香港六合彩

My broad research interests are in postcolonial urbanism, smart cities, gender citizenship and regional futures. 听My research is set in the ethos of co-production with grassroots communities using digital/mapping, visual and participatory research methods to develop and build gendered capacity in the digital and urban margins. In the last 5 years, I have received over 拢3m in funding from European Research Council (Advanced Grant), AHRC, ESRC, British Academy and Swiss National Science Foundation to pursue groundbreaking research on digital urban transformations in the global south and their impacts on everyday social, material and gendered geographies. I have been the frontline Editor of Urban Geography since 2017 and am on editorial boards of several journals: Antipode, Dialogues in Human Geography, Digital Geography and Society, EPD: Society and Space and Territory, Politics and Governance. I was also a sub-panel member in the UK Research Excellence Framework 2021 (REF) representing Geography as Unit of Assessment. I received the Busk Medal from the听Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) in 2019.

More about Professor Datta

I have a Bachelor鈥檚 degree in Architecture (Delhi) and an MPhil in Environmental Design (Cantab) funded by the Overseas Development Administration (ODA) and Cambridge Commonwealth Scholarship. I practised as an architect in New Delhi for a year and as an RIBA chartered architect in London for three years, after which I left professional practice to pursue a PhD.

I worked on my PhD in Environmental Design and Planning at Arizona State University (ASU) from 2000-2003. I was placed on the Dean's list (GPA 4.0) and awarded the King Medal from the Architectural Research Centers Consortium upon graduation. During my time at ASU, I worked as a Graduate Research Associate in the Center for Architecture and Environmental Design.

This was followed by Lectureships in the Department of Architecture at Queen鈥檚 University Belfast (2003-2005), the Cities Programme in London School of Economics (2005-2012) and a Senior Lectureship in the Department of Geography, University of Leeds (2012-2016). I moved to King鈥檚 College London as a Reader (subsequently Professor) in Urban Futures in 2016. While at King鈥檚, I was Chair of the Urban Futures research domain and Convenor of the MA/MSc Sustainable Cities degree programme. I joined 香港六合彩 as Professor of Human Geography in September 2019.

I am the author of 鈥�Squatter Settlement鈥�听(2012 Ashgate), co-editor of 鈥�Postcolonial State鈥�听(2017听Routledge) and听鈥�鈥�听(2011 Ashgate). For my contributions to understanding smart cities, I received the听听from the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) in 2019.

I follow a strong ethos of co-production with societal partners shaping several public-facing outputs such as films, exhibitions, podcasts and a rap song. I have a strong media presence, engaging through regular blogs, podcasts and op-eds in the听ConversationUK, Guardian and openDemocracy.听I am regularly invited to international lectures and keynotes including invitations to speak at several themed UN meetings in Geneva and New York.

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I teach on the following modules:听

Undergraduate

• Digital Geographies (GEOG0164, Convenor)
• Thinking Geographically I (GEOG0151)
• Thinking Geographically II (GEOG0012)
• Development Geography (GEOG0024)
• Geographies of Infrastructure (GEOG0065)

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Postgraduate

• Cities, Space and Power (GEOG0136)
• Urban Imaginations (GEOG0137)

Publications

To view Professor Datta's publications, please visit 香港六合彩 Profiles:

Research Interests

Crosscutting themes of my research are:

• Regional Futures: In 2020, I was awarded the EUROPEAN RESEARCH COUNCIL (ERC) ADVANCED GRANT to initiate a new five-year research project on the dynamics of digitalisation-as-urbanisation in the global south. This project will conduct the first comprehensive South-South investigation of the transition to automated planning processes in metropolitan regions, and its impacts on regional urbanisation.
• Smart Cities and Digital Urbanism: I am known internationally for pioneering theoretical and empirical work on India鈥檚 smart cities and the 鈥榙igital turn鈥� in urban studies. This has attracted ESRC NEWTON funds (PI) titled 鈥楲earning from Small Cities鈥�, AHRC GCRF funds (PI) titled 鈥楲earning from the Utopian City鈥�, BRITISH ACADEMY GCRF funds titled 'Digitising the Periphery: Co-Producing a Toolkit for Digital Democracy and Inclusive Urbanisation' and SNSF funded (CoI) titled 'Smart Cities: Provincializing the global urban age in India and South Africa'.
• Feminist Urban Futures: I have received international recognition as one of the few scholars working on feminist urban futures in the global south pioneering an original research agenda linking digital geographies, urban infrastructures and Violence Against Women (VAW). This has attracted BRITISH ACADEMY GCRF funding (PI) titled 鈥楧isconnected Infrastructures and VAW鈥� and AHRC GCRF NETWORK GRANT (PI) titled 鈥楪endering the Smart City鈥�. This work has used creative practices and co-production (of films, hip-hop music videos, exhibitions and Storymaps) as a tool for the empowerment of marginal social actors and has also transformed the work of NGOs and activists in India.

