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Staff Profile

Professor Rachel Pain

Dean of Social Justice

  • Address: School of Geography, Politics and Sociology
    Newcastle University
    Newcastle upon Tyne
    NE1 7RU
    UK
Background


Rachel Pain is Professor of Human Geography and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.


RESEARCH INTERESTS

  • Disasters, violence and recovery
  • Gender-based violence and its impacts on women, men and children
  • Community and urban trauma and mental health
  • Transgender GBV survivors and access to abuse services 
  • The relationships between domestic and sexual abuse and terrorism/warfare
  • Geopolitics and intimacy
  • Theory, politics and practice of participatory/co-production approaches to research, learning and action


I was born in Northumberland and grew up in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. I began my career as a Lecturer at Northumbria University, before moving to Durham University in 2000 and then Newcastle University in 2017. Here I have served as a Director of Northern Ireland and North East Doctoral Training Partnership, Director of EDI for the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, and University Dean of Social Justice from January 2024. 


I am a social and political geographer whose research is founded in feminist and participatory praxis. Most of my research has focused on violence, community safety, trauma and fear, with gender-based violence an enduring interest. I have collaborated in the UK with national and local government, charities, community organisations, activists, artists and survivors, framed with a Participatory Action Research approach and using a range of qualitative, quantitative and arts-based methods. I also work in partnership with researchers in Bangladesh, Malaysia and Colombia. The conceptual thread running through these projects explores the social politics of what are commonly seen as personal and private experiences of violence, trauma and recovery. Equally, international and urban forms of violence, such as war, terrorism and housing dispossession, are recast as having intimate roots. Through survivor-centred research and the development of concepts such as ‘globalised fear’, ‘intimacy-geopolitics’, ‘intimate war’ and 'geotrauma', the research tackles common myths that persist about the places, scales and impacts of violence and harm.


PRIZES AND AWARDS

  • Chair of Conference 2022, Royal Geographical Society / IBG Annual International Conference
  • International Geographical Union (IGU) - Award for Distinguished Geographical Practice 2022
  • Association of American Geographers Feminist Geographies Speciality Group - Jan Monk Service Award 2022 
  • Urban Studies Best Paper Award 2019 for "Chronic Urban Trauma" https://journals.sagepub.com/page/usj/collections/awards
  • Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences (from 2018)
  • Durham University Excellence in Research Impact Award 2014
  • Durham University Excellence in Learning and Teaching Award 2012
  • Julian Minghi Outstanding Research Award of the Political Speciality Group of the Association of American Geographers 2009. Awarded jointly with Susan J Smith for 'Fear: Critical Geopolitics and Everyday Life'
  • Royal Geographical Society Gill Memorial Award 2008, for contributions to social geography and participatory research
  • Philip Leverhulme Prize 2005


