Staff Profile
Dr Michael Richardson
Senior Lecturer in Human Geography
- Email: michael.richardson@ncl.ac.uk
- Telephone: +44 (0)191 208 7740
- Address: Room 3.22 Henry Daysh Building
Claremont Road
Newcastle University
Background
Michael has been at Newcastle University since 2006 having studied here for his BA, MA and PhD. In 2014 he joined the school of Geography, Politics and Sociology as a Lecturer of Human Geography; before this he worked as a Teaching Fellow here in Human Geography (2013). Michael was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to conduct PhD research into Irish Masculinities on Tyneside (2010-2013) and now builds from this expertise in his research led teaching.
Roles and Responsibilities
Michael is currently on an Innovation and Knowledge Exchange Sabbatical at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art.
Michael is a member of the Social Justice Advisory Group at Newcastle University.
Michael was Director of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion for Geography (2020-2022) and is a member of the School of GPS Athena Swan Self-Assessment Team.
He was Director of the ESRC Northern Ireland and North East Doctoral Training Partnership (NINEDTP) Children, Youth and Families thematic pathway (from 2016-2019).
He was a trustee of the North East Young Dads and Lads Project (2018-2022).
Qualifications
PhD Human Geography, Newcastle University, 2015
MA Human Geography Research, Merit, Newcastle University, 2010
BA Hons Geography, 2:1, Newcastle University, 2009
PhD Supervision
Ged Ridley: ESRC 1 3 studentship - Queering Space: transgender experiences of public bathrooms, collaborative project with Yorkshire Trans Support Network (co-supervised with Prof Peter Hopkins)
Jonny Finn: ESRC 1 3 studentship - Exploration of Post-Industrial Masculine Identity Construction in Newcastle upon Tyne (co-supervised with Prof Alastair Bonnett and Prof Anoop Nayak)
Libby Morrison: ESRC 1 3 studentship - Co-ordinating for Age: an assessment of intergenerational justice and rural disadvantage in Northumberland (co-supervised with Prof Tom Scharf and Prof Peter Hopkins) [Ongoing]
Paul Barber: ESRC 3.5 studentship - Cadet forces and the skills agenda (co-supervised with Prof Rachel Woodward and Dr Alison Williams) [Ongoing]
Chris Yang: Social Media Discourses of Identity and Legitimacy in China (co-supervised with Dr Altman Peng and Dr Majid Khosravinik) [Ongoing]
Geographies of gender and masculinities
Currently Michael is working on a Catherine Cookson Foundation funded project called Postindustrial Pollination. This involves urban beekeeping and planting with the North East Young Dads and Lads as well as the management of rooftop beehives at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. This work uses beekeeping as a lens into everyday understandings of masculinities and urban ecologies.
Michael has recently been funded through the BBC Children in Need programme to evaluate the Teen Dads Project, in collaboration with the North East Young Dads and Lads (2020-2022).
He has organised masculinities sessions at the American Association of Geographers (AAG) conference in New York (2012) and San Francisco (2016). He also contributed to a panel discussion at the Nordic Geographers Annual Meeting (2019) on sustainable diets, masculinities and environmental caring. This had led to a strand of work looking at the relationships between meat and masculinities.
His gender based expertise has been recognised and featured through academic publications and popular press:
The BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0003zgn
The Huffington Post: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/dr-michael-joseph-richardson/crisis-in-masculinity_b_8514002.html
His book Redefining Masculinity: Feminism, Food and Fatherhood will be published with Routledge in 2023.
Geographies of age and intergenerational relations
Throughout much of Michael's work he adopts an intergenerational approach to researching men's lives and this has often focused around ideas of fatherhood and loneliness with young dads and older men.
Michael has developed a digital storytelling app with research software engineers at Newcastle Data and creative practitioners at Seven Stories: the National Centre for Children's Books. His work helps develop masculinities of care in innovative ways.
In the NINEDTP (Northern Ireland and North East Doctoral Training Partnership) funded by the ESRC, Michael held the role of Director of the Children, Youth and Families thematic pathway (2016-2019).
Geographies of the postindustrial and the postcolonial
Michael's research background studying the Irish in Britain draws links across postindustrial and postcolonial identities. Michael has been involved in researching issues of race and ethnicity in a post Brexit era with colleagues here at Newcastle; with the empirical focus on young people helping to bring in his expertise on intergenerational geographies.
Equally, Michael has been developing his research of the postcolonial with a particular focus on Hong Kong; with issues of race and class again at the forefront. Developing these ideas further, Michael has explored the notion of protest, privilege and the postcolonial city. Michael has worked closely with the student-led activist group Newcastle Stands with Hong Kong.
Researching creatively
Most recently, has been working on an Innovation and Knowledge Exchange Sabbatical with Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. Michael has been researching the benefits of creative practice from a social, cultural and geographical perspective with Baltic and having published on this topic already he is keen to establish creative practice as a pathway to impact.
Michael has worked with different organisations within the arts and cultural sector within the region including: Baltic, Seven Stories: The National Centre for Children's Books, Northern Stage, Sage Gateshead, Tyneside Cinema and the Tyneside Irish Centre.
He is currently working on a co-created script with young dads and Jonah York (freelance theatre maker) for a 2 night performance at Northern Stage in 2023 titled 'Father Unknown'.
