Progressive Geographies

I gave 22 talks of various kinds outside of regular teaching in 2014. These talks were in Australia, the United States, Switzerland, Holland and the UK. Some of these were on the Foucault project, some were related to The Birth of Territory, a few were on the Geopolitics/Geometrics work, some on the relation of the urban and territory, and one on Iraq and Nigeria. Many of the talks were recorded, either audio or video, and can be found here. This was the first year for a while when I’ve not spoken about Shakespeare, but I’m hoping that project will be the focus of the first half of 2015.

The only formal article this year was “The Geopolitics of Boko Haram and Nigeria’s War on Terror” in The Geographical Journal. I reviewed a few Foucault courses at Berfrois – here and here – and was part of some review fora and discussions, as well as writing for a few other websites, including a piece for The Funambulist. I was interviewed quite a bit – for the Polis blog, Groundwork, Fordham University television, the Research Unit in Public Cultures, University of Melbourne, Geographical and Archipelago. My academic achievement of the year was the AAG Meridian award for The Birth of Territory.

As well as the countries I visited for work I went to Spain and Ghana twice. We also had a lovely week cycling and hiking in the Brecon Beacons. Susan moved from her post in Ghana to Sierra Leone in September to work on the Ebola crisis – something of which I am obviously very proud.

This blog has also been active. The WordPress annual update is here, but I’d especially point you to this page on Resources – which includes reading guides on Lefebvre and Sloterdijk, a list of English translations of Kostas Axelos, lots of Foucault resources (including lists of audio and video recordings, uncollected publications and his collaborative works), and reading lists on Boko Haram and Ebola.

In terms of writing, the most important work was on Foucault’s Last Decade. I’m hoping to complete a draft of this in early 2015, and then turn to Shakespeare. I have a few publications coming out in 2015 – many of which can be found as preprints here. Early 2015 should also see the publication of Kostas Axelos, Introduction to the Thought of the Future: On Marx and Heidegger, which I edited and introduced.

The most important academic books to me from 2014 are listed here; the novels I read are here and here; and the music I most liked here. Thanks for reading and see you in 2015.