Who We Are
Paroma Wagle, UBC Geography / English Language & Literatures
Dr. Wagle is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow and the Project Lead for Urban Climate Justice from Below. She received her Ph.D. in 2020 from the Department of Urban Planning and Public Policy at the University of California, Irvine. She also holds an Erasmus Mundus Masters in Environmental Sciences, Policy, and Management jointly awarded by four European Universities and a Master of Research in Social Science Research Methods (International Development) from the University of East Anglia, UK. Dr. Wagle is an urban researcher working in the fields of public policy, urban planning, urban history, political ecology, and systems thinking. Her research focuses on megacities and water access, regional watershed management, and urban climate justice.
Kavita Philip, UBC Geography / English Language & Literatures
Dr. Philip is the President’s Excellence Chair in Network Cultures at UBC. She received her Ph.D. in Science and Technology Studies from Cornell University in 1996. Prior to joining UBC she was Professor of History & Informatics at University of California, Irvine. She is best known for her interdisciplinary work in radical history, political science, art, activism, gender, technology studies, and public policy. Her books include Civilizing Natures: Race, Resources, and Modernity in Colonial South India (2004), Tactical Biopolitics: Art, Activism, and Technoscience (co-edited, 2008), and most recently Your Computer is on Fire (co-edited, 2021). Forthcoming books include Studies in Unauthorized Reproduction: The Pirate Function and Decolonization (under contract, MIT Press).
Priti Narayan, UBC Geography
Dr. Narayan is an Assistant Professor at UBC. She received her Ph.D. in Geography in 2019 from Rutgers University. Prior to joining UBC, she was a postdoctoral fellow in the Princeton Mellon Initiative in Architecture, Urbanism and the Humanities and the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies. Dr. Narayan specializes in urban processes and politics in South Asia, focusing on land and housing tenure security and women’s rights movements in relation to slum evictions. In addition to her academic research, Dr. Narayan has led policy research and advocacy on informal settlements as part of Transparent Chennai, a team that created research and maps on neglected issues concerning the urban poor through participatory data collection and mobilization.
Mohammed Rafi Arefin, UBC Geography
Dr. Arefin is an Assistant Professor at UBC. He received his Ph.D. in Geography in 2018 from the University of Wisconsin. Prior to joining UBC, he was an Assistant Professor/Faculty Fellow at New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study. Dr. Arefin specializes in urban environmental politics with a focus on waste and sanitation. He has published work on the politics of waste in Egypt and North America. His new research focuses on the science and policy outcomes of wastewater-based epidemiology, and how this field is changing the relationship between waste, health, and urban governance in cities across the Middle East and North America. Dr. Arefin is also a founding member of the UBC’s Centre for Climate Justice’ Executive Board.
Christopher Reimer, UBC Geography
Christopher is a Ph.D. candidate and Graduate Research Assistant on the project. His research focuses on the history and contemporary politics of conservation policing. Prior to UBC, Christopher obtained his M.A. in Power, Participation and Social Change from the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex and his B.A. in Economics at William Jewell College. He also has more than five years of experience working in international development nonprofits.