Prof Peter Merriman BA, PhD (Nottingham), Cert. FPSHE (Reading) FAcSS FRGS SFHEA
Professor in Human Geography
Department of Geography and Earth Sciences
Contact Details
- Email: prm@aber.ac.uk
- ORCID: 0000-0001-8118-6684
- Office: J7, Llandinam Building
- Phone: +44 (0) 1970 622574
- Twitter: merrimanpete
- Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=j4oUP2oAAAAJ
- Research Portal Profile
- Personal Pronouns: he/him/his
Profile
Peter Merriman is a human geographer specialising in cultural and historical geography, mobility studies, spatial theory, and cultural heritage. He has written widely on geographies of mobility, nationalism and national identity, and theoretical approaches to space and place. He is a Leverhulme Fellow for 2025-26 researching the 1951 Festival of Britain.
Pete joined Aberystwyth as a lecturer in 2005 and was awarded a personal chair in 2014. He completed his BA and PhD degrees at the University of Nottingham, and was a Lecturer at The University of Reading from 2000 to 2005. He is co-Director of the University's Centre for Transport and Mobility (CeTraM).
Pete is an Honorary Member of the Centre for Advanced Studies in Mobility and the Humanities at the University of Padua (Italy), a member of three UKRI peer review colleges (AHRC, ESRC & the Talent PRC), and has served on a range of national and international grant awarding panels, including for the AHRC and FWF Austrian Science Council. He is Editor of the 'Routledge Research in Culture, Space and Identity' Book Series, and sits on the editorial boards of 'Cultural Geographies', ‘Journal of Historical Geography’, 'Mobilities', 'Transfers', 'Applied Mobilities', ‘Mobility Humanities’, and the RGS Book Series. Pete is the External Examiner for Human Geography for Parts IA/IB of the Geographical Tripos at the University of Cambridge (2023-26). He was conferred as a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in 2022, is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG), and a Senior Fellow of Advance HE. He has been listed in Stanford/Elsevier's ‘Top 2% Scientists’ list for citations since 2020.
Responsibilities: Head of the Cultural and Historical Geography Research Group
Teaching
Module Coordinator
Grader
Lecturer
- GS20020 - Research Design and Fieldwork Skills
- EAM4660 - Dissertation in Environmental Change Impacts and Adaptation
- GS33320 - Everyday Social Worlds
- GS14220 - Place and Identity
- GS21520 - Human Geography Research Design and Fieldwork Skills
- GS22920 - Placing Culture
- GS36220 - Landscape, Culture and Society in 20th Century Britain
- GS21420 - Environmental Earth Science Research Design and Fieldwork Skills
Tutor
- GS34040 - Dissertation: Geography, Environmental Science, and Environmental Earth Science
- GS22920 - Placing Culture
- GS36220 - Landscape, Culture and Society in 20th Century Britain
Coordinator
Areas of Ph.D. and D.Prof. supervision:
- Cultural and historical geography
- History and philosophy of geography
- Mobility and transport
- Theoretical approaches to Space and Place
- Cultures of landscape
- National Identity and Nationalism
- Infrastructural geographies
- Twentieth century Britain
- Festival of Britain 1951
- Welsh cultural history
- Cultural heritage
- Port history and heritage
Current PhD Students:
- Anna Pennington
- Lowri Ponsford
- Kirsty Usher
Current D.Prof. student:
- Vaughan Williams
Research
Mobility
My first main research interest is in social science and humanities approaches to mobility and transport. I am co-Director of Aberystwyth University's Centre for Transport and Mobility (CeTraM), and have published two monographs in this area ('Driving spaces: a cultural-historical geography of England's M1 motorway' (Blackwell Publishing, 2007) and 'Mobility, Space and Culture' (Routledge, 2012)), and the co-authored book Connections (2025). I have also co-edited four books on mobility: 'Geographies of Mobilities' (Ashgate, 2011), 'The Routledge Handbook of Mobilities' (2014), 'Mobility and the humanities' (Routledge, 2018, Korean translation 2019), and 'Empire and Mobility in the Long Nineteenth Century' (MUP 'Studies in imperialism' series, 2020). I am a member of the editorial boards of 'Mobilities', 'Transfers', ‘Applied Mobilities’ and ‘Mobility Humanities’, and I am General Editor of Bloomsbury's 6-volume collection on 'A Cultural History of Transport and Mobility' (due out 2026). I am coinvestigator on a £2.5m ‘Infrastructure humanities’ grant at Konkuk University (2025-31).
Theories of Space and Place
I authored an advanced text-book on 'Space' for Routledge's 'Key ideas in Geography' Series (2022) which provided the first comprehensive and accessible examination of approaches that have crossed between such diverse fields as philosophy, physics, architecture, sociology, anthropology, and geography. The book was reviewed by a panel in the AAG Review of Books in 2024. Prior to this I edited a four-volume major reference work on ‘Space’ in the ‘Critical Concepts in Geography Series (Routledge, 2016). I have recently published articles on theoretical approaches to place in ‘Progress in Human Geography’ and ‘Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers’.
Festival of Britain 1951
My current research, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, is examining the role of Wales and Welsh people in the Festival of Britain. It looks at how discourses of Welshness and Britishness were woven through the celebrations, the role of key Welsh organisations in official events, the role of the Welsh language in celebrations, and the resistance of some Welsh nationalists and local authorities to participating in this British Festival.
Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Place
I was AU Principal Investigator on the €3.2 million project 'Ports, Past and Present' project (2019-23) and AU co-investigator on the €3 million ‘Coastal Uplands, Heritage and Tourism’ (CUPHAT) project (2021-23), both funded by ERDF through the Ireland-Wales programme. The major outputs for 'Ports, Past and Present' were 9 films produced with Mother Goose Films.