About me:
I joined the research group Cultural Geography at the Institute of Geography in September 2021. Here, I am teaching different courses of Human Geography, and I am doing research on air technologies and infrastructures, urban mobilities and the politics of planning.
Previously, I worked as researcher and lecturer at the Department of Geography at University of Bonn (2019-2021) and the Department of Human Geography at Goethe University Frankfurt (2014-2019). In my dissertation, I dealt with the globally circulating policy model Bus Rapid Transit and its controversial implementation in Dar es Salaam. I was a member of the graduate school URBANgrad at Technical University of Darmstadt, and held a scholarship from the Hans Böckler foundation (2014-2018). I completed my M.A. in Urban Geography in 2014 and my B.A. in Area Studies Asia/Africa and Human Geography in 2011. I studied at Humboldt University Berlin, the State University of Zanzibar and Université Rennes II.
Contact:
Institute of Geography
Johannes Gutenberg-Universität
Johann-Joachim-Becher-Weg 21
55099 Mainz
Room: 02-175
Research Interests:
Politics of Infrastructures and Technologies, More-than-human Geographies, Political Ecology, Urban Natures, Policy Mobilities, Feminist and Postcolonial Science and Technology Studies, Human-Technology-Environment Relations, Digital Geography, Ethnography, European Metropolitan Areas (Berlin, Paris, Rhine-Main), Indian Ocean World: Eastern Africa and India
Research Projects:
My current project “Urban air in crisis: Changing human-air relations and technological mediation” draws on the spatialities, mobilities and materialities of urban air to examine the transforming relationships between air, humans, technologies, plants and particles from a transdisciplinary perspective.
Previously, I worked on the project Assembling Bus Rapid Transit in the Global South.
Publications:
2022 Dar es Salaam’s bus rapid transit: why it’s been a long, bumpy ride. In: The Conversation. Academic rigour, journalistic flair. Published 12 May 2022. https://theconversation.com/dar-es-salaams-bus-rapid-transit-why-its-been-a-long-bumpy-ride-181486.
2021 Co-producing urban transport systems: adapting a global model in Dar es Salaam. In: Sustainability: Science, Practice and Policy, 17:1, 47-61. https://doi.org/10.1080/15487733.2020.1862545.
2020 Assembling Bus Rapid Transit in the Global South: Translating global models, materialising infrastructure politics. London: Routledge.
2020 Konzeptentwicklung für eine kritische Exkursionsdidaktik für Studienanfänger*innen in der Geographie. (with Katja Thiele): Bonner Zentrum für Hochschullehre – Zertifikatsprogramm Professionelle Lehrkompetenz für die Hochschule. Bonn: University of Bonn. https://www.bzh.uni-bonn.de/de/fuer-lehrende/individuelle-lehr-lernprojekte-dokumentationen/Projektdokumentation_Jacobsen_Thiele.pdf
2018 Pedestrian Mobility for Urban Growth. Walking and its Links to Transportation. Practical Guidance and Good Practice Examples. (with Carrigan, A.; J. Babinard; M. King; C, Kost; J. Mason; L. Nadal and C. Van Eyken): Washington: The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank. http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/157521557142749465/pdf/Practical-Guidance-and-Good-Practice-Examples.pdf
2018 Unemployment Benefit Recipients. Causes, Reactions and Consequences of Housing Relocations. (with N. Grotefendt, T. Kohlsdorf & L. Wegener) In: Helbrecht, I. (ed.): Gentrification and Resistance. Researching Displacement Processes and Adaptation Strategies. Wiesbaden: Springer VS, 161-187.
2017 Temporalities of Assembling Transport Systems. Presences and Absences in an Intermittent Process. In: Mewes, J. S. & E. Sørensen (ed.): Ethnographies of Objects in Science and Technology Studies. Ruhr-University Bochum, 52-64. http://ojs.ub.rub.de/index.php/EOO/article/view/630/598
2016 Die Wohnsituation von ALG II Empfänger_innen in Berlin. Prozesse wenn der Umzug naht. (with N. Grotefendt, T. Kohlsdorf & L. Wegener) In: Helbrecht, I. (ed.): Gentrifizierung in Berlin. Verdrängungsprozesse und Bleibestrategien. Bielefeld: transcript, 185-213.
2015 Schnellbusse auf der Überholspur. Dar es Salaam Rapid Transit als Wegbereiter nachhaltiger urbaner Mobilität?. In: RaumPlanung (182/6-2015) & TRIALOG (120/121-2/2015), 66-73.
