School of Languages and Area Studies (SLAS)

Profile

My main field of research is the city. I am interested in how cities articulate and shape human culture, and the ways in which artefacts, public rituals and spatial patterns both express and promote ways to organise society. As an extension of this, and with a particular focus on Germany and Argentina, I am interested in the ways in which society addresses traumatic historical events through urban interventions. I am also interested in literary and filmic representations of cities and metropolitan life styles and memory cultures. Currently I am working on a major monograph on contested urban spaces and the dynamics of history in Berlin.

Qualifications 

• BA (Hons) Spanish and Latin American Studies (University of Portsmouth)
• PgDip Social Research Methods (University of Portsmouth)
• PgCert Learning and Teaching in Higher Education (University of Portsmouth)
• MA History (University of Portsmouth)
• MSc Design and Social Science (London School of Economics)
• PhD (University of Portsmouth)

Research Clusters

• History, Culture and Development in the Americas
• Memory Cultures
• Social, Historical and Cultural Change in Europe

Discipline Areas

• Area Studies
• Cultural Studies
• History
• Social Theory

Research CV 

Current Research Projects

• The Luminous City: Light and the Construction of London’s Urban Image and Spaces

Edited Books

•  2008 The Lasting War: Reconstructing Society and Identity in Britain, France and Germany after 1945. London: Palgrave, (edited volume, with Gavin Schaffer)

Journal Articles

• 2009 ‘Dystopian Buenos Aires’. Bulletin of Latin American Research, Vol.28 Issue 2, pp.246-265.
• 2006 'How Should We build? Architecture, History, and the Post-Cold War Context in Germany'. National Identities, Vol.8 No.4 (Relocating: Remembering the Meaning and Significance of the Second World War in Post-Cold War Europe), pp.383-400.

Book Chapters 

• May 2009 'No Laughing Matter: Humour as Urban Critique'. In  Marten-Finnis & Winkler (eds). Press and the City (series The European Jewish Press- Studies in History and Language). Bremen: Edition Lumiere.
• April 2008- ‘That Rubble-Heap Near Potsdam: Pre-War Visions and Post-War Urban Development in Berlin. In Riera, M. & Schaffer, G. (eds). The Lasting War. London:Palgrave.  

Conference Organisation 

• 24-25 June 2005 Conference The End of World War Two in a Comparative Perspective: Britain, France and Germany (co-organiser)
• 13 April 2005 Conference Britain and the Home Front, 1939-1945 (co-organiser)
• 28 May 2004 Conference D-Day 1944- The Politics of Liberation (co-organiser)