Malve Jacobsen

Malve Jacobsen is affiliated with the Institute of Geography at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz since 2021, where she teaches Human Geography and conducts research on infrastructures, urban naturecultures, and planning politics. Her work integrates critical theory with ethnographic methods, focusing on transdisciplinary urban issues. She holds an M.A. in Urban Geography (2014) and B.A. in Area Studies and Human Geography (2011) from Humboldt University Berlin, State University of Zanzibar, and Université Rennes II.

• PhD scholarship: Hans Böckler Foundation (2014–2018)
• Erasmus+ coordinator at Mainz (since 2019)

Research interests span postcolonial and feminist science studies, digital geography, and urban air quality technologies. Her current project Technonatural mediations of urban airs explores air as a transdisciplinary nexus of human-technology-environment interactions. Earlier work examined the contested implementation of Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) in Dar es Salaam.

• Key publications include a 2020 Routledge monograph on BRT in the Global South
• 2024 edited volume on Western modernity critiques

Teaching focuses on urban geographies, postcolonial perspectives, and academic skills. She advises students on topics related to infrastructures, urban natures, and political ecology. Grants include internal funding for Urban air in crisis (2022–2023). Active in academic networks, she organizes conferences and workshops on digital geographies and air quality politics.