2013–2014 Collectors between Formality and Informality (Johannesburg), Bottle Collectors in Public Urban Space (Berlin). Blog The (in)formal city (with Tebogo Ramatlo) https://informalcity.wordpress.com/2014/04/22/collectors-between-formal-and-informal-structures-part-2/
2010 „Wir wollen den Besten für Tansania“. Deutsche Welle, Afrika. http://www.dw.com/de/wir-wollen-den-besten-für-tansania/a-6161388
Activities:
Upcoming:
09/2022 Digitising air, commodifying nature: A critical take on the innovation of air purification (Talk at RGS-IBG Annual International Conference, Newcastle)
Past (selection):
06/2022 Atmende Pflanzen, Menschen und Technologien: Die Digitalisierung von urbaner Luft (Talk at Department of Geography and Geoscience, FAU Erlangen, online)
09/2021 Digitized Natures (Workshop at Humangeographische Sommerschule “Digital Geographies” at FAU Erlangen, online, together with Astrid Matejcek, Julia Poerting, Julian Rochlitz, Julia Verne and Oleg Zurmühlen)
09/2019 When the Travelling Model Arrives: Adaptation and Resistance in Global Infrastructure Planning (Talk at Deutscher Kongress für Geographie, Kiel)
09/2019 When Transport Infrastructures Encounter Water: Perspectives from the Indian Ocean Coast (Invited Talk at Vellore Institute of Technology)
01/2019 Bus Rapid Transit: Disziplinierende Technologie oder ‘modernes Minibus-System’? (Talk at Neue Kulturgeographie XVI, Eichstätt)
01/2018 Gathering ‘Global Forms’: Materialisations of a Globally Circulating Transport Model (Talk at Neue Kulturgeographie XV, Freiburg)
08/2017 Global Consultants in the Global South: Expertise, Ideology and Development Aid (Talk at RGS-IBG Annual International Conference, London)
11/2016 Mass Rapid Transit: Options for East African Cities (Talk at Sustainable Transport in East Africa Conference, Nairobi, mit Achieng Abira)
09/2016 Assembling Bus Rapid Transit: Planning Controversies of the Material and Operational (Talk at 4S/EAAST Conference: Science and Technology by Other Means, Barcelona)
03/2016 Approaching the Objects Themselves: Methodological Theorisations of Global BRT Models (Talk at Annual Meeting of the Association of American Geographers, San Francisco)
03/2015 Dar es Salaam Rapid Transit: The User as Co-Producer? (Talk at PhD Training Week: Decentralizing Infrastructures in East Africa, Dar es Salaam)
Teaching:
Summer term 2022
- M2 Stadt- und Sozialgeographie (Seminar, BSc/BEd Geographie)
- M13 Urbane Natur: Kulturgeographische Perspektiven (Seminar and Empirical Field Trip to Berlin, BSc Geographie)
Winter term 2021/22
- M2 Wirtschaftsgeographie (Übung, BSc/BEd Geography)
- M13 Das Fahrrad in der Stadt: Kulturen – Politiken – Technologien (Seminar and Empirical Field Trip in Rhine-Main Area, BSc Geography)
Malve Jacobsen received the certificate “Professional Teaching Competence for Higher Education” (awarded by Bonner Zentrum für Hochschullehre, University of Bonn, July 2020)
Prior teaching at University of Bonn
- Humangeographie Aufbau: Glokale Verflechtungen, Stadtgeographie, Raumproduktionen (Seminar Bachelor Geography, Summer term 2020)
- Humangeographie Aufbau: Geographien der Globalisierung, Stadt und Digitalisierung (Seminar Bachelor Geography, Winter term 2019/2020)
- Asymmetrien globaler Mobilitäten (Project Seminar Bachelor Geography, Winter term 2019/2020)
- Humangeographie Aufbau: Raumtheorien, Postkoloniale Geographien, Feministische Geographien (Seminar Bachelor Geography, Summer term 2019)
Prior teaching at Goethe University Frankfurt
- (Post-)Kolonialismus: Geographische Perspektiven (Seminar Bachelor Geography, Summer term 2018)
- The Work of Global Production (Reading Course Bachelor Geography, Winter term 2017/18)
- (Post-)Koloniale Geographien (with Alev Coban, Seminar Bachelor Geography, Summer term 2017)
- Geographien des Globalen Südens (with Alev Coban, Seminar Bachelor Geography, Summer term 2016)