best to support researchers in social and cultural geography in potentially difficult times. The new committee will be reviewing this shortly, so do get in touch with ideas.

So finally, I’d like to welcome the new committee. I am delighted to be handing on to an excellent group including Pete Adey as Chair, Sarah Mills as Secretary, Chris Bear as Treasurer, Franklin Ginn as Dissertation Co-ordinator, James Ash as Communications Office,  Rebecca Sandover and Mia Hunt as postgraduate representatives, and Amanda Rogers, Harriet Hawkins, Owain Jones, Hannah Macpherson, Tara Woodyer, Paul Simpson and Leila Dawney. Full details will be on the committee webpage soon.  And a final plug.  I’m not totally giving up responsibilities for social and cultural geography.  Stepping down from this role means I have the time to take up editing the Cultural Geography section of Geography Compass. If you have ideas for innovative reviews and overlooked subjects in cultural geography I’d love to hear from you!

With thanks and best wishes

Gail Davies

Dear Colleagues:

Thanks to those of you who were able to respond to my earlier request for information regarding the ESRC’s current ‘benchmarking review’ of UK human geography, chaired by Professor David Ley at UBC and being undertaken in partnership with the AHRC and RGS-IBG.

I was commissioned to provide an overview of social and cultural geography, covering the last ten years and seeking to answer the following three questions:

1. How has research in social and cultural geography in the UK developed over the last ten years, and what are the major strengths and weaknesses of the field?
2. How does UK research in social and cultural geography compare with research produced by colleagues in other countries?
3. Can you suggest some examples of key academic outputs by UK scholars (books and other publications) that have made an important contribution to scholarship and/or have helped to set or move intellectual agendas in the field?

My draft report is attached here, with an invitation to provide any further comment by Monday 12 March.  The final report has to be submitted on 19 March

Please send your comments and suggestions to: p.a.jackson@sheffield.ac.uk

Your help will be very much appreciated and will contribute directly to the review process.

 

Thanks and best wishes

Peter Jackson

The Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) wishes to appoint an Editor to Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. The current Editor, Professor Alison Blunt, Queen Mary, University of London, completes a normal five year term at the end of 2012. Transactions is one of the foremost international journals of geographical research, publishing the very best scholarship from around the world, across the whole range of the discipline. The new Editor will be an internationally renowned scholar who has excellent networks worldwide and a broad interest in, and support for, the full range of research work undertaken in geography.

More details are available at www.rgs.org/TransactionsEditor. Closing date for applications: 23 March 2012.

Forthcoming opportunities on the SCGRG committee

I want to start this news items with a note of thanks to everyone who has served on the SCGRG committee from 2006 to 2012, the six years for which I have been Secretary, then Chair of the group. I’d also like to thank all those SCGRG members, and others, who have ensured that doing these roles has been consistently interesting and enjoyable.  Many of the committee are also coming to the end either 3 or 6 years service.  So, summer 2012 is going to see significant changes for the group.

The SCGRG will be looking to elect a new Chair and Secretary at the AGM held during the RGS/IBG Conference in Edinburgh 3-5^th July 2012.  We will also have vacancies for a Dissertation Co-ordinator and a Communications Officer (web editing and twitter is currently done by me, with other media maintained by the wider committee).  We will also be welcoming new committee members who want to take on a more informal role in the first instance.

The RGS Handbook has more details on the roles for committee members and the election process.  According to the RGS, those looking for election to Chair and Secretary should be RGS members, and the majority of the Committee must be members of the RGS-IBG.

New officers and committee members will be elected by those present at the AGM.  The RGS handbook explains that nominations for Committee membership will be accepted up to the beginning of the AGM. Nominations must be in writing (email is fine) and include the names of the proposer and seconder.  You don’t have to pay to register for the conference to attend the AGM.  If you are interested in any of these roles but are not able to attend the AGM, you can be nominated in your absence.

If you are interested in any of these roles, please do get in touch with me, or with any other members of the committee. You can find their details here.  Many of us will be at the AAG conference in New York, so feel free to talk to us informally there.  We very much look forward to hearing from you.

With best wishes

Gail Davies (Chair SCGRG)

Nominations for RGS-IBG medals and awards

RGS-IBG medals and awards recognise excellence in geographical research and fieldwork, teaching and public engagement. Any Fellow or member of the Society may make a nomination, and Research Groups are also encouraged to support nominations.

