Umeå, Sweden, 14 – 17 June 2011
We would like to welcome you all to the Sixth International Conference on Population Geographies, to be held at the University Campus in Umeå, Sweden next June.
Call for papers and more information, including link to our website, will be send out during the fall of 2010.
*Deadline for abstract submission February 2011 *

Preliminary programme in brief:

*Tuesday 14/6 *Registration, reception and pre-excursion for early arrivals
*Wednesday 15/6 *Registration, keynotes and parallel sessions Evening activity
*Thursday 16/6 * Keynotes and parallel sessions Conference dinner

*Friday 17/6 *Parallel sessions and closing session,
*Friday – Sunday 17-19/6* Post-conference excursion to Kiruna

We hope to see you here in Umeå next June. Please help circulate this call amongst your colleagues and on your mailing lists!

Very welcome!!

Gunnar Malmberg

http://www.geo.umu.se/om-institutionen/personal/malmberg-gunnar/

The Call for Proposals for the 4^th Cycle of the National Metropolis Research Competition is now available on the National Metropolis website: http://canada.metropolis.net/competition/4th_researchcomp_e.html.

A recent Statistics Canada Study projects that by 2031 approximately one-third of all Canadians will be visible minorities. (Visible minorities include those who identify/self-select as non-white, but does not include Aboriginals). This projection adds insight to recent studies that show that:

• Socio-economic disparities between racial groups have been growing.
• Visible minorities, particularly those newly immigrated, are consistently overrepresented among the poor in Canada.
• Poverty is increasingly concentrated in visible minority communities and this spatial concentration of poverty is particularly acute in urban areas.

In light of Canada’s demographic trends, an examination of the economic outcomes and consequences of poverty amongst growing visible minorities in Canada, as well as the policies that could prevent and support emergence from poverty, is necessary.

The standard explanation of the factors that can lead to poverty amongst Canada’s growing visible minority communities, these often being immigrant communities, is usually cited as a combination of country of origin; immigration applicant class; literacy and official language capacity; quality of education; time spent in Canada; foreign credential recognition; access to child care and other gender-related factors; urban/rural factors; access to social capital; inter-generational considerations; and discrimination and racism.

This call for research proposals seeks assessments of the adequacy of these standard explanations of poverty and of enduring economic disadvantage amongst growing visible minority communities in Canada.

Proposals should:
A) Articulate an approach to assessing the adequacy of the standard explanations of poverty amongst growing visible minority communities, showing how the standard explanatory factors are understood and how they will be assessed. Proposals will also articulate how the research will determine whether or not there is a need for alternate explanations or enhanced conceptualizations of poverty.
Emphasis should be placed on consequences and outcomes of poverty as well as on the possible solutions. It is suggested that proposals refer to/consider the following components: geographic/spatial concentration of poverty, differences between rural and urban contexts, provincial and territorial differences, age considerations in consequences and outcomes, reactive/protective behaviours and subsequent outcomes (e.g., radicalization), difference due to religious minority contexts, and the role that gender plays in economic outcomes are all welcomed.

B) Indicate as precisely as possible the policy linkages of the proposed research project, based on consultations with relevant policy-makers in Citizenship and Immigration Canada and/or in partnering federal departments; or with policy-makers at the provincial or municipal level. Where appropriate, applicants are also encouraged to indicate the specific implications of the research project for the concerns of, or for programs and services provided by, other relevant stakeholders (e.g., multicultural groups, NGO’s and other immigrant serving groups) based on direct consultations and/or involvement with these stakeholders. Letters of support from Federal, Provincial or Municipal policy-makers are recommended.

To Apply: Click here for application forms available on the SSHRC website.

Submission deadline: October 4, 2010

Poverty reduction is a core target in the international development agenda. Reproductive morbidities include physical disorders such as fistula and infertility, as well as maternal depression and mental ill-health. For every maternal death, there are an estimated twenty women with maternal morbidities. Although these morbidities cause widespread disability and reduce the quality of life, they receive little attention as public health problems. The burden of reproductive health morbidities falls heaviest on the poor who often do not have access to essential health care and services.

More informaiton on the seminar, and the call, can here found in this pdf.

Contemporary Labour Migration: National and International Perspectives

Hosted by NUI Galway under the auspices of the Population Geography Research Group of the RGS-IBG and Population Commission of the International Geographical Union

Papers are invited for an Anglo-Irish population conference on Labour Migration. Whilst there is a focus on Ireland and the UK, papers that address the broad conference themes in other geographical contexts will be most welcome.

Major changes have taken place in the scale and character of labour migration in the UK and Ireland since the early 1990s, involving both national and international workers. Established patterns of movement have continued within and between rural and urban regions; both countries also experienced dramatic increases in overseas labour immigration from the early 1990s on, to fill vacancies in highly skilled and lower skilled employment. Both countries, with Sweden, opened their borders immediately in 2004 to members of the new accession states of the European Union to meet labour deficits. In response to reduced rates of economic growth since 2008, demand for labour has fallen and new challenges have emerged for labour, employers and governments. New migration patterns are apparent, associated with migrant return to countries of origin and relocation within and between regions. Ireland and the UK provide similarities but also contrasts in terms of labour migration, in particular the diversity of the former’s immigrant flows. Both countries are currently facing crises in their labour markets which are finding expression in changing migration patterns, a phenomenon that is not exclusive to them. This experience provides a context for exploring and developing existing and new theoretical perspectives relating to internal and international migration.