RECENT REPORTS, MUSIC AND FILM

Publications

  • Articles

  • Authored Books

  • Book Chapters

    • Pain R, Bloodgood E, Gilbert C. Trauma. In: Calkin S; Freeman C, ed. Handbook of Feminist Political Geography. Boston: de Gruyter, 2025. In Press.
    • Pain R, Rezwana N, Sahdan Z. Trauma, gender and space: insights from Bangladesh, Malaysia and the UK. In: Datta A; Hopkins P; Johnston L; Olson E; Silva JM, ed. Routledge Handbook of Gender and Feminist Geographies. London: Routledge, 2020, pp.287-296.
    • Pain R, Hopkins P. Researching Social Geographies. In: Newcastle Social Geographies Collective, ed. Social Geographies: An Introduction. London: Rowman and Littlefield, 2020.
    • Pande R. Race. In: The Newcastle Social Geographies Collective; Pain, R; Hopkins, P, ed. Social Geographies An Introduction. London: Rowman and Littlefield International, 2020, pp.133-142.
    • Jones C, Richardson MJ. Justice. In: The Newcastle Social Geographies Collective, ed. Social Geographies: An Introduction. London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2020, pp.79-88.
    • Hopkins P, Pain R. Age. In: The Newcastle Social Geographies Collective, ed. Social Geographies: An Introduction. London: Rowman and Littlefield, 2020, pp.192-199.
    • Alexander C, Pain R. Urban security: Whose Security? Everyday Responses to Urban Fears. In: Springer, ed. Ceccato V (ed) The Urban Fabric of Crime and Fear. Springer, Dordrecht, 2012.
    • kinpaisby-hill mrsc. Participatory praxis and social justice: towards more fully social geographies. In: Del Casino, V; Thomas, ME; Cloke, P; Panelli, R, ed. A Companion to Social Geography. Blackwell, 2011, pp.214-34.
    • Pain R, Askins K. Engaging communities in research. In: Gardner et al, ed. Communicating geographical research beyond the academy. London: RGS/IBG, 2010.
    • Pain R, Hopkins PE. Social geographies of age: landscapes, lifecourses, equity and justice. In: Smith SJ; Pain R; Marston S; Jones JP, ed. The SAGE handbook of social geography. London: Sage, 2009, pp.78-98.
    • Smith S, Pain R, Marston S, Jones JP. Introduction: situating social geographies. In: Smith et al, ed. Handbook of Social Geographies. Sage, 2009.
    • Pain R, Smith S. Introduction: geographies of well-being. In: Smith,S et al, ed. Handbook of Social Geographies Sage. Sage, 2009.
    • Pain R. Introduction: doing social geographies. In: Smith,S et al, ed. Handbook of Social Geographies. Sage, 2009.
    • Pain R, Smith S. Whose fear is it anyway? Resisting terror fear and fear for children. In: Pain,R; Smith,S, ed. Fear: Critical Geopolitics and Everyday Life. Ashgate, 2008.
    • kinpaisby-hill mrsc. Publishing from participatory research. In: Blunt, A; et al, ed. Publishing in Geography: a Guide for New Researcher. Wiley-Blackwell, 2008.
    • Pain R, Smith S. Fear/hope and reconnection. In: Pain,R; Smith,S, ed. Fear: Critical Geopolitics and Everyday Life. Ashgate, 2008.
    • Pain R, Smith SJ. Fear, critical geopolitics and everyday life. In: Pain,R; Smith,SJ, ed. Fear: Critical Geopolitics and Everyday Life. Ashgate, 2008.
    • Pain R, Smith SJ. Critical geopolitics and everyday fears. In: Lee,M; Farrell,S, ed. Fear of Crime: Critical Voices in an Age of Anxiety. London: Routledge, 2008.
    • Alexander C, Beale N, Kesby M, McMillan J, Pain R, Ziegler F. Participatory diagramming. In: Kesby,M; Kindon,S; Pain,R, ed. Connecting People, Participation and Place: Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods. Routledge, 2007.
    • Kindon S, Pain R, Kesby M. Participatory action research: origins, approaches and methods. In: Kindon,S; Pain,R; Kesby,M, ed. Connecting People, Participation and Place: Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods. Routledge, 2007.
    • Kesby M, Kindon S, Pain R. Participation as a form of power: retheorising empowerment and spatialising participatory action research. In: Kesby,M; Kindon,S; Pain,R, ed. Connecting People, Participation and Place: Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods. Routledge, 2007.
    • Kindon S, Pain R, Kesby M. Introduction: connecting people, participation and place. In: Kindon,S; Pain,R; Kesby,M, ed. Connecting People, Participation and Place: Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods. Routledge, 2007.
    • Kesby M, Kindon S, Pain R. Conclusion: the space(s) and scale(s) of participatory action research: constructing empowering geographies?. In: Kesby,M; Kindon,S; Pain,R, ed. Connecting People, Participation and Place: Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods. Routledge, 2007.
    • Pain R, Bailey C. British social and cultural geography: beyond turns and dualisms?. In: Kitchin,R; (ed), ed. Mapping worlds: international perspectives on social and cultural geographies. 2007.
    • Pain R. Old age and Victimisation. In: Davies,P; Francis,P; Jupp,V; (eds), ed. Victimisation: Theory, Research and Politics. London: Macmillan, 2003.
    • Pain R. Writing essays and related assignments. In: Rogers,J et al, ed. he student's companion to geography. Oxford: Blackwell, 2002.
    • Pain R. Women’s experiences of violence over the lifecourse. In: Teather, E, ed. Embodied geographies. Routledge, 1999.
    • Pain R. Women's fear of sexual violence: explaining the spatial paradox. In: Jones,H, ed. Crime and the Environment: the Scottish Experience. Aldershot:Avebury, 1993.

  • Edited Books

    • Hopkins P, Newcastle Social Geographies Collective, Pain R, Shaw R, Gao Q, Bonnett A, Jones C, Richardson M, Rzedzian S, Benwell MC, Lin W, McAreavey R, Stenning A, Blazek M, Pande R, Najib K, Finlay R, Nayak A, Ridley G, Mearns G, Bonner-Thompson C, McLaughlin J, Boussalem A, Iqbal N, Heslop J, Jarvis H, Burrows R, Bambra C, Copeland A, Tate S, Campbell E, Thompson M, James A, Raynor R, Cunningham N, Powells G, Herbert J, Hocknell S, ed. Social Geographies: An Introduction. London, UK: Rowman and Littlefield, 2021.
    • Kindon S, Pain R, Kesby M, ed. Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods: Connecting People, Participation and Place. London: Routledge, 2007.

  • Editorial

  • Reports