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OUR MISSION

The Spatial Justice Studio (SJS) seeks to establish and sustain interinstitutional, interdisciplinary, and inter-sectoral programs that bring faculty, students and the community together across disciplines into diverse experiences to develop meaningful solutions to issues related to spatial (in)justice. The SJS will explore alternative possibilities for urban areas and ways of achieving more equitable urban futures through active research agendas, engaged teaching practices and community based participatory research which will lead to the creation/regeneration of equitable, functional and sustainable communities for all.

OUR TOPICS 

Uneven distribution of resources
Just sustainability
Spatial planning
Gated communities
Gentrification
Urban resiliency
Climate change
Urban heat islands
Environmental justice
Smart cities
Food deserts
Education
Local government boundary change Gerrymandering
Electoral redistricting
Access to healthcare
Transportation desert
Spatial mismatch

SPATIAL JUSTICE STUDIO EVENTS

OUR WORK

Spatial Justice Studio Faculty/Community Fellows Program

The Faculty / Community Fellows program is open to all faculty at UNCSA and WSSU, as well as interested community members. This year’s program will also allow past fellows to reapply for funding to continue their research into issues of spatial justice impacting the community.

Spatial Justice Indicators

This research proposal seeks to explore the issue of spatial justice through the development of a Spatial Justice Index (SJI). To date, most work associated with spatial justice has been qualitative and case study based. In this research, the SJI will be created by quantitatively exploring geographic (i.e. land uses, distance to parks, schools, vices, etc.), demographic (i.e. race, ethnicity, age, etc.) and socio-economic variables (i.e. income, education, poverty, etc.) of census tracts in an effort to apply the concept of spatial (in)justice to NC communities.

Forsyth County Neighborhood Opportunity Atlas website screen capture

Forsyth County Neighborhood Opportunity Atlas

The Spatial Justice Studio @ CDI, in partnership with Forsyth County, is developing a Neighborhood Opportunity Atlas to provide a holistic analysis of conditions across the county that can be used to identify, compare and assess neighborhoods in Forsyth County now and into the future for planning, programming, budgeting and evaluation. The atlas is an innovative, statistical, and geographic product that will provide quantitative census tract level information for a wide range of community indicators and begin a process to identify, target and tackle underperforming neighborhoods.

NSF HBCU-UP TIP — URBAN STUDIES & SUSTAINABILITY: Incorporating Data Science into the Urban Studies & Sustainability Curriculum

WSSU’s Target Infusion Project titled – Integrating Data Science into the Urban Studies & Sustainability Program (TIP – IDSUSSP) seeks to expose undergraduate students interested in the field of Urban Studies & Sustainability to data science. Through the use of data, urban studies can help reshape the world’s cities into more sustainable places.

SPATIAL INJUSTICE: EXPLORING REDLINING IN WINSTON-SALEM, NC

SPATIAL JUSTICE STUDIO, FACULTY LEAD

Dr. Russell M. Smith is a Professor of Geography in the Department of History, Politics & Social Justice and the Faculty Lead for the newly established Spatial Justice Studio at the Center for Design Innovation (SJS @ CDI). He received his doctoral degree in Geography from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. 

CALENDAR OF EVENTS

2022 EVENTS

AUGUST

Spatial Justice Studio Fellows 2022-2023 Applications Open
August 17, 2022
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SEPTEMBER

Virtual SJS Faculty and Community Fellows Meeting. Registration Required
September 14, 2022 — 12:00 Noon
REGISTER NOW

SJS Faculty and Community Fellows Applications Due
September 30, 2022 — 5:00 p.m.
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OCTOBER

Spatial Justice Conversation with Wake Forest University Physician Assistants Program
October 19, 2022 — 12:30 p.m.
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NOVEMBER

GIS Day 2022
November 16, 2022 — 12:00 p.m. via Zoom (Advanced registration required)
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REGISTER NOW

DECEMBER

NCLGBA Winter Conference – Forsyth County Neighborhood Opportunity Atlas
December 9, 2022 — 10am–Noon
MORE INFO AND TO REGISTER NOW

2023 EVENTS

MARCH

NC GIS Conference – Forsyth County Neighborhood Opportunity Atlas
March 8-10, 2023
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PUBLICATIONS AND RESOURCES

RESOURCES

Justice Spatiale – Spatial Justice
A forum for international debates about spatial justice, in a pluridisciplinary perspective.

Just Space—Community groups supporting each other on London planning
20 May: Just Space has responded to the document produced by the Mayor and still considers that the draft London Plan is unsound because the Public Sector Equalities Duty has not been discharged.

Spatial History Project – Stanford University
The Spatial History Project at Stanford University is a place for a collaborative community of students, staff, and scholars to engage in creative spatial, textual and visual analysis to further research in the humanities.

Spatial justice – Wikipedia
Spatial justice links together social justice and space, most notably in the works of geographers David Harvey and Edward W. Soja. The organization of space is a crucial dimension of human societies and reflects social facts and influences social relations (Henri Lefebvre, 1968, 1972).Consequently, both justice and injustice become visible in space.

Segregated by Design
‘Segregated By Design’ examines the forgotten history of how our federal, state and local governments unconstitutionally segregated every major metropolitan area in America through law and policy.

The City and Spatial Justice — Edward W. Soja

Spatial Justice and Planning — Susan S. Fainstein

Spatial Justice: Towards an Ethics of Spatial Equity — J. Bissett-Scott, Delle Odeleye, Ian Frame

Spatializing the Urban, Part I — Edward Soja

Why Discuss Spatial Justice in Urbanism Studies? — Roberto Rocco

Winston-Salem’s Residential Segregation History — Elizabeth A. Herbin-Triant

Spatial Justice Network

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OFFICE LOCATION

Spatial Justice Studio
Center for Design Innovation
450 Design Ave,

Winston-Salem, NC 27101