Papers are invited on the following themes in particular:

(i) the socio-economic and political contexts of recent labour migration, including the role of employers, national governments and international agencies in the migration process;
(ii) the composition of migration flows at an international scale and impacts in source and reception areas;
(iii) the internal and transnational labour migration experience within urban and rural settings;
(iv) the transnational labour migrant experience in the broader host society.

Abstracts (max. 300 words) are invited by Tuesday 6th April 2010: http://www.conference.ie/Conferences/index.asp?Conference=90.

Guest Speaker: Professor Adrian J. Bailey, University of Leeds and Hong Kong Baptist University will deliver a plenary address on Recession, Labour Migration, and Europe’s Transnational Turn, at 18:30 on 12th May, in the D’Arcy Thompson Theatre.

Graduate Bursaries: A limited number of graduate bursaries are available on a competitive basis to cover the cost of the registration fee, (sponsored by the Dean of Arts, Social Sciences & Celtic Studies): http://www.conference.ie/Conferences/index.asp?Conference=90.

Registration commences at 10:30 on Wednesday 12th May followed by buffet lunch at 12:00.  The Conference opens at 13:00 on the 12th May and closes at 17:00 on Thursday 13th of May.
Conference web site:
http://www.conference.ie/Conferences/index.asp?Conference=90

Organisers
Darren Smith, Chair, RGS-IBG Population Geography Research Group  d.smith@brighton.ac.uk
Mary Cawley: mary.cawley@nuigalway.ie
Marie Mahon: marie.mahon@nuigalway.ie
Valerie Ledwith: valerie.ledwith@nuigalway.ie
School of Geography and Archaeology, National University of Ireland, Galway

If you want to come to the one day CASA meeting “Advances in Spatial Analysis & e-Social Science”, then please go to the registration site at http://www.casa.ucl.ac.uk/conference/ and register.

You can get to the GISRUK site from http://gisruk2010.spatial-literacy.org/registration/

If you need any more information about this meeting email christiane.morgan@ucl.ac.uk.

The programme for the CASA meeting is listed below

Session One (AM)

Online exploration of cultural regions, migration and ethnicity using the geography of personal names  – Paul Longley & Pablo Mateos

Spatial Interaction Models for Higher Education – Alex Singleton & Ollie O’Brien

The Dynamics of Skyscrapers: Scaling, Allometry, and Sustainability – Michael Batty

Development of an urban growth model using high-resolution historical data – Kiril Stanilov

Session Two (PM)

The research frontier in urban modelling: the agenda and the challenges – Alan Wilson

On-line Spatio-Temporal Analysis of Network Data and Road Developments – Tao Cheng

Twitter Tags and Real-Time Visualisation of Complex Geographic Data with MapTube – Richard Milton

Tales of Things and Electronic Memory ­ Creating and Mapping The Geography of Everything – Andrew Hudson-Smith

Panel Discussion with Mike Goodchild, Keith Clarke, David Maguire, Carl Steinitz

Coffee at convenient points is provided, but lunch is not.

Afterwards, there will be a reception in the Wilkins Building Jeremy Bentham Room.

The conference promises discussions regarding radical application of statistics as well as chance for socialising.

More details, booking etc can be found here: http://www.radstats.org.uk/conf2010/

Papers are invited, consisting of abstracts of maximum 300 words. The deadline for submission is 12th March 2010.

For submissions and further inforamtion please see: www.nuigalway.ie/labour_migration/conference/

https://www.survey.bris.ac.uk/lsewebsite/bsps2010/

More information is available in this pdf.

This is an international conference bringing together researchers working in the economic, social, psychological and health fields to present state of the art analyses of ageing processes; pinpoint existing gaps in knowledge and identify priorities for future research and data collection.

The keynote speakers are: Jim Heckman, University of Chicago; David Barker, University of Southampton and Jack Guralnik, National Institute of Ageing.

The focus of this conference is the use of longitudinal data from studies such as the British Birth Cohorts and the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing to understand life-course determinants of healthy ageing, including the effect of early-life circumstances on outcomes in later life.

Research using such data is essential to inform sound policy that can address the needs of an ageing society. Themes addressed in the conference include: Frailty, disability and physical functioning at older ages; Ageing and cognition; Employment at older ages and transitions to retirement; Economic and financial circumstances over the life-course; Ageing, social participation and wellbeing in later life; Government policies and the ageing population.

Further information and booking is available as the conference website: www.ageingconf.org

Booking is now open, with an ‘early bird discount’ available.

This GEOMED 2010 1st Circular details the initial considerations for the conference.