Liu Cao 曹流

UK academics studying topics sensitive to China face harassment, survey finds Exclusive: University staff report facing pressure to change teaching and are told that Chinese surveillance is rife Academics and students of Chinese studies in Britain are being subject to harassment, surveillance and pressure to self-censor as they seek to avoid disruption to funding, a survey of universities by a transparency group has concluded. The findings by UK-China Transparency coincide with new government guidance stating that universities may be breaching rules by having partnerships with foreign governments that require academic staff to pass ideological tests – for example, by hosting Confucius Institutes. Continue reading...

UK academics studying topics sensitive to China face harassment, survey finds

Why Are BRI Projects in Nepal Stalled? Geopolitics is at play. New Delhi does not want Nepal to be too close to Beijing and views BRI projects with suspicion.

A fascinating read from The Diplomat today about Nepal and the BRI!
thediplomat.com/2025/06/why-...

Hard work or inherited (mis)fortune? Young people’s future in an unequal world Renewing analysis from The Spirit Level: how are children and young people’s health, education and employment prospects shaped by household wealth?

How does inequality affect our lot in life? Aini Gauhar of @equalitytrust.bsky.social looks at how household wealth shapes children’s health, education and future work prospects. But which countries offer clues to a more equitable way forward? #LSEInequalitiesBlog

Yes. I am right. I am seeing how Chat GPT is ruining students critical thinking and writing skills in real time. It is not the future. It is a tool designed to render the populace helpless, to make people doubt their innate intelligence, and to foster overreliance on technology.

It should go without saying, but apparently it needs to be said: if you are peer reviewing a ms for a scholarly press, DO NOT feed that ms into an AI machine to write your reader report for you. DO NOT.

Social & Cultural Geography is seeking a new Editor. We hope that you might be keen to join our lovely team! 🙏

⏰ Closing date for applications is Friday 20 June 2025

📬 Applications should be sent to the journal’s editorial office at scg-jrnl@unimelb.edu.au

📄 Full details: go.unimelb.edu.au/uy8p

USF International Fellowships 2025 - deadline 16th July 2025

📣 USF International Fellowships 2025 - apply now!

This fully-funded program offers 3-9 month sabbatical research visits for urban scholars from the Global South.

Read more & apply here: urbanstudiesfoundation.org/funding/inte...

Deadline 16th July 2025

Also thanks
@carwynmorris.bsky.social
for inviting me to his Wanghong urbanism workshop which benefits the development of this paper!

So happy to see the third paper is finally out which I answered 'what' is the urban change effects caused by 'wanghong' consumption from China. Huge thanks to the editorial team and reviewers from
@ijurresearch.bsky.social
for helping me polish this paper which I am so grateful!

THE POLITICS OF WANGHONG CONSUMPTION: (Re)Making the Place through New Urban Aestheticisation Why does seemingly innocent wanghong (online celebrity) consumption—recording appreciation for a place and sharing photos of it on social media platforms—cause neighbourhood changes and instigate exc...

If now we can post photos with filters and multiple edits to create a polished image of the urban (even could be misleading and fake), does that mean there is a new urban aestheticisation process happening in the digital age? @ijurresearch.bsky.social onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....

The cover art for a book, “Women Changing Cities: Global Stories of Urban Transformation”, which includes pink typeface over a grey stylized photo of a Paris street from above.

This International Women’s Day, we’re incredibly proud to reveal the cover of our third book, “Women Changing Cities: Global Stories of Urban Transformation”.

Photo essays from 11 cities around the world, including Paris, Bogotá, Barcelona and Montréal. To be released by RIBA Publishing in October.

Update: in dialogue with the journal editors now. Thanks to those who stepped up as allies and friends to also raise their concerns.

While I'm disappointed in the research quality, I'm more cut up by the class discrimination. I wouldn't wish "a taste for deprivation" on anyone else.

For those that remain, our jobs are changing rapidly. Many are being ‘restructured’ into new roles, or being merged into new ‘units’. For academics many of us are loosing our disciplinary identity as we get merged into mega-schools of Social Science

The crisis in British higher education is acute + painful right now. If you are in it you already know this, but for those who are not I want to share what is going on. As strikes start at Newcastle Uni + others will doubtless follow, now is a time for solidarity + resistance

Two Weeks In The Death Spiral Of Cardiff University - Reading Time: 4 minutesBy an anonymous academic. Cover image by Adwitiya Pal On the second day of classes…

Two Weeks In The Death Spiral Of Cardiff University, by an anonymous academic.
This is truly shocking read.
The Cardiff executive board should hang their heads in shame.
voice.cymru/two-weeks-in...

Context: today Cardiff University announce proposals for 400 redundancies, including 15 in School of Geography, which will also be merged with school of social sciences...

please send an abstract (max. 250 words) to Liu.Cao02@xjtlu.edu.cn and vickie.zhang@bristol.ac.uk by Friday, 28 February 2025, we look forward to your participation!

First post at Bluesky 🤩 :

CFP RGS-IBG 2025 Birmingham: Please see this menu me and
@vickiezhang.bsky.social
will organise a session with topics about cultural economy, affects and consumption, please circulate and join us if you are interested and we promise it will a lot of fun 😊