Mia Gray

Are you an early career or established researcher engaged on original research intended to produce monographs, editions or studies of documents, texts or illustrations? Apply for the Neil Ker Memorial Fund 2026: https://bit.ly/4hO0Oo1

Thousands of Starbucks workers are on strike for a living wage and better working conditions. Stand with them by boycotting Starbucks until it can strike a fair contract. sbworkersunited.org

@sbworkersunited.org

Reeves to plough millions into playgrounds after years of Tory neglect A Treasury source told The Mirror: 'This funding will breathe new life into play areas across England, creating safe, exciting spaces for thousands of children'

Welcome, but will be very curious to see the details (type of playground, geography, etc.)

EXCLUSIVE: Rachel Reeves to plough millions into children's playgrounds after years of Tory neglect

Excited to share my first PhD paper which was based on my fieldwork at @thebotanics.bsky.social and just published on @geoopenaccess.bsky.social yesterday! 🌺

Together with my Green New Deal colleagues, Colin Hines and Larry Elliott we have published a document of hope and possibility in advance of the Rachel Reeves event on Wednesday:

A Popular Budget to Fund a Social and Green New Deal.

Please read and share….

greennewdealgroup.org/press-releas...

Why Sweden Clears Snow-Covered Walkways Before Roads — Streetsblog USA It's part of "gender-balanced" policy that reflects the fact that women walk more than men.

As I slipped and slid along slushy and icy pavements on my way to the metro, it feels like it’s worth resharing the story of how Swedish cities flipped the order of snow clearance as they reflected on how gendered normal practices were:

usa.streetsblog.org/2018/01/24/w...

Handbook of Labour Geography ‘Labour geography is now a burgeoning, cross-disciplinary field of research with all manner of practical implications. This Handbook showcases the richness and breadth of the field. Edited by a field-...

It was a real pleasure to write a chapter in the Handbook of Labour Geography. The editor, Andy Herod, was a joy to work with and the collection itself looks great.
www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/han...

‘Out of touch’ hereditary peers criticised for voting against workers’ rights Lords look ‘undemocratic and firmly against interest of working people’, say senior trade union and Labour figures

Lords say employment rights will create unemployment, but the actual evidence shows an absence of rights kills jobs.

If useless bosses can fire people without reason, that’s what damages the economy. It’s hereditary peers that need the boot.

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

A dreaded sunny day, so let's go where we're happy ...

What future for residential property taxation in Britain? - Economics Observatory Council tax is unpopular, unfair and overdue for reform. An alternative would be to fund statutory services through central government, introduce a modest local service charge, and absorb stamp duty a...

If it’s all eyes on property tax, surely the time has come for a thorough overhaul of Council tax, which is grossly unfair. Split out the service charge, fairly tax the value of residential property, the majority win or break even… www.economicsobservatory.com/what-future-...

"Brexit has reduced GDP by 6% to 8%"

So actually worse than 'project fear'. Great job everyone.

cc @mrjamesob.bsky.social

English councils to remain poorer than in 2010 despite funding rise, says report Exclusive: Impact of austerity cannot be undone by end of parliament despite above-inflation funding, analysis finds

EXC: English councils will still be poorer in 2029 than they were in 2010, according to the IfG.

Report finds councils are increasingly providing social care and little else. Libraries, youth services, parks, all falling by the wayside.

www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

Labour to stop Reform councils taking credit for deprivation cash The Pride in Place fund offers up to £20 million to be allocated by respected local figures — but Labour MPs fear Nigel Farage’s influence and want a greater role

This won’t be the big thing everyone’s talking about today, but shows how little ministers believe in empowering English local government. Ministers decide where funding goes and MPs want a say in how it’s spent. Local government as delivery agents rather than instruments of local democracy.

Senior Research Fellow, IPPR North | IPPR The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) is an independent charity working towards a fairer, greener, and more prosperous society.

We're hiring!💥

IPPR North are looking for a senior researcher who has big ideas for the future of our regions. Join us at this pivotal time for our economy and democracy.

Based in Manchester, apply by 31st October.

www.ippr.org/jobs/senior-...

This looks great -- such an important topic. I'm really looking forward to delving into this one.

Seminar poster: Beth Greenhough presenting "Visualizing Post-Viral Lives: Body Mapping Women's Lived Experiences of Long COVID." University of Cambridge, Dept of Geography, 29 OCT 2025, 16:00-17:30. Abstract image of a virus particle.

TOMORROW: Next talk in the Infrastructural Geographies Michaelmas Term 2025 Seminar Series will be delivered by Beth Greenhough @oxfordgeography.bsky.social 16:00-17:30 in the Large Lecture Theatre. All welcome!

British Academy Book Prize 2025 Shortlist Event Join the shortlisted authors of this year's British Academy Book Prize for a dynamic conversation exploring the issues that define our time. These imaginative writers will share insights from their gr...

