Miriam Williams

I am an urban geographer whose work focuses on care, justice, sustainability and commons in the city. I am currently working on a research project on Care-full food justice: community food initiatives across Metropolitan Sydney and will commence a project on Sustainabie Household Practices in 2019. In 2017 I commenced my current role at Macquarie University as a lecturer in Geography and Planning. 

In June 2018 I was invited to present a Keynote at the Institute of Australian Geographers Urban Study Group Symposium on Cities of Care. In 2018 my paper titled Care-full Justice in the City was released online by the Antipode Foundation as part of a curated collection connected to the Association of American Geographers Annual Antipode lecture. 

My recent PhD research awarded in 2013 was titled: 'Cities of Possibility: Performing Care-full Urban Justice'. My PhD work responded to calls to look beyond injustice in the city in order to develop a grounded knowledge of actually existing justice. I innovatively developed the concept of Care-full Justice and demonstrated how, in the search for actually existing justice in the city, care and justice need to be approached as relational, interdependent, contextual, everyday and mediated.

My research explores everyday practices of justice and care in the city with a specific focus on community food initiatives and urban commons. My current research focuses around seven main areas:

• Care-full Justice in the city
• A Feminist Ethic of care and the politics and practices of care
• Sustainability Practices
• Food justice and community food initiatives
• Diverse Economies, post-capitalist poltics and commoning
• Urban Commons and urban planning theory
• Participatory methodologies and geographies of possibility

I teach into both the undergraduate and postgraduate planning degrees. In 2019 I am unit convenor of:

• GEOP461 Planning Expereince S1
• GEOP832 Gateway to the Planning Profession S1
• GEOP810 Special Topic in Environment and Geography A S1 and S2
• GEOP813 Special Topic in Environment and Geography B S1

I am interested in supervising HDR students with the following research interests:

• Urban and Planning Theory 
• Sustainability Practices
• A Feminist Ethic of Care and the politics and practices of care
• Diverse economies, post-capitalist politics and community economies
• Urban Commons and commoning
• Geographies of Justice and Activism
• Community Food initiatives and Food Justice