Our everyday urban lives often entail encountering a familiar stranger – this is someone who we recognise but have never spoken to – a phenomenon known to hold important social benefits. The emergence of large scale big data sources present new and exciting opportunities as well as computational challenges through which we can both capture and measure familiar strangers across metropolises. This presentation will draw on one source of big data – a large transit smart card database – and reveal how familiar stranger encounters are important in shaping opportunities for crime within the context of a transit environment.

Title: Familiar strangers and urban analytics: mapping, measuring and monitoring

Speaker’s bio: Jonathan Corcoran is Professor in Human Geography within the School Earth and Environmental Sciences at The University of Queensland, Australia and the director of the Queensland Centre for Population Research. His research interests lie in the fields of Population Geography, Spatial Science and Regional Science. His publications cover topics including human mobility and migration, human capital, and social problems each of which has a focus on quantitative methods. He is the co-editor of Australian Population Studies and Secretary of the Applied Geography Commission.

When: 28 May 2021 12:00pm-1:00pm

Where: Zoom: https://uqz.zoom.us/j/88068806690?pwd=OTVoNnZwUUhHUmUzNFd6SGNUaTI2QT09 Password: UQ