About me
I joined the research group Cultural Geography at the Institute of Geography in 2021. I am teaching different courses of Human Geography, and I am doing research on air technologies, urban naturecultures, infrastructures, 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
E-Mail: malve.jacobsen@uni-mainz.de
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 Technonatural mediations of urban airs 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
2025 Volumetric breathing: Verticality and horizontality in South Indian metro systems. In: Ephemera. Theory & Politics in Organization. online first: https://ephemerajournal.org/contribution/volumetric-breathing-verticality-and-horizontality-south-indian-metro-systems (peer reviewed)
2024 Moos. In: Borgards, R., F. Felcht, V. Kuni, F. Middelhoff, R. Pütz & A. Schlottmann (eds.): Von Katzenklappe bis Pilzdruck. 39 Kleinigkeiten zwischen den Arten. Göttingen: Wallstein, 186-195.
2024 (together with C. Tristl) Western Modernity in Crisis: (De-)Constructions of Plural and Alternative Forms of Social Organization. Edited collection for Society and Space Forum. https://www.societyandspace.org/forums/western-modernity-in-crisis-de-constructions-of-plural-and-alternative-forms-of-social-organization
2023 Mediating infrastructural discipline: Established practices and changing structures of Dar es Salaam’s transport sector. In: Urban Forum 34, 481-500. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12132-022-09477-5. (peer reviewed)
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. (peer reviewed)
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 (eds.): 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. (peer reviewed)
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
03/2025 Talk at STS Hub, Berlin: “Making air visible: Data epistemologies and politics of evidence”
09/2023 Session organization at Deutscher Kongress für Geographie, Frankfurt: “Geographien der Luft: Teilchen, Technologien und Turbulenzen” (together with Tino Petzold and Till Straube)
09/2023 Talk at Deutscher Kongress für Geographie, Frankfurt: “Moose und Menschen in Koexistenz: Technologische Mediationen, evidenzbasierte Kalkulationen und diskursive Verhandlungen urbaner Luftqualität”
07/2023 Lecture and workshop at International Forster Summer School, Mainz: “Something in the air: Urban breathability and the rise of air quality technologies“
01/2023-11/2023 Organization of Arbeitskreis Digitale Geographien Meeting and Workshop: “Digital Disruptions” (together with Verena Brinks, Astrid Matejcek, Rupert Neuhöfer, Julia Verne and Julian Zschocke)
01/2023 Talk at Neue Kulturgeographie Tagung, Halle: “Geographien der Luft” (together with Tino Petzold and Till Straube)
01/2023 Session organization at Neue Kulturgeographie Tagung, Halle: “Die westliche Moderne in der Krise: (De-)Konstruktionen pluraler und alternativer gesellschaftlicher Organisation” (together with Christiane Tristl)
11/2022-09/2024 Co-speaker of AK Digitale Geographien (together with Hannah Boettcher, Leonie Büttner, Finn Dammann, Yannick Ecker and Astrid Matejcek)
10/2022-09/2023 Internal university research funding for research project “Urban air in crisis” (Research and Technology Transfer, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz)
09/2022 Talk at RGS-IBG Annual International Conference, Newcastle: “Digitising air, commodifying nature: A critical take on the innovation of air purification”
06/2022 Talk at Department of Geography and Geoscience, FAU Erlangen: “Atmende Pflanzen, Menschen und Technologien: Die Digitalisierung von urbaner Luft” (online)
09/2021-11/2023 Erasmus+ coordinator (Department of Geography at Johannes-Gutenberg University Mainz)
09/2021 Workshop at Humangeographische Sommerschule Digital Geographies, FAU Erlangen: “Digitized Natures” (online, together with Astrid Matejcek, Julia Poerting, Julian Rochlitz, Julia Verne and Oleg Zurmühlen)
06/2020 Award of certificate “Professional Teaching Competence for Higher Education” (by Zentrum für Hochschullehre, University of Bonn)
09/2019 Talk at Deutscher Kongress für Geographie, Kiel: “When the Travelling Model Arrives: Adaptation and Resistance in Global Infrastructure Planning”
09/2019 Talk at Vellore Institute of Technology: “When Transport Infrastructures Encounter Water: Perspectives from the Indian Ocean Coast”
06/2019-01/2020 Assistance of the organization of Neue Kulturgeographie Tagung, Bonn: “Technocultures/Technoscapes” (convened by Julia Verne and Nadine Marquardt)
01/2019 Talk at Neue Kulturgeographie Tagung, Eichstätt: “Bus Rapid Transit: Disziplinierende Technologie oder ‘modernes Minibus-System’?”
