ICOG visiting research fellow: Jeppe Strandsbjerg

From February 2019 to January 2021, Dr Jeppe Strandsbjerg, formerly an associate professor at the Copenhagen Business School and now a senior editor at Danish publishing house Djøf Forlag, will be joining ICOG as a visiting research fellow.

Cartographies of empires

Strandsbjerg's primary research focus is on developing ideas on the links between cartography, space and sovereignty, building on his previous work on Territory, Globalization and International Relations: The Cartographic Reality of Space (Palgrave, 2010) and ‘Cartopolitics, Geopolitics and Boundaries in the Arctic’ (in Geopolitics 2012). Currently he is developing these ideas in collaboration with Prof. Luis Lobo-Guerrero, University of Groningen, Dr Filipe dos Reis, University of Erfurt, Kerry Goettlich, London School of Economics, and Dr Laura Lo Presti, University of Palermo. The shared collective part of the project investigates Cartographies of Empires. They aim to develop this project exploring the role cartography has played historically in the development of European Empires and what this has to inform about Western modes of reasoning about order, power and governance.

The common project includes a methodological take on cartography that analyses maps as empirical sites of enquiry. The analysis starts with maps and mapping projects – planned and realised – and traces are followed on relations on order, power, and governance.

Apart from contributing to the theoretical work, each participant contributes analysis on a historical case. Here I will investigate Danish mapping of Greenland from the fifteenth century onward. Even though there was little contact between Copenhagen and Greenland after connection was lost to the Norse settlements, Denmark maintained a juridical title to these lands. I am going to focus on actual mapping projects and planned expeditions as well as those that failed. Official orders and plans tell us a lot about how the role of cartography is seen in relation to the long distance governance ambitions.

Visiting research fellowship programme

ICOG welcomes applications for visiting research fellowships from academics working in the fields of its five research centres. The duration of visits usually varies from a month to half a year. During this time, visiting research fellows are expected to work on their own research projects (ideally in collaboration with a scholar or an academic team from ICOG) and to participate in the events organised by ICOG.