People in the Centre for Research in Identity, Governance, Society
CRIGS draws together a core group of staff based at Loughborough University with networked members around the Globe.
Loughborough Staff
 Professor Sarah L. Holloway
Director of CRIGS and Professor of Human Geography
Sarah is social geographer whose research focuses on the twin themes of ‘Children, Youth and Families’ and ‘Geographies of In/Exclusion’. Intellectually, my research is driven by a fascination with the ways in which social difference is constituted through the interleaving of wider processes and the individual’s biographical narratives in particular times and porous places. Empirically, I pursued this interest through research on geographies of learning; parenting cultures; children’s and young people’s geographies; historical and contemporary forms of racialisation; and place-based studies of consumption.
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 Professor Morag Bell
Professor of Cultural Geography and ProViceChancellor for Teaching
Morag researches the cultural dynamics of international North/South relations since the late nineteenth century. Her current work focuses on the ways in which ideas of global health and disease inform debates about risk, representation and networks of knowledge.
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 Dr Ed Brown
Senior Lecturer in Human Geography and Associate Director, Sustainability Research School
Ed is a development geographer with expertise in Latin America. He takes a political economy approach, and currently has two strands of ongoing research. The first is extending CRIGS governance research agenda via work on the critical geographies of corruption and credit extension in Latin American cities. The second builds on his role as Associate Director of Loughborough's Sustainability Research School and concerns issues around energy policy and sustainable energy use in low income communities.
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 Dr Jon Cloke
Lecturer in Human Geography
Jon has a diversity of different research areas that he engages with, starting with his main focus on all aspects of the political economy of development. He has pursued research in tandem with working for government and non-government agencies in the UK and in Latin America, as well as through a variety of different consultancies in the private and public sector. Whereas his main area of interest currently is the broad topic of corruption, he has also become involved in research and consultancy on themes as diverse as connectivity between global cities, corporate social responsibility and alternative energy provision in poor rural communities. A further theme to his research interests has been the household in countries of the global south; leading on from his PhD on microfinance in Nicaragua he has recently published critical work on the household, as well as the broader theme of cities and gender.
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 Dr Kate Gough
Reader in Human Geography
Kate’s research focuses on urban issues in developing countries, principally in West Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia. This research has focused on issues to do with low-income housing; land and housing markets, governance and civil society, home-based enterprises, youth, the peri-urban interface, and rural-urban linkages. Recent research projects include: Rural-urban dynamics in a globalising world: changing livelihoods and settlement patterns in frontier regions of Africa and Asia; Youth and the city: skills, knowledge and social reproduction; Community initiatives and the democratization of planning in Ghana; Home-based enterprises in low-income settlements; and Continuity and change in peri-urban Accra.
 Dr John Harrison
Lecturer in Human Geography
John’s research interests lie within the broad scope of political-economic geography, and he has a specific focus on the relationship between cities, regions and the state. His research seeks to connect the new politics of economic development with transitions in the regulation and governance of capitalism and its spatial form. He has recently authored a number of papers on city-regions, exploring their emergence as key sites for economic development, looking at different models of city-region governance, their political construction, and the challenges of sustaining competitive city-regions. These themes have been explored primarily through empirical research into the shifting geographies of cities and regions in England under devolution.
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 Dr Louise Holt
Senior Lecturer in Human Geography
Louise is a leading researcher in Geographies of Children, Youth and Families, and she organises the bi-ennial international conferences on this topic. Her own research centres on two themes. A recent British Academy grant saw her explore the developing nature of family-friendly spaces in cities. She is currently undertaking ESRC-funded research on geographies of learning, disability and social in/exclusion.
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 Michael Hoyler
Senior Lecturer in Human Geography and Associate Director of GaWC
Michael's research interests are in urban economic and social geography with a focus on the transformation of European cities and metropolitan regions in contemporary globalization. Current research investigates inter-city relations on the eve of the financial crisis (ESRC), cities in economic expansion since 1500 (The Leverhulme Trust), and the emerging global geographies of higher education. Contact details
 Dr Heike Jöns
Lecturer in Human Geography
Heike's research interests revolve around the geographies of knowledge and higher education with particular reference to the nature and outcome of academic travel and the study of academic networks. The main period of interest has been the 20th century. She has also a background in research on geographies of bank branch networks and regional transformation in Hungary and on European centres of interaction in the Middle Ages. These research areas are linked by an interest in the social and material realities of actor-networks in different times and places and related debates on theories and practices of representation.
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 Dr Elizabeth Mavroudi
Lecturer in Human Geography
Liz is a political/social geographer whose research interests in human geography are focused around how theories of national identity, citizenship and political participation are changing as a result of transnational migration, diaspora and globalisation. In particular, Liz is interested in how such changes affect the daily lives, politics and identities of migrants and how they may be excluded/ included as a result.
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 Professor David Slater
Professor of Social and Political Geography
David charts the geopolitics of imperial power and democratic alternatives, with special emphasis on US-Latin American relations, and provides critical analysis of the persistence of 'Euro-Americanism' in Western social and political theory.
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 Dr Darren Smith
Reader in Human Geography
Darren is a social / population geographer, whose research focuses on the connections between contemporary migration flows, population change, social conflicts, and sociospatial transformations. He coined the term studentification to conceptualise urban changes tied to concentrations of students in residential neighbourhoods, and he has conducted studies of the impacts of universities on local communities in UK, Ireland, Canada, and Australia. Other research projects have examined urban and rural gentrification; sub-national family migration; changing family geographies, and; Housing in Multiple Occupation (HMO) and coastal deprivation. Darren is currently Chair of the Population Geography Research Group of the Royal Geographic Society, and elected member of the Research Committee of the Royal Geographic Society.
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Researchers
 Dr Jennifer Lea
Research Associate in Human Geography
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Jennifer is interested in geographies of the body and embodiment. She is currently working on an ESRC funded project with Louise Holt and Sophie Bowlby looking at the social relationships of children with special educational needs in mainstream and special schools. She is also involved in an AHRC funded project with Chris Philo and Louisa Cadman which looks at everyday spiritual practices (such as yoga and meditation) in Brighton. Her previous research explored health, care and embodied learning through the practices of therapeutic massage and yoga.
Dr Oli Mould Research
Associate in Human Geography
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 Dr Helena Pimlott-Wilson
Research Associate in Human Geography
Helena is a social geographer, whose research interests focus on children, youth and families. Her research is driven by an interest in the daily lives of children, particularly in relation to family life. In this context, her empirical work focuses on parental employment from the perspective of children; social policy implementation in the local context; and in/exclusion in educational spaces.
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Dr Jo Sage
Research Associate in Human Geogrpahy
Jo's research focuses on the impacts of higher education and student populations on local communities and urban housing markets, and connections with urban gentrification. Critically investigating new expressions of studentification in the UK, her research grapples with reconceptualisations of urban change and social relations. Jo is currently Conferences Officer of the Population Geography Research Group of the Royal Geographical Society.
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Dr Sandra Vinciguerra
Research Associate in Human Geogrpahy
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 Dr Adam Warren
Research Associate in Human Geography
Adam's main research interests are in privacy and public policy. As a member of CRIGS he explores concepts of health and well-being in the West within the context of current debates in geographies of science, cultures of risk and postcolonial theory. This involves analysis of western discourses and practices associated with the control of infectious diseases. He is particularly interested in the surveillance practices involved, their governance and their impact on individual identity.
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