IN-PERSON Prague Research & Teaching Conference

Abstract

This paper examines how synergistic creative research and pedagogical practices can unsettle the accepted norm of what and who gets to be geographic. Since 2022, I have integrated my teaching and research efforts to address the systematic erasure of minority groups’ spatial practices from the conventional maps used by urban planners and architects. In my “Participatory Mapping” course and public workshops, I encourage students and community members to critically examine the ideologies of power embedded mapping conventions and to develop creative practices that better represent their own communities’ spatial histories and experiences. My ongoing research, which is currently building towards an “Atlas of Black Psychogeographies,” is deeply connected to identity and community. Through participatory mapping workshops, I investigate how Black communities worldwide have faced systematic denial of geographic self-determination – from the arbitrary division of Africa’s colonial boundaries… to the ongoing gentrification and erasure of Black neighborhoods in the United States… and the spatial isolation imposed on Black-European immigrants from former colonies. The absence of Black spatial histories from traditional archives limits our ability to document important cultural geographies, leaving Black neighborhoods and sacred spaces vulnerable to unwanted redevelopment. This atlas of Black Psychogeographies is a strategy for combating further erasure of my community’s history, while the pedagogical arm of my practice aims to empower students to do the same for their own communities. Drawing on my background in urban planning and community arts, I’ve transformed my classroom into a collaborative research space where students explore how intersectional identities shape both design decisions and lived experiences of the built environment. This paper analyzes the facilitation strategies that foster inclusive knowledge co-creation and advance more equitable urban planning practices.