Andrew Harris

I’m an Associate Professor in Geography and Urban Studies. I am an urban geographer interested in a wide range of topics related to cities and urban life but primarily around the role of art, creativity and culture in recent processes of urban restructuring, and on vertical geographies of contemporary cities. I convene the interdisciplinary MSc Urban Studies programme and am Co-Director of the UCL Urban Laboratory. I’m also the co-lead for the Global Urbanisms research cluster in the Department.

More about Dr Harris

I grew up in Hanwell in West London and graduated in Geography from the University of Cambridge in 1999. I then completed a MSc in 'Modernity, Space and Place' at UCL in 2001, and undertook an ESRC-funded PhD in UCL Geography between 2001 and 2005. After a year working away from academia, I was as a part-time research fellow at UCL on a project which explored the material and metaphorical dimensions to water and landscape in Mumbai, and included the making of a short documentary film. I was an ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow working 2007-2008 on a project entitled ‘Rethinking the creative city: twenty-first century urbanism in London and Mumbai’. In September 2008, I was appointed as a Lecturer in Urban Studies and Geography at UCL to support an innovative new MSc programme in Urban Studies, which I now convene, part of a cross-Faculty initiative at UCL called the Urban Laboratory.

I am a member of the ESRC Peer Review College, was Events Coordinator for the Royal Geographical Society-Institute of British Geographers Urban Geography Research Group (2009-2013), and was part of the Urban Lab+ network funded by the EU's Erasmus Mundus Programme Action 3. I was a visiting fellow at LATTS in Paris in 2021/22.

Teaching

I teach on the following modules: 

• Urban Imaginations (GEOG0137, Convenor)
• Creative Cities (GEOG0138, Convenor)
• Urban Practices (GEOG0140, Co-Convenor)
• London: Aspects of Change (GEOG0142, Convenor)
• MSc in Urban Studies Dissertation (GEOG0144, Convenor)
• Geography in the Field 2 (GEOG0014, Co-Convenor, 1st Year Module)
• Urban Geography (GEOG0028, 2nd Year Module)

I also teach the London Lab (SOCS0037) course.

 

Publications

To view Dr Harris's publications, please visit UCL Profiles:

Publications

Research Interests

Bringing together approaches and ideas from urban geography with art history, engineering, urban sociology, architectural history, visual methodologies and urban anthropology, I explore a broad number of key debates within urban studies: from gentrification and the global city to urban infrastructure, vertical urbanism and transport planning.

My research often centres on recent urban transformations in London, including work on art districts, high-rise urbanism, culture-led urban regeneration, and suburban landscapes. I also have long-standing research interests in Mumbai exploring mill-land redevelopment, heritage districts and transport infrastructure particularly elevated roads and walkways, as well as municipal buses.

My work is characterised by creative experiments with comparative urbanism: working across Mumbai and London to contest Eurocentric assumptions in urban and social theory, pursuing multi-sited research that foregrounds intra-urban comparisons, and more recently developing work around urban verticality across London and Paris.

Impact

My work on creative city policy-making has been used by organisations including the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, the British Urban Regeneration Association, Camden Council and the Cultural Development Centre of Thessaloniki, Greece. The public web resource created to disseminate findings and an illustrated summary pamphlet from the AHRC Creative City Limits research network can be found on the UCL Urban Labs pages.

I also have organised public events on urban themes, particularly around sound and music, with organisations in London including the Arcola Theatre, the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, the Roxy Cinema, the Royal Academy of Arts, Hoxton Hall and the Westminster Hub.

