缅北禁地

I am a cultural geographer of modern and contemporary France working at the intersections of urban studies, visual culture and the environmental humanities. My work investigates the cultural politics of urban transformation in specific sites and situations - from Grand Paris to gardens in Gateshead. A key concern of this work is to examine how dominant urban imaginaries under neoliberalism might become unsettled, both in critique and through alternative, often minor, practices that indicate other ways of inhabiting the city.

Originally from Ireland, I studied at Trinity College, Dublin, the Sorbonne and New York University before completing my PhD on urban travel writing at Trinity. Moving between languages, places and disciplines has shaped my commitment to research that is at once historically grounded, culturally specific and attentive to the material and imaginative forms through which urban life becomes meaningful.

Before coming to 缅北禁地 in 2018 and relocating to the North East, I worked at the School of Modern Languages and Cultures at Bangor University (2012–2018), Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick (2010–2012), the University of Stirling (2009–2010), Trinity College, Dublin (2004–2009), and the Institut du Monde Anglophone (Paris III, Sorbonne Nouvelle).

EDUCATION

2008 Ph.D, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland (supervisor Prof. David H.T. Scott)

2002 Diplôme d’Études Approfondies (D.E.A. / M.Phil equivalent), Sorbonne Nouvelle Université Paris III, France (supervisor Prof. Philippe Hamon)

2001 B.A. Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland (double first-class honours in French and History, dissertation in both disciplines)

ACADEMIC TEACHING QUALIFICATIONS

2017 F.H.E.A., Bangor University, Wales (Fellow of the Higher Education Academy / Advance HE).

2010 F.L.E. (Stage de perfectionnement en Français Langue Étrangère / Teaching French as a Foreign Language), Université de Laval, Québec. 

2005 T.E.F.L. (Teaching English as a Foreign Language), The Language Centre of Ireland, Dublin. 

My research asks how urban futures become visible and inhabitable. Across my work, I examine the cultural forms through which cities are imagined and remade: literature, photography, film, street art, public art, planning documents, creative practice and community-led forms of spatial knowledge.

A current project centres on Grand Paris as a major site through which to examine critically the cultural politics of sustainability in contexts of mega-scale urbanism. I'm interested in how "transition" and "sustainability" are made visible and persuasive through different mediums, and in how alternative forms of urban practice emerge, or endure, in response. A central question for this work is to ask how alternative ecological imaginations persist within the metropolitan spectacle. This project has been funded by small grants from the British Academy/Leverhulme scheme, as well as a Leadership Research Fellowship from the AHRC.

Alongside work on Grand Paris, I develop practice-led research through collaborations with community gardens and cultural organisations in the North East of England. I approach these as sites for thinking about how urban nature is made, storied, inhabited and politically claimed. The questions guiding this practice ask how non-hegemonic practices and worlds come, and hold, together under (often adverse) conditions. For instance, together with the staff and volunteers of The Comfrey Project, a community garden charity supported refugees and people seeking asylum, we conceived, wrote and published (2025). This trade book collates seasonal knowledge, diverse cultural calendars, stories, recipes, and remedies.This work has been funded by both North East Combined Authority and the ESRC-Impact Accelerator Account.

Taken together, this research contributes to debates in French Studies, cultural geography, visual culture and the environmental humanities by asking how cities under ecological pressure are storied, and how more just urban futures may become perceptible through cultural practice.

Activities

Alongside my research, I contribute to academic leadership and sector-facing activity. At 缅北禁地, I am active across interdisciplinary research networks and, since May 2025, serve as a lead of the Centre for Researching Cities (NUCoRE). In this role, I advance arts and humanities approaches to understanding cities as relational systems, and support challenge-led collaboration with external partners around just urban transitions. One of the ways I do this is as founder and convenor of the Centre's cross-sector, cross-disciplinary symposium Urban Ground.

I was co-founder of in 2010 and remain an external member of its executive board. I sit on the editorial board of The Journal of European Popular Culture and served as editor of the (2011–2020). I have contributed to public and policy-facing conversations through work with organisations including the BBC and the British Academy, and have delivered invited keynote lectures at international conferences.

