Members

Amélie Deschamps
Associate professor in geography, researcher at the PLACES laboratory. Her research focuses on the greening of urban public space, based on a study of participatory programmes implemented by municipalities, and on sustainable development in a context of budgetary austerity.

Didier Desponds
Professor of Urban Geography and Social Geography at CY Cergy Paris Université. His work focuses on residential strategies, the processes of social specialisation of territories, urban micro-conflicts and the social effects of urban policies implemented at different levels (from local urban renewal operations to housing policies implemented by the State). He is also director of the ‘Devenirs urbains’ collection published by Editions du Manuscrit.

Jean-Baptiste Frétigny

Associate professor in geography at CY Cergy Paris Université, deputy director of the PLACES laboratory, associate researcher at UMR Géographie-cités and co-editor of the journal Métropolitiques. His research interests lie in the fields of urban studies, mobility studies and social and cultural geography. His work focuses in particular on the heterogeneity of mobility experiences, representations and policies.

Katja Hackenberg
Associate professor in human and social sciences at the IUT in Neuville-sur-Oise.

Anne Hertzog
Associate professor in geography at CY Cergy Paris Université, director of the PLACES laboratory. She works on the processes of heritage protection, the tourism-memory link and the geography of museums. Her current research explores the future of places marked by massacres and extreme violence and their contemporary heritage. She also works on so-called participatory and/or militant cultural and artistic projects, questioning their socio-spatial effects in different urban and rural contexts.

Karl Hoarau
Associate professor in geography and researcher at the PLACES laboratory. His research focuses on category 4 and 5 tropical cyclones (winds of 215 km/h or 115 knots) in the world's cyclone basins. The intensity of cyclones in the databases is re-analysed a posteriori by the author using the method of Dvorak (1984) which uses thermal infrared satellite images. The aim is to assess whether there has been a trend since the beginning of the satellite era and to determine the role of current global warming in relation to multi-year (El Niño or La Niña) or multi-decadal oscillations in the activity of the most intense cyclones.

Damien Masson
Associate professor in urban planning, deputy director of the PLACES laboratory and associate researcher at the CRESSON laboratory (UMR CNRS-MCC 1563). His research explores the sensory experiences and ambiences of urban space and ordinary mobility. In particular, he examines the sensory and ambient aspects of urban security policies. He is co-director of the ambiances international network and co-director of the Ambiances, Atmospheres and Sensory Experiences of Space series published by Routledge.

Basile Michel
Associate professor in geography, researcher at the PLACES laboratory and associate researcher at the Espaces et Sociétés laboratory (UMR CNRS 6590). His research focuses on the links between art, culture, creativity and territories. His current work focuses on ecological and social issues in the arts and culture, the relationship between cultural venues and their territories, urban change linked to cultural dynamics, and cultural and creative districts.

Akila Nedjar-Guerre
Associate professor in information and communication sciences in the MMI department of the Cergy-Pontoise IUT, researcher in the PLACES laboratory. Her work focuses on representations of the environment and sustainable development in the media, and on the networking mechanisms proposed by stakeholders as part of collaborative citizen approaches. On secondment.

Walid Rabehi
An associate professor in the PLACES laboratory and associate researcher at the IDEES-Rouen laboratory (UMR CNRS-6266), his main research themes focus firstly on the spatiotemporal trajectories of urbanisation, ranging from automatic extraction methods for land use classes to predictive modelling. It then focuses on coastal zones and their vulnerability to the effects of land artificialisation.

Samuel Rufat
University professor in geography at CY Cergy Paris Université, member of the PLACES laboratory and associate researcher at the UMR Géographie-cités. His work focuses on four main themes: social vulnerability and urban resilience, inequalities and environmental justice, post-socialist metropolises, and the spatial practices and representations of video game players. On secondment.

Carrie Ann Benjamin
Carrie is a postdoctoral researcher on the EUTOPIA fellowship programme, with a doctorate in anthropology and sociology. Her research focuses on the role of public space in relations to the city in terms of identification, difference and (dis)comfort.

Alice Golisano
Member of the PLACES laboratory and EUTOPIA-SIF postdoc researcher, in collaboration with the Department of Theatre Studies at the University of Ljubljana and the European Cultural Foundation. Her project focuses on border-defying cultural enterprises and the impact of cross-border cultural events on cross-border communities between Italy and Slovenia. Her case studies include the (In)Visible Cities festival, European Capital of Culture 2025 Go! Borderless and the Liquid Becomings European Pavilion project, funded by the European Cultural Foundation. She holds a doctorate in theatre and performance studies and history from the University of Warwick and CY Cergy Paris Université, under the EUTOPIA cotutelle programme.

Clément Luccioni
ATER equivalent teacher-researcher (50%).

Alessandra Manzini
EUTOPIA SIF post-doctoral researcher at CY Cergy Paris Université (PLACES laboratory) and Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF, CASEs group, Barcelona) in the fields of radical geography, advanced statistical ethno-archaeology and political ecology. Through the SPIRAL project, she is conducting a cross-cultural comparative study of spiritual landscapes and forest management practices.

Natacha Rollinde
Natacha Rollinde has a doctorate in urban planning and geography, is a contract teacher-researcher at CY Cergy Paris Université and an associate researcher at Lab'Urba. Her research focuses on the way in which players in the urban fabric interpret, take part in or, on the contrary, resist the socio-ecological transition. After examining the role of food retailers in this process in her dissertation, Natacha Rollinde's post-doctoral work focused on city workers and residents involved in managing urban cleanliness. Her work combines the theoretical and methodological frameworks of territorial ecology, geography and urban sociology.

