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Dr Sam Kinsley

Dr Sam Kinsley

Senior Lecturer in Human Geographies

 5426

 Amory C425

 

Amory Building, University of Exeter, Rennes Drive, Exeter, EX4 4RJ , UK

 Office hours:

I have regular office hours, in-person & online: Please book using MS Bookings - you must log-in to your Exeter account.

 

Overview

I am a Senior Lecturer in Human Geographies with a particular interest in technology and the future. My research principally concerns how technologies and technical practices are designed and imagined and what this tells us about how we experience and imagine society and space. My current research concerns geographical imaginaries of automation, with a particular focus on 20th century UK industry. I am an inaugeral Co-Editor-in-Chief of the open access journal Digital Geography & Society. In 2015 I received the Progress in Human Geography Best Paper Prize for the article "The matter of 'virtual' geographies". I joined the department as a Lecturer in Human Geography in April 2013. I was promoted to Senior Lecturer in December 2018. Through participation in continuing professional development I was appointed a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in 2016. Between September 2013 and February 2015 I was a co-investigator on the ESRC-funded Contagion project concerning understandings of contagious phenomena, leading a work package focused on digital media. Between January 2021and December 2024 I am a co-investigator on the ESRC-funded project Algorithmic Politics after Brexit.

My research reveals the increasing importance of how we tell stories about the technologies in our daily lives. There are two key themes: how we understand what a 'technology' is or can be and how we narrate a sense of cultural, political or social change in relation to technology. I explore geographies of technology by unpicking what 'technologies' are and how they are involved in our understandings and experiences of society and space. In turn this enables me to investigate two key elements of of technology: the geographies of the design and development of technology and how technology is often instrumental in how we narrate and perceive political and social changes or the sense of a future. This work informs how I lead and contribute to the teaching of geography at Exeter, in particular modules concerning cultural and political geographies and dissertations on a range of topics.

ORCID: 0000-0002-1336-292X

Broad research specialisms:

Geographies of technology design and use, geographies of automation, 'digital'/ 'electronic'/ 'virtual' geographies, 'the future' and geography, geographies of invention and innovation, media geographies, 'doing theory' and philosophies of technics/technology.

Postgraduate supervision:

I would be very pleased to talk with prospective postgraduates about research that falls into the above areas and beyond.

I currently work with: Kate Byron (SWDTC, Bristol): gender, subjectivity and A.I./machine learning; and: Megan Furr (AHRC CDA, Exeter): gender and regional politics in the C19th British telegraphy sector.

I have advised to successful completion: Dr. Paula Crutchlow (SWDTC, Exeter): 'The Museum of Contemporary Commodities' - data, trade, place and value; and Dr. Patrycja Pinkowska (ESRC, Exeter): Deportable migrants' experiences of and responses to punitive migration policies in the UK.

Qualifications

BSc (Hons) Digital Art and Technology (University of Plymouth)
MSc Society of Space (University of Bristol)
PhD "Practising tomorrows?" (Geography, University of Bristol)
Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Career

Before lecturing at Exeter, I worked as a Research Fellow in Digital Cultures at UWE, Bristol, between 2010 and 2013. Between November 2009 and June 2010 I worked as an RA with the brilliant Prof. Martin Weller in the Institute of Educational Technology, at the Open University, investigating practices and rationales for digital scholarship. I have a PhD in Geography from the University of Bristol, for which I received a 1+3 studentship from the ESRC. I have served as a committee member of the RGS-IBG Digital Geographies research group. I have previously and variously contributed as committee member, web officer and tresurer for the RGS-IBG History and Philosophy of Geography research group between 2008-2017 and as an ordinary committee member for the RGS-IBG Social & Cultural Geography research group between 2013-2015. I convened the Exeter Geography human geography seminar series between 2013-2015 and served as the communications officer for the department between 2015-2019. I am currently supporting academic online video production in the department.