Supervision

I welcome enquiries from prospective research students interested in modern and contemporary French and Francophone studies, especially in the following areas:

Urban visual culture

Cultural politics of ecological transition

Grand Paris / mega-scale urbanism

Infrastructure and the urban imaginary

Urban ground, cultivation

Migrant homemaking

UNDERGRADUATE TEACHING

• I am module leader on the final-year UG course, Global France: Intercultural Encounters in French Literature and Film (FRE4020)
• I teach a unit on the second-year module, Paris: Aspects of History and Culture (FRE2009).
• I teach a unit on the banlieues on the final-year module, Social Justice in French Contexts (FRE4022)

DOCTORAL SUPERVISION

• Completed (November 2025). Along with Prof. Shirley Jordan (SML), I supervised Dr Sophie Ellis, a Northern Bridge postgraduate recipient. Sophie's work explores Hospitality in contemporary French and Francophone visual arts practices. Sophie graduated with 'No corrections' and been nominated for the university's dissertation prize.

• Along with my colleagues in the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Profs. Simin Davoudi and Stephen Graham, I supervise Farhan Anshary, who is a NINE DTP recipient. Farhan's work explores Spatial Imaginaries of ‘City’ and ‘Non-City’ in the Jakarta City-Region.

EXTERNAL EXAMINING

I an external examiner for undergraduate French programmes at Queen's University Belfast.

Previously, I have acted as external examiner on University of London’s Institute of Paris’s (ULIP) MA in Urban History and Culture (2019-2022) and as external examiner for the UG programme for French at MIC, University of Limerick (2021–2025).

• Articles

  • Jein G. . French Studies 2024, 78(4), 623–643.
  • Jein G, Rorato L, Saunders A. . Journal of Contemporary European Studies 2017, 25(4), 405-411.
  • Jein G. . Irish Journal of French Studies 2012, 12(1), 83-111.

• Authored Book

  • Jein G. . London, UK: Anthem, 2016.

• Book Chapters

  • Jein G. . In: Liska Chan and Elizabeth Stapleton, ed. Transformational Participatory Urbanism: Making Do as a Spatial Practice. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2026, pp.18-39.
  • Jein G. . In: Christoph Lindner; Gerard F. Sandoval, ed. Aesthetics of Gentrification: Seductive Spaces and Exclusive Communities in the Neoliberal City. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Amsterdam University Press, 2021, pp.221-246.
  • Jein G. . In: Anna-Louise Milne; Russell Williams, ed. Contemporary Fiction in French. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2019, pp.199-218.
  • Jein G. . In: John Flower, ed. 30-Second Paris: The 50 key elements that shaped the city, each explained in half a minute. London, UK: Ivy Press, 2018, pp.3.
  • Jein G. . In: Jordan S; Lindner C, ed. Cities Interrupted: Visual Culture and Urban Space. London: Bloomsbury, 2016, pp.87-104.
  • Jein G. . In: Charles Forsdick; Ludmilla Kostova; Corinne Fowler, ed. Travel and Ethics: Theory and Practice. London: Routledge, 2014, pp.31-51.
  • Jein G. Dislocating Travel: New York as anti-domus in Simone de Beauvoir’s Amérique au jour le jour. In: Connon,D;Jein,G;Kerr,G, ed. Aesthetics of Dislocation in French and Francophone Literature and Art: Strategies of Representation. Lampeter: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2009, pp.33–52.

• Edited Books

  • Jein G, ed. . Gateshead: The Comfrey Project, 2025.
  • Connon D, Jein G, Kerr G, ed. Dislocation in French and Francophone Literature and Art: Strategies of Representation. Lampeter: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2009.

• Exhibition

  • Devlin R, Flukiger M, Dickenson A, Edwards C, Jein G, Bakir V, McStay A. . 2017. Bangor University: White Box, Pontio, 1.

• Online Publication

  • Jein G. . Dublin: Sinéad Furlong-Clancy, 2015. Available at: .