Nominations should consist of a completed nomination form with a statement of 200-300 words outlining why the candidate should receive the award, a CV of the candidate and written support of approximately 200-300 words from two additional Fellows or members of the Society.

To download the nomination form, read the nomination criteria, or find out more about the medals and awards, please visit: http://www.rgs.org/AboutUs/Medals+and+Awards/Nominate+your+choice.htm

The deadline for making a nomination is 28 February 2012.

If you have any questions, please contact the Director’s Office, E: director@rgs.org.

 

Nominations for vacant positions on RGS-IBG Council

Positions on Council are nominated and elected by the Fellowship and bring with them the responsibilities of a Trustee of the Society. It is normally expected that Council members will also serve on (and chair in the case of Vice-Presidents and Honorary Treasurer) the Committee of Council relevant to the position to which they have been elected. Only Fellows of the Society may stand for positions on Council and only Fellows may propose candidates for election (this includes Postgraduate Fellows).

The deadline for making a nomination is 25 March 2012.

A list of vacant positions for election and more information about the responsibilities of Council members, can be found here: http://www.rgs.org/AboutUs/Governance/Nominations+for+Council.htm.  

Candidates may only stand for one position.  They must provide a short biographical note and the names of five Fellows of the Society supporting of their application (Proposing Fellows).  Proposing Fellows may only support one candidate for any single position and must provide a brief summary of why the candidate is suitable for the Council position along with their Fellowship number.

If you have any questions, please contact the Director’s Office, E: director@rgs.org.

CFP: RGS-IBG Postgraduate Mid-Term Conference 2012, University of Nottingham

Geographical Reflections

This is a call for papers for the RGS-IBG Postgraduate Forum Mid-term Conference, to be hosted over the weekend of 20th – 22nd April 2012 at the School of Geography, Nottingham University. The aim of the conference is to provide a welcoming, relaxed and supportive environment for postgraduates to present any aspect of their research to their peers.

Papers with any theme on any topic within geography or a related discipline are invited, and postgraduates should feel comfortable presenting their work at any stage of its development. We would also welcome any papers or posters which deal with this year’s conference theme: ‘Geographical Reflections’. This could include:

– How has postgraduate work furthered debates in geography?
– How have postgraduates developed new and innovative methodologies?
– How has postgraduate research challenged previous geographical work?
– How can reflecting on past debates inform our understanding of present and future geographies?

This broad theme is designed to appeal to postgraduates at any stage of their degree working in or on geographical topics, from both the physical and human domains of geography, and to all related disciplines.

As well as the paper sessions we will also run several interactive workshops covering a range of topics such as publishing during your PhD, practical tips for teaching and demonstrating, common methodological approaches and issues and securing post-PhD grant funding.

We are delighted to announce that Nick Clifford (Professor of Physical Geography, King’s College London) will present the pre-conference plenary to the conference theme of ‘Geographical Reflections’ on the evening of Friday 20th April.

The RGS-IBG Mid Term Conference event has been kindly sponsored by the University of Nottingham Graduate School, the School of Geography and the RGS-IBG Postgraduate Forum.

The guidelines for abstract submission are as follows:

Papers: Papers should be no more than 10 minutes in length with 5 additional minutes allocated for discussion afterwards. Abstracts of no more than 200 words should be submitted to RGSmidterm2012@nottingham.ac.uk

Posters: Posters should be A0 in size. They will be mounted on display boards throughout the day and presenters will be allocated a 15 minute slot in which to answer questions. Abstracts of no more than 200 words should be submitted to RGSmidterm2012@nottingham.ac.uk

The deadline for paper and poster abstract submissions is 5pm 3rd February 2012.

ALL DELEGATES MUST REGISTER BEFORE SUBMITTING AN ABSTRACT: please see http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/geography/research/rgs-ibg-postgraduate-conference/rgs-ibg-postgraduate-mid-term-conference-2012.aspx for registration forms and further details.

Review of research quality and impact in Social and Cultural Geography

As you may already know, the ESRC is currently undertaking a ‘benchmarking review’ of UK human geography in partnership with the AHRC and the RGS-IBG.  This is intended to gauge the strength of the subject in terms of its international standing and provides an opportunity to make the case for additional support for the subject.  The review is being chaired by Professor David Ley from UBC and is completely independent from the Higher Education Funding Councils’ Research Excellence Framework.