Research group links

Research

Research interests

Sam’s research pursues geographies of technology, contributing to how we understand the increasing importance of mediating technologies in our lives.  Key here are two themes: how we understand spatial experience and how we understand 'mediation' and technology. Sam's research activity has led to the production of events and activities for creative public engagement with technology development, not least through links with the Pervasive Media Studio in Bristol. In 2015 Sam was awarded (jointly) the Progress in Human Geography Best Paper Prize for his article "The matter of 'virtual' geographies". Sam’s research comprises three key strands:

(1) How geography/geographers think 'technology'. In particular, thinking about the simultaneously supportive and disabling capacities of mediating technologies in everyday life. There are three particular empirical and conceptual focuses for this work. First, commitments to particular ideas that take on a currency or power, such as: 'algorithms', ''robots', or 'the digital', are a focus of critical interrogation in Sam's current work. Second, Sam has researched conditions of movement of ideas and performances of spatiality through technically mediated systems (as part of the ‘Contagion’ project), Third, a longer strand of Sam's theoretical work has investigated the various ways in which different forms of automation are said to be commodifying the human capacity for attention. 

(2) Exploring the spatial imaginaries and anticipatory practices of technology development. The current focus of this work is the claims being made for processes of automation (through claims about 'algorithms', 'AI', 'robots' and so on) and the kinds of spaces and spatial experience those processes both are imagined to create andhelp bring into being. Earlier work focused on industrial research and development of ‘ubiquitous computing’ in Silicon Valley California. Sam’s PhD research investigated the rationales and practices for anticipating particular kinds of technological future within research labs. This was extended with a historical case study of a large commercial research project and led to a project for the European Capital of Culture 2012 in Guimarães (Portugal), working with citizens to realise an alternative vision of a ‘smart city’.

(3) Understandings of the materialities that underpin our uses of technology in everyday life. This research focuses on what has been called the technicity of the diverse array of sociotechnical systems we increasingly use in our everyday lives. Emerging work addresses the ways in which sensory capacities are technically trained. Conceptually, this work significantly draws on Sam’s ongoing engagement with the work of the philosophy of technology.

Sam’s research convenes and addresses an audience across geography, in particular bringing together theoretically informed social and cultural geographers and those conducting research broadly associated with a 'digital turn'. His work also critically engages with broad interdisciplinary debates concerning the agency of technologies through the lens of everyday life, the growth of ‘pervasive media’ that adjust according to location and context through a variety of devices and systems, and the growth of discussion about 'automation', all of which extend significantly beyond academe.

Research projects

Contagion - funded by the ESRC from Sept 2013 - March 2015
Contagion investigates the conditions for movement of infectious disease as well as potent ideas.  Using Tardean approaches to bio-sociality, the work uses large databases on influenza and social media as well as investigations of financial analyses to compare contagion within different domains. The work is in conjunction with colleagues at the AHVLA and FSA.

Grants/Funding:

2013 ESRC

Contagion - transforming social analysis and method

2011 British Academy
Computing Futures – institutional cultures of innovation in Silicon Valley

Publications

Key publications | Publications by category | Publications by year

Key publications


Kinsley SP (2019). Subject/ivities. In Ash J, Kitchin R, Leszczynski A (Eds.) Digital Geographies, London: SAGE Publications Limited, 153-163.  Abstract.
Sandover R, Kinsley SP, Hinchliffe S (2018). A very public cull – the anatomy of an online issue public. Geoforum, 97, 106-118. Abstract.
Kinsley SP (2016). Vulgar geographies? Popular cultural geographies and technology. Social and Cultural Geography
Kinsley S (2015). Memory programmes: the industrial retention of collective life. Cultural Geographies, 22(1), 155-175. Abstract.
Kinsley S (2014). The matter of 'virtual' geographies. Progress in Human Geography, 38(3), 364-384. Abstract.
Kinsley S (2013). Beyond the screen: Methods for investigating geographies of life 'online'. Geography Compass, 7(8), 540-555. Abstract.