As part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science (2013), he commissioned a play based on his PhD research titled 'Under Us All' which was a piece of verbatim theatre, coupled with artistic workshops, based on the narratives of three generations of men of Irish descent.
Before this he was involved with an AHRC funded Collaborative Skills Development Programme (2012).
Current Teaching
GEO1015 - Human Geographies of the UK (Module Leader)
GEO2111 - Doing Geographical Research: Theory and Practice - Stage 2 dissertation preparation module
GEO3099 - Dissertation - mentorship of Stage 3 students in the development of their dissertations
GEO8017 - Human Geography: Concepts in Action
Previous Teaching
GEO2225 - Citizenship in a Global City: Hong Kong - an international fieldcourse for Stage 2 undergraduates (Module Leader)
GEO3135 - Geographies of Gender and Generation - a specialist Stage 3 undergraduate module (Module Leader)
- Shaw R, Richardson MJ. ‘An Epic Tale of England’: Atmospheric authentication of nationalist narratives. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 2022, 40(2), 351-368.
- Richardson MJ. My Reflections on Connell. Boyhood Studies 2021, 14(1), 116-120.
- Hopkins P, Newcastle Social Geographies Collective, Pain R, Shaw R, Gao Q, Bonnett A, Jones C, Richardson M, Rzedzian S, Benwell MC, Lin W, McAreavey R, Stenning A, Blazek M, Pande R, Najib K, Finlay R, Nayak A, Ridley G, Mearns G, Bonner-Thompson C, McLaughlin J, Boussalem A, Iqbal N, Heslop J, Jarvis H, Burrows R, Bambra C, Copeland A, Tate S, Campbell E, Thompson M, James A, Raynor R, Cunningham N, Powells G, Herbert J, Hocknell S, ed. Social Geographies: An Introduction. London, UK: Rowman and Littlefield, 2021.
- Richardson M, Pande R, Ridley G. Gender. In: The Newcastle Social Geographies Collective; Pain, R; Hopkins, P, ed. Social Geographies An Introduction. London: Rowman and Littlefield International, 2020, pp.162-172.
- Finlay R, Nayak A, Benwell M, Hopkins P, Pande R, Richardson M. Growing up in Sunderland: young people, politics and place. Newcastle upon Tyne: Newcastle University, 2020.
- Richardson MJ. Participants as experts in their own lives: researching in post-industrial, intergenerational and post-colonial space. In: Sarah Marie Hall and Ralitsa Hiteva, ed. Engaging with Policy, Practice and Publics Intersectionality and Impact. Bristol: Policy Press, 2020, pp.61-78.
- Richardson MJ. Protest and privilege, in Hong Kong and beyond. Political Geography 2020, 82, 102259.
- Burrell K, Hopkins P, Isakjee A, Lorne C, Nagel C, Finlay R, Nayak A, Benwell MC, Pande R, Richardson M, Botterill K, Rogaly B. Brexit, race and migration. Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space 2019, 37(1), 3-40.
- Richardson MJ. Occupy Hong Kong? Gweilo citizenship and social justice. Annals of the American Association of Geographers 2018, 108(2), 486-498.
- Bos D, Finlay R, Hopkins P, Lloyd J, Richardson M. Reflections on the ESRC internship scheme for postgraduates. Journal of Geography in Higher Education 2017, 41(1), 106-118.
- Richardson MJ. Intergenerational space. Children's Geographies 2016, 14(5), 617-619.
- Richardson MJ. Masculinities and Generational Change Within the Irish Diaspora. In: Claire Dwyer and Nancy Worth, ed. Identities and Subjectivities. Springer, 2016, pp.1-16.
- Richardson MJ, Lawrence G. Under Us All: "What you've been through...is what we've all been through". In: Rees C, ed. Masculinity in Crisis: Depictions of Modern Male Trauma in Ireland. Dublin: Carysfort Press, 2016, pp.85-101.
- Goodall K, Hopkins P, McKerrell S, Markey J, Millar S, Richardson J, Richardson M. Community experiences of sectarianism. Edinburgh: Scottish Government Social Research, 2015. Social Research series.
- Richardson MJ. Embodied intergenerationality: family position, place and masculinity. Gender, Place and Culture: A Journal of Feminist Geography 2015, 22(2), 157-171.
- Goodall K, McKerrell S, Markey J, Millar S, Richardson M. Sectarianism in Scotland: A ‘West of Scotland’ Problem, a Patchwork or a Cobweb?. Scottish Affairs 2015, 24(3), 288-307.
- Richardson MJ. Theatre as safe space? Performing intergenerational narratives with men of Irish descent. Social & Cultural Geography 2015, 16(6), 615-633.
- Richardson MJ. Intergenerational relations and Irish masculinities: reflections from the Tyneside Irish, in the North-East of England. In: Gorman-Murray,A; Hopkins,P, ed. Masculinities and Place. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2014, pp.255-268.
- Richardson MJ, Tate S. Improving the transition to university: introducing student voices into the formal induction process for new geography undergraduates. Journal of Geography in Higher Education 2013, 37(4), 611-618.
- Richardson MJ, Tate S. University is not as easy as A, B, C...: How an extended induction can improve the transition to university for new undergraduates. Emerge 2012, (4), 11-25.