since 2019 Reviewing for peer-reviewed journals (e.g., Antipode, Urban Studies, Applied Mobilities)
01/2018 Talk at Neue Kulturgeographie, Freiburg: “Gathering ‘Global Forms’: Materialisations of a Globally Circulating Transport Model”
11/2017-02/2019 Erasmus+ coordinator (Department of Human Geography at Goethe University Frankfurt)
08/2017 Talk at RGS-IBG Annual International Conference, London: “Global Consultants in the Global South: Expertise, Ideology and Development Aid”
11/2016 Talk at Sustainable Transport in East Africa Conference, Nairobi: “Mass Rapid Transit: Options for East African Cities” (together with Achieng Abira)
09/2016 Talk at 4S/EAAST Conference, Barcelona: “Assembling Bus Rapid Transit: Planning Controversies of the Material and Operational”
03/2016 Talk at Annual Meeting of the Association of American Geographers, San Francisco: “Approaching the Objects Themselves: Methodological Theorisations of Global BRT Models”
since 2016 Academic teaching (see below)
03/2015 Talk at PhD Training Week: Decentralizing Infrastructures in East Africa, Dar es Salaam: “Dar es Salaam Rapid Transit: The User as Co-Producer?”
12/2014-11/2018 PhD scholarship (Hans-Böckler foundation)
since 2014 Field research in Johannesburg, Dar es Salaam, Nairobi, Kochi, Chennai, Paris, Rhein-Main area, Berlin and other German cities
Teaching
I supervise Bachelor and Master theses that relate to my fields of research and teaching. Please get in touch with a first idea in mind. Inspiration for topics can be found here: https://kulturgeographie-mainz.de/teaching/
Summer Term 2025
- M6/M9ED Geländepraktikum Methodenworkshop: Urbane Natur (BSc Geographie, MEd Geographie)
- M2/M2ED Übung: Humangeographie II – Wirtschaftsgeographie (BSc Geographie, BEd Geographie)
Winter Term 2024/25
- M2/M2ED Übung: Humangeographie I – Sozialgeographie (BSc Geographie, BEd Geographie)
Summer Term 2024
- M6/M9ED Geländepraktikum Methodenworkshop: Urbane Luft (BSc Geographie, MEd Geographie)
Summer Term 2023
- M9 Seminar zu aktuellen Konzepten/Debatten: Postkoloniale Geographien: Kontinuitäten und Brüche (BSc Geographie)
- M2/M2ED Übung: Humangeographie II – Wirtschaftsgeographie (BSc Geographie, BEd Geographie)
Winter Term 2022/23
- M2-MA Advanced Seminar: Academic Skills II (MA Human Geography)
- M15 Spezielle Humangeographie: Multiple Mobilitäten in Frankfurt (BSc Geographie)
Summer Term 2022
- M2/M2ED Übung: Humangeographie II – Stadt- und Sozialgeographie (BSc Geographie, BEd Geographie)
- M13 Spezielle Humangeographie: Urbane Natur – Kulturgeographische Perspektiven (BSc Geographie)
Winter Term 2021/22
- M2/M2ED Übung: Humangeographie I – Wirtschaftsgeographie (BSc Geographie, BEd Geographie)
- M13 Spezielle Humangeographie: Das Fahrrad in der Stadt: Kulturen – Politiken – Technologien (BSc Geographie)
Prior teaching at University of Bonn
- Humangeographie Aufbau: Glokale Verflechtungen, Stadtgeographie, Raumproduktionen (Seminar BSc Geography, Summer term 2020)
- Humangeographie Aufbau: Geographien der Globalisierung, Stadt und Digitalisierung (Seminar BSc Geography, Winter term 2019/2020)
- Asymmetrien globaler Mobilitäten (Project Seminar BSc Geography, Winter term 2019/2020)
- Humangeographie Aufbau: Raumtheorien, Postkoloniale Geographien, Feministische Geographien (Seminar BSc Geography, Summer term 2019)
Prior teaching at Goethe University Frankfurt
- (Post-)Kolonialismus: Geographische Perspektiven (Seminar BSc Geography, Summer term 2018)
- The Work of Global Production (Reading Course BSc Geography, Winter term 2017/18)
- (Post-)Koloniale Geographien (with Alev Coban, Seminar BSc Geography, Summer term 2017)
- Geographien des Globalen Südens (with Alev Coban, Seminar BSc Geography, Summer term 2016)