Geography

Profile

I graduated with a BA in Geography from University of Leicester (1984) and
a PhD (Leicester) in 1988. In 1993, I joined the Department of Geography at
Portsmouth as a Lecturer. Since 1999, I have been the Departmental Courses
Leader for Curriculum Enhancement and Quality.

Research Interests

Self employment, entrepreneurship and work-life balance

My most recent research investigates the phenomena of small-scale
entrepreneurship carried out (and started up) within the context of family life,
parenting and work-life balance. The research focuses on typically professional
mothers who have made the decision to manage this work-life balance through
small business start-ups (typically internet based activities). (Ekinsmyth 2011,
2012, forthcoming).
Previously, I have been concerned to understand the lived realities of freelance
workers who rely for their livelihoods on tenuous and insecure links to the
magazine publishing industry. In my publications, I have explored these realities
from the perspectives of the individual workers and organisational structures
using the conceptual lenses of risk (Ekinsmyth 1999), project organisation
(Ekinsmyth 2002a) and ‘embeddedness’ (Ekinsmyth 2002b).

Creative/Cultural Industries and urban change

My work on the magazine publishing industry (see above) falls under this
heading. My interest in the creative industries is continued today through my
work on small businesses, many of which are in the arts and crafts sector.

Teaching

I teach urban, economic, social and cultural geography and contribute to other
areas of the undergraduate curriculum such as Geographical Theory and
Research Methods. I am currently the Leader of the following units:
• Geographies of Well-being
• Cultural Geography
• Geographical Research Methodologies
• Human Geography: Critique and Discourse
Since 1997, I have led/been involved with field courses to Barcelona and Berlin,
each with a focus on urban economic, social and cultural change.
I have contributed chapters to Shurmer-Smith P (2002) Doing Cultural
Geography, Sage, London

Pedagogic Research

In October 2008, I was awarded £3000 to undertake a study of the use of audio
feedback in the geography and earth sciences disciplines from the Geography
and Earth Sciences Subject Centre of the Learning and Teaching Support
Network. This is part of an overall project on audio feedback "Sounds Good"
sponsored by JISC (Ekinsmyth (2010) Reflections on using digital audio to give
assessment feedback, Planet 23, 74-77).

Key Publications

All publications