Overview

Postgraduate research in Human Geography can cover a wide range of topics, but in essence it is broadly concerned with the dynamic interactions between humans and their environment. This encompasses social and cultural geography, urban and political geography, economics and development studies, as well as environmental and landscape planning.

PhD

The PhD is a three-year full-time and five-year part-time programme. You research and write a thesis of a maximum of 100,000 words under the supervision of an academic team. Students participate in the vibrant seminar culture of the School and have opportunities to meet and interact with researchers who work in major areas of Human Geography.

The first year includes training in research methodology and then the remaining years involve field work and/or library research and writing up. Normally, you work closely with two supervisors throughout your research, although you have a committee of three (including your primary supervisor) overseeing your progress.

MSc by Research

This programme is one-year full time, or two-year part-time. You research and write a thesis under the supervision of one or two academic staff. We have a vibrant research group whose interests stretch across the range of Human Geography.

Choosing a topic

PhD applications are welcome in any main aspect of Human Geography including Rural and Urban Geographies, the Geographies of Tourism, Development Geography, and Political Geography as well as GIS and the utilisation of new geo-spatial technologies.

Although sometimes we have specific PhD research projects which might be externally funded by a Research Council where the PhD project has already been specified, most of our research students choose their own research topics. Once you have decided on the nature of your project, you should informally contact the member of staff in the School whose expertise and interests most closely match your area of research and ask them if they will act as your supervisor.

It is extremely important that you attach to your email an updated CV, a 2-page research proposal (including background statement, aims and objectives and research methods) and that you indicate how you are planning to fund your PGR studies. You then work with your proposed supervisor on refining your research proposal which provides the starting point for your subsequent research.

Supervision

Each student is supervised by a supervisory team that consists of at least two members of academic staff one of them designated to act as the student’s Main supervisor. Occasionally, particular projects require more than two supervisors depending on the expertise that each supervisors brings in the project. It is also possible that co-supervision is provided by a member of staff from different School.

Students meet (or, while in the field, make contact) with their supervisor(s) several times over the course of each term. These meetings involve intensive discussion of the way the project is developing, the readings and training that have been done and that need to be done, and the way field research and writing-up is progressing.

If the research project requires that the student has to spend a significant amount of time in the field (away from the School), local supervision is usually organised. Overseas students who wish to spend most of their time in their home country while undertaking PhD research may register as an external student or for a split PhD.

Skills training

The University’s Graduate School co-ordinates the Research Development Programme for research students, providing access to a wide range of lectures and workshops on training, personal development planning and career development skills.

Research within the School is grouped into the following research areas:

Geography and Human Ecology 

Our interdisciplinary research theme explores the complexity and diversity of interactions between people, place and environment. We pursue our research in a range of geographical and social contexts to elaborate – and engage critically and constructively with – understandings of these relationships and approaches to their management and governance. Our research encompasses questions of sustainability and resilience, set within a broader interest in systems thinking. Research undertaken within our theme is distinguished by significant capacity in the critical and applied social sciences and spatial analysis, and is advanced through strong commitments to theoretical and conceptual innovation, as well as practical research that can influence developments in policy and practice  The interdisciplinary basis of the group draws in perspectives from human geography, urban studies, political geography, anthropology, economics, conservation and development studies, and has specific research interests in: Land use change and sustainable landscape planning Applied resource economics and environmental valuation, participatory approaches to natural resource management, ecosystem services and biocultural diversity, political economies of development and tourism, and urban mobility and diversity in contested cities. Members of the theme are active members of the University-wide Kent Interdisciplinary Centre for Spatial Studies (KISS) and the School’s Centre for Biocultural Diversity (CBCD) and Durrell Institute for Conservation and Ecology (DICE). We also host a lively programme of seminar and reading groups that synergise with these wider centre activities. Members of the theme are currently convening a reading group exploring the multiple provocations of the Anthropocene.

Social Anthropology

The regional expertise of our staff has a global reach, with field sites in Europe (including UK), the Middle East, the Balkans, South Asia, Amazonia and Central America, Oceania and Southeast Asia. Themes of conflict, violence, the economic crisis and precarity form a major focus of our current work in these areas, alongside new research on austerity and its social impact, and charity. We have emerging interests in social inequality, work, and organised crime and corruption; and are internationally recognised for our work on ethnicity, nationalism, and identity.

Our research extends to intercommunal violence, diasporas, pilgrimage, intercommunal trade, urban ethnogenesis, indigenous representation and the study of contemporary religions and their global connections (especially Islam). History and heritage is another key theme, with related interests in time and temporality, and the School hosts the leading journal History and Anthropology. Other research addresses the anthropology of natural resources; anthropology of tourism; and post-socialist economy and society in Europe and Central Asia.

We research issues in fieldwork and methodology more generally, with a strong interest in the field of visual anthropology. Our work on identity and locality links with growing strengths in kinship and parenthood. This is complemented by work on the language of relatedness, and the cognitive bases of kinship terminologies

A final focus concerns science, medical anthropology and contemporary society. We work on the anthropology of business, biotechnology, and mental health. Related research focuses on policy and advocacy issues and examines the connections between public health policy and local healing strategies. Staff collaborations and networks extend widely across these regions and thematic interests, and Kent is well-known for its pioneering engagement with the anthropology of Europe.

Conservation Biology

Research within the conservation biology theme is broadly centred on using ecological approaches to understand and maintain biodiversity and ecosystem service provision.

The main tenet that underpins our work is that it is genuinely applied, with the explicit aim of either improving conservation practice (both in-situ and ex-situ) or informing policy development, both nationally and internationally.  To achieve this, we collaborate closely with individuals and organisations including government agencies, not-for-profits, private landowners and corporations from around the world, in addition to more traditional partnerships with academics at other universities and research institutes.

The scope of work conducted in the conservation biology theme is diverse, spanning multiple levels of biological organisation, from molecular/evolutionary genetics through to ecosystems, and a wide array of taxonomic groups (e.g. mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, butterflies, orchids).  Primarily, there are four key accordant areas of expertise. The first is spatial/landscape conservation and ecology, with particular emphasis on protected area network design via systematic conservation planning techniques, as well as the use of novel methods to explore the impacts of environmental change (e.g. habitat fragmentation and degradation, climate warming, urbanisation) on populations and assemblages.  The second focuses on analysing extinction risk across a continuum ranging from individual species up to global macroecological patterns.  Third, much of the long-standing research in DICE is concentrated on monitoring population dynamics and examining trends in the genetic diversity of threatened species, contributing directly to the success of a whole host of conservation programmes over the years.  Finally, we study human-wildlife conflict/interactions (e.g. resource competition, disease transmission, development mitigation, wildlife gardening) from a natural sciences perspective, complementing concurrent social science research or contributing to knowledge within an interdisciplinary framework.

About The Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology (DICE)

DICE is Britain’s leading research and postgraduate training centre dedicated to conserving biodiversity, as well as the ecological processes that support ecosystems and people.

We focus on combining natural and social sciences to understand complex conservation issues and design effective interventions to conserve biodiversity. Our staff have outstanding international research profiles, yet integrate this with considerable on-the-ground experience working in collaboration with conservation agencies around the world. This blend of expertise ensures that our programmes deliver the skills and knowledge that are essential components of conservation implementation.