Publications by category


Journal articles

Kinsley S, Layton J, Davis J, Wills J, Featherstone D, Temenos C, Barnett C (2020). Reading Clive Barnett's the Priority of Injustice. Political Geography, 78, 102065-102065.
Sandover R, Kinsley SP, Hinchliffe S (2018). A very public cull – the anatomy of an online issue public. Geoforum, 97, 106-118. Abstract.
Kinsley SP (2016). Vulgar geographies? Popular cultural geographies and technology. Social and Cultural Geography
Kinsley S (2015). Memory programmes: the industrial retention of collective life. Cultural Geographies, 22(1), 155-175. Abstract.
Kinsley S (2014). The matter of 'virtual' geographies. Progress in Human Geography, 38(3), 364-384. Abstract.
Kinsley S (2013). Beyond the screen: Methods for investigating geographies of life 'online'. Geography Compass, 7(8), 540-555. Abstract.
Kinsley SP (2013). Code/space in perspective. Dialogues in Human Geography, 3(2), 244-247. Author URL.
Kinsley S (2013). Me++: the Cyborg Self and the Networked City. Information, Communication & Society, 16(9), 1520-1524. Author URL.
Kinsley S (2012). Futures in the making: Practices to anticipate 'ubiquitous computing'. Environment and Planning A, 44(7), 1554-1569. Abstract.
Crogan P, Kinsley SP (2012). Paying Attention: Towards a critique of the attention economy. Culture Machine, 13
Kinsley S (2011). Anticipating ubiquitous computing: Logics to forecast technological futures. Geoforum, 42(2), 231-240. Abstract.
Pearce N, Weller M, Scanlon E, Kinsley SP (2010). Digital Scholarship Considered: How New Technologies Could Transform Academic Work. In Education, 16(1), 33-44. Abstract.  Author URL.
Kinsley S (2010). Representing 'things to come': Feeling the visions of future technologies. Environment and Planning A, 42(11), 2771-2790. Abstract.

Chapters

Kinsley S (2022). Technology. In  (Ed) The Routledge Handbook of Social Change, Routledge, 244-253.
Kinsley SP (2019). Subject/ivities. In Ash J, Kitchin R, Leszczynski A (Eds.) Digital Geographies, London: SAGE Publications Limited, 153-163.  Abstract.

Publications by year


2022

Kinsley S (2022). Technology. In  (Ed) The Routledge Handbook of Social Change, Routledge, 244-253.

2020

Kinsley S, Layton J, Davis J, Wills J, Featherstone D, Temenos C, Barnett C (2020). Reading Clive Barnett's the Priority of Injustice. Political Geography, 78, 102065-102065.

2019

Kinsley SP (2019). Subject/ivities. In Ash J, Kitchin R, Leszczynski A (Eds.) Digital Geographies, London: SAGE Publications Limited, 153-163.  Abstract.

2018

Sandover R, Kinsley SP, Hinchliffe S (2018). A very public cull – the anatomy of an online issue public. Geoforum, 97, 106-118. Abstract.

2016

Kinsley SP (2016). Vulgar geographies? Popular cultural geographies and technology. Social and Cultural Geography

2015

Kinsley S (2015). Memory programmes: the industrial retention of collective life. Cultural Geographies, 22(1), 155-175. Abstract.

2014

Kinsley S (2014). The matter of 'virtual' geographies. Progress in Human Geography, 38(3), 364-384. Abstract.

2013

Kinsley S (2013). Beyond the screen: Methods for investigating geographies of life 'online'. Geography Compass, 7(8), 540-555. Abstract.
Kinsley SP (2013). Code/space in perspective. Dialogues in Human Geography, 3(2), 244-247. Author URL.
Kinsley S (2013). Me++: the Cyborg Self and the Networked City. Information, Communication & Society, 16(9), 1520-1524. Author URL.

