Rate My Professor Sophie Bond

Professor Sophie Bond is a Professor and Head of School of Geography at the University of Otago. She holds an LLB, MPlan, and PhD, all from the University of Otago, where her doctoral research focused on 'Participation, urbanism and power'. As a human geographer, her research interests centre on the politics of participatory planning practice and the spatialities of democracy. These encompass community responses to and engagement in issues associated with increased flood events and sea-level rise from climate change, climate justice, democratic engagement and an ethic of care, spaces of democracy, contestation, resistance and the formation of collectivities in response to environmental and/or social change, social sustainability, intergroup relationships, 'community' and identity formation, autonomous geographies and alternative economies, urban sustainability and participation in planning processes, and qualitative and feminist methodologies, poststructural approaches, political ecology, and discourse theory.

Professor Bond teaches courses including ENVI 111 Environment and Society, ENVI 211 Environmental History of New Zealand, GEOG 280 Research Methodology in Human Geography, GEOG 380 Field Research Studies (Arts), GEOG 376 Geographies of Contestation, Action and Change, and GEOG 463 Geographies of Justice. She has supervised numerous postgraduate students, with completed PhDs on topics such as urban sustainability, REDD+ governmentality, urban design guidance, alternative socio-economic practices, and accessing nature, as well as Master's theses on community engagement, co-housing, homelessness, and resource management. Key publications include 'Making and unmaking political subjectivities: Climate justice, activism, and care' (2020, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, with A. Thomas and G. Diprose), 'Care-full and just: Making a difference through climate change adaptation' (2020, Cities, with J. Barth), 'Contesting deep sea oil: Politicisation-depoliticisation-repoliticisation' (2019, Environment & Planning C, with G. Diprose and A.C. Thomas), 'A democratic ethos' (2019, chapter in Keywords in radical geography), 'Negotiating a "democratic ethos": Moving beyond the agonistic-communicative divide' (2011, Planning Theory), and the co-authored book 'Stopping Oil: Climate Justice and Hope' (Pluto Press, with A. Thomas and G. Diprose).