Staff Profile
Dr Robert Shaw
Reader in Geography
- Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 3918
- Address: School of Geography, Politics and Sociology,
Henry Daysh Building
Newcastle University,
Newcastle upon Tyne,
NE1 7RU
Hello! My name is Rob and I'm an urban and social geographer interested in how cities are governed in relation to sensory and embodied experiences. I have been working at Newcastle since September 2015, having previously been at Durham University where I obtained my PhD in 2012.
My current research focuses on a Leverhulme Trust-funded project called 'Urban Sensory Pollutants in Singapore and Johor Bahru' (2025-2028). Through research in Singapore and Johor Baru, this project opens a new interdisciplinary agenda crossing social and natural sciences to study urban sensory pollutants (eg light, noise, smell). In collaboration with my physical geography colleague Nick Cutler and an ecologist who we will hire as a Research Associate, we will analyse the impacts of urban sensory pollutants on humans and non-humans, establishing the harms of different pollutants and how they interact with each other. My interest in this project comes from the paradox in which the senses are problematic both when they are highly 'polluting' but also where there is sensory over-sanitization (that is, where cities become too dark, too quiet, etc). As such, I want the project also explores the politics of when and how sensory stimuli become labelled or not as ‘pollutants’.
My previous work has been centred on the sensory and the night, and my 2018 book,The Nocturnal City, was published by Routledge. I have carried out research exploring the night-time economy in the UK, changing artificial lighting technologies and the Nuit Debout protest movement in France. In addition, I have published conceptual work on the idea of 'atmospheres', as well as on ecosophical theories in geography, focusing on the work of Felix Guattari in particular.
I have shared my expertise with media such as BBC Radio 4's Thinking Allowed, the North-West Evening Mail, The Conversation, and even in stand-up comedy form at the Newcastle Bright Club.
Google scholar: Click here.
Summary
Potential PhD student? Then please get in touch if you're interested in any projects on the night, time and society, affect/non-representational theory and public space, social theory in geography....
My current research focuses on a Leverhulme Trust-funded project called 'Urban Sensory Pollutants in Singapore and Johor Bahru' (2025-2028). Through research in Singapore and Johor Baru, this project opens a new interdisciplinary agenda crossing social and natural sciences to study urban sensory pollutants (eg light, noise, smell). In collaboration with my physical geography colleague Nick Cutler and an ecologist who we will hire as a Research Associate, we will analyse the impacts of urban sensory pollutants on humans and non-humans, establishing the harms of different pollutants and how they interact with each other. My interest in this project comes from the paradox in which the senses are problematic both when they are highly 'polluting' but also where there is sensory over-sanitization (that is, where cities become too dark, too quiet, etc). As such, I want the project also explores the politics of when and how sensory stimuli become labelled or not as ‘pollutants’.
My previous work has been centred on the sensory and the night, and my 2018 book,The Nocturnal City, was published by Routledge. I have carried out research exploring the night-time economy in the UK, changing artificial lighting technologies and the Nuit Debout protest movement in France. In addition, I have published conceptual work on the idea of 'atmospheres', as well as on ecosophical theories in geography, focusing on the work of Felix Guattari in particular.
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Articles
- Shaw R, Blazek M. Politics of rhythm and crisis in the slow death of higher education: implications for academic work and student support. Critical Studies in Education 2023, 65(3), 276-293.
- Shaw Robert. Geographies of Night Work. Progress in Human Geography 2022, 46(5), 1149-1164.
- 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.
- Shaw R. Polyflexibility in Public Lighting. Journal of Energy History/Revue d'histoire de l'énergie 2021, 5.
- Kumar A, Shaw R. Transforming rural light and dark under planetary urbanisation: Comparing ordinary countrysides in India and the UK. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 2020, 45(1), 155-167.
- Shaw R. On the biogeoastronomical night and cautious theory. City 2019, 23(2), 277-280.
- Shaw Robert. Pushed to the Margins of the City: The Urban Night as a Timespace of Protest at Nuit Debout, Paris. Political Geography 2017, 59, 117-125.
- Shaw R. Knowing Homes and Writing Worlds? Ethics of the 'Eco-', ethics of the 'Geo-' and how to light a planet. Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography 2017, 99(2), 128-142.
- Shaw Robert. Night as Fragmenting Frontier: Understanding the Night that Remains in an era of 24/7. Geography Compass 2016, 9(12), 637-647.
- Shaw R. Bringing Deleuze and Guattari down to Earth through Gregory Bateson: Plateaus, Rhizomes and Ecosophical Subjectivity. Theory, Culture and Society 2015, 32(7-8), 151-171.
- Shaw R. 'Alive After Five': Constructing the Neoliberal Night in Newcastle upon Tyne. Urban Studies 2015, 52(3), 456-470.
- Shaw R. Streetlighting in England and Wales: New Technologies and Uncertainty in the Assemblage of Streetlighting Infrastructure. Environment and Planning A 2014, 46(9), 2228-2242.
- Shaw R. Controlling darkness: self, dark and the domestic night. Cultural Geographies 2014, 22(4), 585-600.
- Shaw R. Beyond Night-Time Economy: Affective Atmospheres of the Urban Night. Geoforum 2014, 51(1), 87-95.
- Shaw R. Neoliberal Subjectivities and the Development of the Night-Time Economy in British Cities. Geography Compass 2010, 4(7), 893-903.
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Authored Book
- Shaw R. The Nocturnal City. London: Routledge, 2018.
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Book Chapters
- Shaw R. Time Journeys Through the Night Sky. In: Brunn, S, ed. Geography of Time, Place, Movement and Networks. Springer, 2024, pp.215-227.
- Shaw R. Darkness in Videogame Landscapes: Corporeal and Representational Entanglements. In: Dunn, Nick Edensor, Tim, ed. Rethinking Darkness: Cultures, Histories, Practices. London: Routledge, 2020.
- Shaw R. The making of pub atmospheres and George Orwell’s Moon Under Water. In: Schroer, S; Schmitt, S, ed. Exploring Atmospheres Ethnographically. Oxford: Routledge, 2018, pp.30-44.
- Shaw R. The Lighthouse without a light: lighthouses, exploration and geography. In: Strang, V; Edensor, T; Puckering, J, ed. From the Lighthouse: Interdisciplinary Reflections on Light. London: Routledge, 2018, pp.177-179.
- Shaw R. Relational Places: lighthouses and networks of mobility. In: Strang, V; Edensor, T; Puckering, J, ed. From the Lighthouse: Interdisciplinary Reflections on Light. London: Routledge, 2018, pp.201-204.
- Shaw R. Cleaning Up the Streets: Newcastle-upon-Tyne’s Night-Time Neighbourhood Services Team. In: Graham, S McFarlane, C, ed. Infrastructural Lives: Urban Infrastructure in Context. Routledge, 2015, pp.174-196.
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Editorial
- Shaw R, Taylor Aiken G. Editorial: The 2+n Ecosophies. Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography 2017, 99(2), 107-113.