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Impact

My work has high translatability into policy/industry and public/lay knowledge and has gained international recognition through invited presentations in the United Nations headquarters in Geneva and New York. I have garnered a major impact by building and consolidating international research networks across stakeholders in global policy, third sector, creative industries and grassroots organisations, delivering cutting-edge scholarship and impactful research towards fulfilling SDGs #5 (gender equality) and #11 (sustainable cities and communities).

A key impact of my work has been in the听curation and co-production of knowledge听through long-term involvement with participants in low-income settlements and partnerships with NGOs and grassroots organisations in the global south. My work has transformed marginal lives and the methods of NGO partners by including gendered local knowledge within digital platforms and data commons from which they are usually excluded. In 2018, I co-produced a听听(called 鈥楰hadar Girls鈥�) with research participants, which was reported in all major national newspapers.

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I co-curated this work into an exhibition titled听#AanaJaana听[#ComingGoing] in Delhi鈥檚 Mandi House Metro station throughout January 2019, which was developed later into an听story map. Its research method 鈥樚齢as informed NGO practices in building the digital capacities of youth. The song and exhibition were used by a national news channel to produce a听听for the 2019 Delhi election agenda around gender safety in public spaces and a gender-sensitive Delhi masterplan.

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During the听COVID-19 pandemic, I have been working with sound artists and women in low-income neighbourhoods in Delhi to facilitate online podcast training workshops leading to the production of 4听听written and recorded by these women. I have also worked with animation artists to produce an听听highlighting the struggles faced by marginal communities in India during the crisis.

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Invited presentations at the United Nations

• Nov 2021 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Inter-sessional Panel on 'Sustainable urban development in the post #COVID19 world' 17-19 November 2021 in Geneva, Switzerland.
• Dec 2020 Virtual forum on 鈥淒igital Transformation of Cities and Communities, UN-Habitat and ITU, Geneva.
• Feb 2020 UN-Habitat World Urban Forum 10 plenary panel on 'Frontier Technologies', Abu Dhabi.
• May 2018 Plenary Speaker in the UN ECOSOC Integration section in New York.
• May 2016 Plenary Speaker at听the UNCTAD CSTD 19 annual meeting in Geneva.

In 2016, I was cited in the UN World Cities Report听and my听听article was an agenda contributor to the World Economic Forum.听My research has been documented several times in the national and international media (newspapers and radio), including BBC Radio, Guardian, South China Morning Post, Economic Times, 听Hindustan Times, and mentions in LA Times, Reuters, Times of India, FirstPost, Quint, Dainik Jagran, and Times Higher Education.

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Recent and upcoming keynote

2022

• MPRI Special Talk Series: The State of Cities - #CityConversations
• ICT4S Conference, Plovdiv, Bulgaria.

2021

• Geoforum Annual Lecture at the RGS-IBG annual meeting in London, 1-3 Sept 2021. Title: 鈥楾hick time鈥�: Experiments with feminist urban futures
• RC21 鈥楽ensing the City鈥� Plenary in Antwerp, Belgium, 14-16 July 2021. Title: Regional Futures: the politics of digitalisation as urbanisation in the global south.
• Media Architecture Biennale. Title: Regional Futures: the politics of digitalisation as urbanisation in the global south.
• RSA Network on Infrastructural Regionalism (NOIR) Conference. Title: Distant times: Excavating the future smart city in Simla municipal record room
• RSA Regions in Recovery plenary speaker.
• EURA 2021 Conference, Oslo [Virtual] Title: 鈥楧ecolonising urban Futures: Reclaiming Shimla from 鈥楤elow Cart Road鈥�
• TISS School of Public Policy and Governance, 4th International Graduate Seminar on "Quality of life in informal settlements鈥�.
• Bartlett International Lecture Series. Title: Distance

2020

• Futurium Plenary, Berlin Future Institute
• Artepolis-8 International conference, Bandung, Indonesia
• UN-Habitat World Urban Forum 10 in Abu Dhabi, 8-13 February

2019

• Finisterra Annual Lecture in Lisbon
• Centre for BOLD Cities, Rotterdam
• 鈥楢esthetics of Gentrification鈥� Conference, Portland OR
• European Public Policy Conference, Madrid
• Digital | Visual | Cultural workshop at the University of Oxford

2018

• Sociological Review Journal conference, Newcastle
• 50th Irish Geographers鈥� Annual Meeting, Maynooth, Ireland

2017

• AHRC Conference 鈥榃hose right to the smart city鈥� at听the University of Plymouth
• Association for Literary Urban Studies Conference, University of Tampere, Finland
• 鈥淪mart and Green Cities, for whom?" conference at the听University of Oslo.