2012

Kinsley S (2012). Futures in the making: Practices to anticipate 'ubiquitous computing'. Environment and Planning A, 44(7), 1554-1569. Abstract.
Crogan P, Kinsley SP (2012). Paying Attention: Towards a critique of the attention economy. Culture Machine, 13

2011

Kinsley S (2011). Anticipating ubiquitous computing: Logics to forecast technological futures. Geoforum, 42(2), 231-240. Abstract.

2010

Pearce N, Weller M, Scanlon E, Kinsley SP (2010). Digital Scholarship Considered: How New Technologies Could Transform Academic Work. In Education, 16(1), 33-44. Abstract.  Author URL.
Kinsley S (2010). Representing 'things to come': Feeling the visions of future technologies. Environment and Planning A, 42(11), 2771-2790. Abstract.

Sam_Kinsley Details from cache as at 2023-06-09 23:26:43

Refresh publications

External Engagement and Impact

Editorial responsibilities

Co-Editor-in-Chief of Digital Geography & Society (open access), Elsevier.


External positions

Member of the AHRC Peer Review College 2015-2018.

Member of the review panel for demonstrations and posters, Association of Computing Machinery Conference on Designing Interactive Systems 2012, Newcastle.

Member of the advisory board for the EPSRC-funded ‘Creativity Greenhouse: Sense-making representation of a Technologically Enabled Society (SeRTES)’ project.


Invited lectures & workshops

2018 "Worrying realites: spatial theory for 'digital' geographies", Keynote lecture for IRS Spring Academy 2018 Investigating Space(s): Current Theoretical and Methodological Approaches: Virtuality and Socio-Materiality, Einstein Center Digital Future, Berlin, 23rd May.

2016 "An algorithmic imaginary: anticipation and stupidity", Living with Algorithms, Royal Holloway University of London, 9th June.

2016 "An algorithmic imaginary: anticipation and stupidity", Institute for Science, Innovation and Society, University of Oxford, 3rd May. 

2016 "Prosethetic stupidity, or world-ing by numbers", presented at Researching Alternative Worlds: New political orientations in Geography, University of Bristol, 27th April.

2015 "The pharmakon of paying attention" presented at The Politics and Economics of Attention, Behaviour Change & Psychological Governance Seminar Series (seminar 6), University of Bristol, 14th December.

2013 "Using social media in risk identification and communication", presented to General Scientific Advisory Committee and the FSA’s communications and policy team.

2013 ‘Designing with fiction’, Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture Research Seminar, University of Edinburgh, 25th January.

2012 ‘Design Fiction’, within the ‘Smart Cities’ workshop, part of the ‘Open City’ programme for Guimarães 2012 European Capital of Culture, held at the Design Institute Guimarães (Portugal), 15th July.

2012 ‘Ten things I have learned about anticipating technology futures’, part of the ‘10 things I learnt’ event, Design Wales Forum, Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff, 9th March.

2012 ‘Desiging with fiction’, Pervasive Media Studio Friday lunchtime talk series, Pervasive Media Studio, Watershed, Bristol, 10th February.

2011 ‘Access & attention: commodities of the digital economy’, Computer-Mediated Living Research Group, Microsoft Research, Cambridge, 9th August.

2010 ‘A brief history of the future of pervasive media’, Pervasive Media Studio Friday lunchtime talks series, Pervasive Media Studio, Watershed, Bristol, 14th May.

2009 ‘A short history of the future of computing’ presented in the School of Geographical Sciences Roberts Skills Workshop series, University of Bristol, 17th February.

Teaching

Postgraduate research

Sam would be very pleased to talk with prospective postgraduates about research in cultural geographies that broadly concerns technology, popular culture and creative practices.

Modules

2022/23


Supervision / Group

Research Fellows

  • Kuba Jablonowski (he/him)

Postgraduate researchers

  • Megan Furr

Alumni

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