Tonight’s (nearly) the night! The British Academy Book Prize ‘shortlist showcase’ takes place this evening (winner revealed tomorrow). Don’t miss a glimpse inside the covers of six of the best works of non-fiction… www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/events/livin...

Pls share: Applications open for Summer Institute in Economic Geography, Toronto, 5-10 July 2026

Featuring: Lars Coenen, Karen Lai, Devika Narayan and Stefan Ouma

Early career economic geographers (broadly defined) are welcome to apply. Stipends available. www.econgeog.net/Toronto2026

Cristina, This looks great (as does your new paper)!

Reminder for this #AAG2026 session. Abstracts due October 20th!

Call for Papers – AAG 2026, San Francisco Feminist Fabulative Futures: Imagining Housing Otherwise In the midst of intersecting housing, debt, as well as climate and democracy crises, imagination becomes a political act. Feminist scholars and artists have long turned to the speculative and the fabulative to envision worlds that could be otherwise – worlds where care, interdependence, and collective dwelling replace dispossession, extraction, and foreclosure (McElroy 2023; Thieme 2021; Netzwerk Feministische Wohnforschung 2025). This session invites contributions that take seriously the feminist call to imagine differently in the face of deepening urban precarity. Rather than treating the housing crisis as a failure of politics and finance alone, we approach it as a failure of imagining housing and its politics radically otherwise. Following feminist and decolonial traditions of world-making (e.g. Haraway 2013), we ask: What narratives, aesthetics, and speculative practices can help us re-story housing beyond ownership and enclosure? How can fabulation-as method, theory, or art-expand what we understand as home, property, or repair? And how might feminist engagements with fiction, film, sound, and design open pathways toward inhabiting more just and caring futures? We seek creative, conceptual, and empirical contributions that explore how feminist fabulative thinking reshapes our understanding of housing and urban life – both in theory and in practice.

✨ CfP AAG 2026, San Francisco ✨

Tabea Latocha and I are teaming up feminist fabulative futures and we’d love for you to join us.

Our proposed session explores how storytelling, speculation, and fabulation can help us imagine housing otherwise — beyond ownership, extraction, and displacement. 🏡🌿💭

Poster for the event: Imagining our working lives: a creative exploration. The poster features a picture of a woman sat at a desk looking at a screen, surrounded by colourful pots and books. The poster contains a qr code to the event (see post)

Join us for 'Imagining our Working Lives: A Creative Exploration' 💭🖍🪛🧤🥄🖱

1st Nov, Central Manchester. Part of ESRC Festival of Social Science 2025.

Free to attend, places limited. Register: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/imagining-...

P.s. There'll be cake!🍰
With @amycbarron.bsky.social + @clarecourtney

Debt Trap Nation: Family Homelessness in a Failing State: @kbrickell.bsky.social (@kingscollegelondon.bsky.social) and Mel Nowicki (Oxford Brookes) as part of the Infrastructural Geographies Michaelmas 2025 Seminar Series on the 22nd October, 16:00-17:30 in the Small Lecture Theatre. All welcome!

Our latest @safety-nets.bsky.social project blog is out. We reflect on spatial inequalities and disability benefit reforms. And the pickle UK gov changes might create for subnational and devolved authorities.

The growth gamble: Do we need to loosen the tie binding devolution with economic outcomes in England? - RSA Main Earlier in 2025, the UK government announced a commitment to reduce spending on disability benefits by restructuring entitlements and eligibility to various health-related benefits. It claims through ...

New RSA Blog 📉
“The Growth Gamble” explores how UK welfare reform, deindustrialisation & regional divides intersect.
By Sioned Pearce, @haylesben.bsky.social, Mhairi Ross & @ruthpatrick0.bsky.social.

👉 www.regionalstudies.org/rsa-blog/202...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

New: Dialogues in Urban Research exploring what it means to think about crisis as urban & how locating crisis in the urban reconfigures relations between eventful & everyday crisis politics, materiality, discourse & movement. Part of a great set of interventions.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

From Managerialism to Crisis: The Shock Doctrine of US Municipal Finance By David Fields

Recurring fiscal crises afflicting U.S. municipalities are neither isolated nor accidental occurrences; rather, they constitute a deliberate political strategy engineered to achieve specific, capitalist class-based outcomes.

utahvanguard.medium.com/from-manager...

LSE Geography & Environment is recruiting: Assistant Professor and Associate Professor in Urban Planning.

Expertise in sustainable cities, planning regulation, or planning law is especially welcome.

For more info, pls visit here 👉 jobs.lse.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...

#LSE #UrbanPlanning #AcademicJobs

Our new paper on "Place-based solidarity: Crisis, austerity and the devolution of responsibility"

authors: Coco Huggins and Mia Gray

is now available free online: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...