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Recent Op-eds

• Datta, A. (2021) Fast Urbanism: Between Speed, Time and Urban Futures,听Transient Cities Blog.
• Datta, A. (2021) Gendering COVID19 in India.听Geography Directions Blog.
• Datta, A. (2020) Survival infrastructures under COVID-19 in India. Geography Directions Blog.
• Datta, A (Sept 2019) Why Smart City projects may not be enough to hold back Jalandhar鈥檚 youth. Citizen Matters.
• Datta, A (March 2019) 鈥楰hadar ki Ladkiyan鈥�: A hip hop music video co-produced with young women in Delhi鈥檚 urban peripheries.听Guftugu: Indian Writers鈥� Collective, Vol. 3
• Datta, A (1 February 2019) Indian women from the outskirts of Delhi are taking selfies to claim their right to the city.听The Conversation UK.[Republished in Scroll.In, Quartz, Firstpost]
• Datta, A, Ahmed, N. and Tripathi, R. (26 Oct 2018) #MeToo has arrived in India, and it鈥檚 changing how technology is used to fight injustice.听The Conversation UK. [Republished in Scroll.In, Quartz]
• Datta, A (9 June 2016)听.听The Conversation.
• Datta, A (27 January 2016)听The Conversation.听[Republished in Scroll.In, Quartz]

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Recent Films/Exhibitions/Podcasts

• Nov 2021 听Curated public exhibition in the Building Centre, London. Titled: 鈥樷��, 12 November to 10 December 2021. Funded by ESRC-Newton.
• Dec 2019 听Curated public exhibition in collaboration with Safetipin in Khoj Studios, New Delhi. Title: 'Disconnected Infrastructures and Violence Against Women', funded by British Academy.
• 8 March 2019 Podcast interview on 鈥楽mart Cities鈥� produced by Royal Geographical Society (RGS-IBG) #AsktheGeographer
• March 2019 AHRC (PI) funded and co-produced 鈥楰hadar ki Ladkiyan鈥� music video was curated inside a bioscope and showcased in the 2019听International Association of Women in Radio & Television (IAWRT)听听in Delhi from 5-7 March 2019, Delhi.
• January 2019 Co-produced 鈥樷�� 3 min hip-hop music video with participants in Madanpur Khadar. YouTube听[10k + views in July 2019]

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• January 2019 Curated #AanaJaana [#ComingGoing] exhibition in Delhi鈥檚 Mandi House Metro station as part of their 鈥楢rt in the Metro鈥� initiative.
• March 2017 In conversation with Mathew Gandy and Simon Marvin on 鈥樷�� British Academy film听

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• March 2017 Curated Museum of London exhibition on 鈥楥ity Now, City Futures鈥�.
• 2013 鈥楥ity Bypassed鈥� and 鈥楥ity Forgotten鈥� 鈥� two films that depict different faces of development urbanization and communal politics in Maharashtra.

Research Students

Postdoctoral researchers

The following postdoctoral researchers currently, or have recently, worked with me:

• Nabeela Ahmed
• Tom Cowan
• Sheema Fatima
• Philip Nicholson
• Srilata Sircar

Research Grants, Scholarships and Awards

• 2022-2026: European Research Council Advanced Grant (PI ref: 101019318). Title: Regional Futures: The Territorial Politics of digitalisation-as-urbanisation in the global south. Amount: 鈧�2,499,862 ~ 拢2,163,497
• 2021-2023: British Academy GCRF Tackling Global Challenges (PI ref: TGC\200118). Title: Digitising the periphery: Co-producing a toolkit for digital democracy and inclusive urbanisation. Amount: 拢49,967.
• 2018-2021: ESRC-ICSSR Urban Transformations in India (PI ref: ES/R006857/1). Title: Learning from small cities: Governing imagined futures and the dynamics of change in India's smart urban age. Amount: 拢464,339 fEC.
• 2018-2021: AHRC network grant (PI ref: AH/R003866/1) titled 鈥楪endering the smart city: A subaltern curation network on Gender-Based Violence (GBV) in India鈥� fEC 59,720.
• 2018-2021: Swiss National Science Foundation Money follows the co-operation line (CoI ref: 10001AM_173332/1). Title: Smart cities: 鈥楶rovincialising鈥� the global urban age in India and South Africa. Amount: fEC 624,000CHF ~ 拢553,000 fEC.
• 2017-2019: British Academy GCRF 鈥楥ities and Infrastructure鈥� Programme. (PI ref: CI170047). Title: 鈥楧isconnected infrastructures and Violence Against Women (VAW): Innovating digital technologies in low-income neighbourhoods to produce safer Indian cities鈥�. Amount: fEC 拢280,798.
• 2018: British Academy Visiting Fellowship award (ref. VF1\102424) to Prof. Sanjay Srivastava to work collaboratively with Dr Datta on a project titled, 鈥楿rban Futures: Satellite Mapping, Big Data and the Politics of Space at the Margins of the Indian City鈥�. Amount, 拢32,595.
• 2016-2017: AHRC development grant (PI ref: AH/N007395/1) titled 鈥楲earning from the Utopian City: An International Network on alternative histories of India's urban futures鈥�. Amount: 拢39,682 (fEC)