Research Students

Current PhD students and their working titles

• Emilia Weber (FT, 2017-) Performances of Politics, Power and Resistance in the UK. ESRC studentship. Secondary supervisor (Primary supervisor, Dr Tariq Jazeel, Department of Geography).
• Sidra Ahmed (FT, 2018-) The Lived Skyscraper: Branding, Viewing and Experiencing Contemporary Vertical London. ESRC studentship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Dr Clare Melhuish, UCL Urban Lab).
• Isobel Pagendam (FT, 2019-) Everyday ups and downs: exploring multi-sensory experiences of the lift in London. ESRC studentship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Professor Iain Borden, Bartlett School of Architecture).
• Hanadi Samhan (FT, 2019-) The volumetric Palestinian refugee camp. Self-funded. Secondary supervisor (Primary supervisor, Professor Camillo Boano, Development Planning Unit).
• Sarojini Sapru (FT, 2022-) In the end we only regret the walls we didn't tag: Migrant Youth and the Spatial Politics of Graffiti Writing in Delhi. ESRC studentship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Dr Pushpa Arabindoo, Department of Geography).
• Qianqian Lu (FT, 2022-) Urban Regeneration and Community Revitalisation through Participatory Art and Cultural Projects in Historic Areas in Beijing. Self-funded. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Prof Yasminah Beebeejaun, Bartlett School of Planning).
• Leah Aaron (FT, 2022-) How Data Governance Anxieties Impact Post-COVID Platform Urbanisms in London and Berlin. ESRC studentship. Secondary supervisor (Primary supervisor, Dr Susan Moore, Bartlett School of Planning).
• Helene Schulze (FT, 2022-) Crop diversity and resilient urban futures Understanding the contributions of seed savers in London. ESRC studentship. Secondary supervisor (Primary supervisor, Dr Russell Hitchings, Department of Geography).

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Completed PhD Students

• Dzmitry Suslau (FT, 2015-) Constructing Urban Narratives: Public Art and the Gendering of Urban Space in Vilnius, Minsk and Kaliningrad. SSEES Foundation Scholarship. Secondary supervisor (Primary supervisor, Dr Richard Mole, School of Slavic and Eastern European Studies).
• Murray McKenzie (FT, 2014-2019) Coming Together and Apart in Heiqiao Village, Beijing: Urban Life, Artistic Practices, and the Making of Social Worlds UCL Overseas Research Scholarship, Chinese Government Scholarship and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Scholarship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Dr Caroline Bressey, Department of Geography).
• Shaun Teo (FT, 2015-2019) Symbiotic States and Progressive Projects: Shenzhen and London in Comparative Conversation. UCL Graduate Research Scholarship/Overseas Research Scholarship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Professor Jennifer Robinson, Department of Geography).
• Ana Maria Huaita Alfaro (FT, 2013-2018) Encounters at Lima’s inner-city marketplaces: negotiating fragmentation and common living in urban Peru. PRONABEC – National Scholarship Programme, Ministry of Education of Peru. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Alexandre Apsan Frediani, Development Planning Unit).
• Soledad Martinez (FT, 2013-2018) May I Walk with You? Exploring Inequality in Everyday Walking Practices in Santiago de Chile Full-support scholarship (Beca Chile), Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Dr Filipa Matos Wunderlich, Bartlett School of Planning).
• Cecil Sagoe (FT, 2013-2017) English Planning and Governmentality: The Case of the London Legacy Development Corporation. ESRC studentship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Dr Ben Clifford, Bartlett School of Planning).
• Sam Barton (FT, 2013-2017) Alienation and Authenticity in Brixton: An Ethnography of a Changing Neighbourhood. ESRC studentship. Primary supervisor (Secondary supervisor, Dr Adam Drazin, Department of Anthropology).
• Sam Merrill Buried Memories: Mnemonic Production in the London Underground and Berlin U-Bahn. (FT 2010-2014) University College London Graduate School Research Scholarship. Second supervisor (Primary supervisor, Professor Richard Dennis).
• Donald Poland The Remaking of Resilient Space: A Case Study of West Hartford Center (PT, 2009-2015). Self-funded. Second supervisor (Primary supervisor, Dr Alan Latham).
• Astrid Wood, Peripatetic Planning: Tracing the Mobility of Bus Rapid Transit through South African Cities (FT, 2010-2015) Self-funded. Second supervisor (Primary supervisor, Professor Jennifer Robinson)

Research Grants, Prizes and Awards

My research has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) and the Leverhulme Trust.