James Symonds

Professor James Symonds

Discretionary Award 2022

Claiming the Streets. Using the Past to Challenge the Present and Imagine the Future of Urban Public Spaces

With Danielle van den Heuvel & Luca Bertolini

The conference will bring together scholars from different disciplines as well as policymakers and other stakeholders in the community to together tackle questions on the in- and exclusivity in the city. We do this by specifically looking at the street as a site of contestation and emancipation. In particular, we aim for the conference to be a site of encounter between hitherto separate enquiries into the past, present and future of city streets, and between academic enquiries and practical experiences.

More information

Areas of interest

Archaeology Capitalism Colonialism Diaspora Urban Studies Poverty Inequality

Cohort

Discretionary Award

Biography

James Symonds is an historical archaeologist who studies the archaeology of the modern world (c.AD 1500-present). He is currently the Professor of Historical Archaeology (North of the Alps) at the University of Amsterdam.

His research interests include the study of capitalism, colonialism, and landscapes of Improvement and diaspora, urban and industrial archaeology, and the archaeology of poverty and inequality. He has undertaken teaching and published research relating to the Isle of South Uist (Western Isles, Scotland), Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island (Canada), Ostrobothnia and Lapland (Finland), and west Bohemia (Czech Republic). He has for the most part concentrated on the historical archaeology of the 18th and 19th centuries, with occasional forays into the 20th century.

Biographical details correct as of 26.02.25