As part of the review, Professor Peter Jackson has been commissioned to undertake a review of research quality and impact in the field of Social and Cultural Geography (with reviews of other sub-disciplinary areas also being commissioned).  As part of the review, which is working with very tight deadlines, he has been asked to liaise with study group members, to confer with senior academics in the field and to produce a report of c.2000 words by 27 February.  This is to seek your assistance with this process.

Please make your suggestions under some (or ideally all) of the following headings:

1. How has research in social and cultural geography in the UK developed over the last ten years, and what are the major strengths and weaknesses of the field?
2. Give examples of key academic outputs (books and other publications) that have made an important contribution to scholarship and/or have helped to set or move intellectual agendas in the field.
3. Give examples of key non-academic impacts (including engagement with research users in policy and practice), noting any changes that have arisen as a result of research in social and cultural geography.

This last question is particularly challenging given the lack of any single group of research ‘users’ in our field so suggestions of particular people to contact who might be able to verify the non-academic impact of research in social and cultural geography would be particularly helpful as this is also part of my brief.

If time permits, I hope to be able to circulate a copy of my draft report (at the end of February), providing an opportunity for further comments and suggestions before the final version is submitted in mid-March.

Please send your replies to p.a.jackson@sheffield.ac.uk by Friday 27 January at the latest.  Your help with be very much appreciated and will contribute directly to the benchmarking review process.

 

Thanks and best wishes

Peter Jackson

Happy new year!  The SCGRG annual report for 2011 is now published here.

Our thanks to everyone who has supported the group over the last year.  If you have ideas for how we might best further research in Social and Cultural Geography in 2012, do get in touch via twitter, facebook or email the committee.

with best wishes,

Gail

 

Policing geographies: engendering securities and insecurities

Call for Papers RGS/IBG annual conference

Co-convenors: Hester Parr (Glasgow)*, Tim Cresswell (Royal Holloway), and Richard Yarwood (Plymouth), Olivia Stevenson (Glasgow).

*Initial contact point (Hester.parr@glasgow.ac.uk)

This session explores the ‘policing’ of diverse human geographies in the world, and specifically how different registers of policing (by force(s), institutions, legislative shapes and other forms of governance) can engender both securities and insecurities. At the same time, we want immediately to problematise the possibility of ever ultimately ‘securing’ geographies (literally, as well as metaphorically, in and through border-work) and thereby to engage with insecurities. What are insecure geographies? We are curious about how geographies can be(come) insecure, dissolute, disruptive, hard-to-track, and simply missing.

Understanding insecurity beyond a discourse of danger is particularly appealing; and we wish to appeal for papers that re-value insecurities in a variety of ways. Overall, the session hopes to bring security and insecurity into tense conversation via the concept and exercise of ‘policing’; and here ‘policing’ is recognised as a metaphor, and a governing arrangement intended to engender lawfulness but also peace.

This session might lend itself to examination of police, police jurisdiction, police force(s), border ‘work’ (legislatively, conceptually), acts of tracing and tracking, dissident mobilities, porous networks and insecure securities. We welcome both conceptual and empirical papers.

The following questions and themes may prompt ideas, but please do not be restricted by them:

• What are securities and insecurities?
  How can we police security and insecurity?
  What is it to police geographies?
  How can we conceptualise and research insecure/secure geographies?
• What are insecure mobilities and should these always be policed?
• Is police-work always productive of new insecurities?
• Does policing bring peace and security?
• What are the differences between policing and security?

 

Professional Officer: Conference and Research Groups – Maternity Cover

Salary: £24,000 to £26,000

Temporary, full time, Professional Officer (maternity cover) to organise the Society’s annual international conference, to support the Society’s 28 research groups, and to work with the Head of Research and Higher Education to disseminate information on the Society and geography to the geographical academic/research community.

This appointment would be suitable for someone who has an interest in contemporary academic geography and for organising events, with very strong communication skills. It provides an excellent opportunity to work alongside the academic community. The person appointed to the post is likely to have at least two years of work experience or a Masters (or further) degree and work experience.

Cover is expected to last until at least 31 July 2012 or until the existing post holder returns. The starting date is 3 January 2012.

Closing date for applications: Noon on 11 November 2011. More information available at http://www.rgs.org/AboutUs/Jobs.htm