March 19, 2019, by lzzeb

A day in the life of….Martin Danyluk

A blog by Dr Martin Danyluk

I am an Assistant Professor here at the School of Geography, and I started my position only recently, in January 2019. I’m also brand new to the UK, having arrived here from Canada on New Year’s Eve—a strange and disorienting time to land in a new country! Prior to coming to Nottingham, I was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of British Columbia, in Vancouver. I have a PhD in geography and an MSc in urban planning, both from the University of Toronto.

My research looks at the spaces of logistics—the rapidly growing industry that moves goods and materials through the global economy—and its impacts on urban life and politics. I consider myself an urban and economic geographer; I’m fascinated by cities and the human problems they pose—issues like public health, food security, transportation, poverty, environmental justice, and racial segregation. It’s been rewarding to draw on these varied interests this semester in the second-year Economic Geography module, where I’ve given lectures on logistics, labour, colonialism and extraction, and the environment.

There’s really no such thing as a typical day for me—and that’s one of the things I like most about working in academia! On any given day I may be engaged in some combination of teaching, preparing for lectures, marking assignments or exams, convening tutorials, meeting with students or colleagues, preparing to give a talk at a conference, and replying to emails (lots of emails). Somewhere in there I try to find time for my own research and writing and, when the stars align, to cook myself a decent dinner.

The most rewarding aspects of this job are, first, the opportunity to do research on social issues that I think are important, and second, the chance to instill that same sense of importance in my students. I love working with students who see problems in the world around them and are motivated to do something about those problems.

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