Léo Taillandier
Doctoral student in geography at UMR Géographie-cités, under doctoral contract at the Ecole Doctorale de Géographie de Paris, then temporary teaching and research associate at CY Cergy Paris Université. His thesis looks at cycling in the suburbs and outer suburbs of French urban areas. It aims to highlight the diversity of factors influencing cycling and associated with the heterogeneity of cycling between and within urban areas. It is based on the construction and analysis of several dozen indicators representing these influencing factors, as well as on multivariate and multilevel statistical models.

Camila van Diest
Post-doctoral researcher at CY Cergy Paris Université (PLACES laboratory) and at the Observatoire des politiques culturelles (OPC). Her research lies at the crossroads of urban sociology and social geography. She is currently taking part in a collective survey on the cultural activities of the social landlord “Toit et Joie - Poste Habitat” in and around its residences and in public spaces. After devoting her thesis to the cultural requalification of a former public prison in Chile, Camila van Diest carried out her first post-doctoral research on the social appropriation of places marked by the traces of state violence in this country.

Thomas Calvet-Drouelle
After completing a dissertation on decarbonization strategies for IT companies, Thomas Calvet-Drouelle decided to embark on a PhD to delve deeper into the various environmental impacts of IT companies and their value chains. His thesis “Strategies and initiatives by companies in the IT sector to reduce their environmental impact throughout their value chains, with the aim of promoting sustainable economic growth” is co-directed by Didier Desponds (CY PLACES) and Béatrice Ledésert (CY GEC). The aim of the thesis is to identify existing practices, assess the effectiveness of existing strategies for reducing environmental impact, and model the interactions between sustainability and growth.

Anne-Sophie Destrumelle
Doctoral student within the EUR Humanités, Création, Patrimoine. The research project will be approached primarily from the angle of the public's perception/reception of the Saint-Denis basilica-cathedral monument; the religious/cultural relationship, and what it may mean in the Saint-Denis area, which is marked by contrasts and great cultural diversity. The project will thus seek to define the interactions between the triptych ‘monument - museum - public’ in the light of its contemporary urban and social environment, in order to characterise the form and essence of a museum project and what it means for and in the Saint-Denis basilica.

Rémi Engrand
A doctoral student at the PLACES laboratory since December 2024, Rémi Engrand is carrying out his thesis via the FIRST (CY Transfer) scheme, in partnership with the Yvelines département and under the supervision of Didier Desponds. The research is based on a field survey conducted mainly in the Grand Paris Seine & Oise urban community (Yvelines). Entitled “The effects of urban renewal on the reputation of urban policy areas”, his thesis aims to assess the impact of urban renewal on the image and reputation of working-class neighborhoods benefiting from ANRU and non-ANRU programs (such as the PRIOR'Yvelines program). To this end, he will shed light on the various narrative, architectural and urban strategies implemented by the public and private players involved in these operations, before cross-referencing them with the perceptions of the inhabitants, co-inhabitants and peri-inhabitants of the neighborhoods concerned.

Alham Hitache
Doctoral student on a CACP-PNR Vexin Français & CY Cergy Paris Université partnership project (PLACES and ETIS laboratories) on the identification of changes in land use patterns in the Cergy-Pontoise conurbation and the Vexin Français Regional Nature Park using Artificial Intelligence (AI) methods, in particular Deep Learning.

Tristan Majou
After obtaining funding from the Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment (CSTB) in 2020, he is now a doctoral student in geography working on the role of urban amenities in the development of spatial justice: the cases of the metropolises of Paris and Lyon, at CY Cergy Paris Université. This research is directed by Didier Desponds (PLACES) and co-supervised by Laurent Dalmas (CEMOTEV, associate professor).  
By drawing on the rich literature on social and environmental justice issues, this research project aims to measure local inequalities in a metropolis and understand the determinants of these inequalities. In particular, the policies implemented by cities often present amenities as the preferred tool for reducing spatial inequalities. For several decades now, the metropolises of Paris and Lyon have been undergoing major urban renewal and redevelopment projects, which provide an opportunity to improve the built environment, but also to install new amenities (parks, schools, sports facilities, cinemas, etc.). The aim is therefore to understand the role of these amenities or facilities from the perspective of theories of justice. 
This spatial analysis involves the construction of local justice indicators and econometric modelling, as part of a multi-disciplinary and reproducible approach, to make it an operational tool for diagnosing inequalities for local decision-makers.

Vinciane Mobio
Vinciane Mobio's joint international thesis with the University of Abomey-Calavi focuses on: ‘The Restitution of African Cultural Heritage to Africa: the involvement of local communities in the process of creating and modernising host museums in Benin, Senegal and Côte d'Ivoire’.

Edoux Pauly Tiokou Ngassa
PhD student in geography since 2022. This thesis, supervised by Didier Desponds (thesis director) and Pierre Kamdem (thesis co-director), is entitled ‘Urban sprawl, spatial planning issues and sustainable development challenges in the Douala III and Douala V (Douala-Cameroon) boroughs’. Envisaged as a preferred tool for diagnosing and implementing sustainable development on a local scale, using the local Agenda 21 for the city of Douala as a frame of reference, this research focuses part of its thinking on presenting the state of play in terms of urban planning in the urban peripheries of the city of Douala, particularly the Douala III and V districts. Drawing on current scientific processes and interventions in the urban environment, the aim is to understand how the spatial and demographic dynamics leading to urban sprawl have had a more or less negative impact on urban structuring.
By putting forward models adapted to the notion of the sustainable city, to the principle of limited urbanisation, to urban renewal and rehabilitation, and by integrating a territorial logic, the additional vision of this investigation is to define sectoral objectives and identify specific indicators with a view to proposing in-depth responses to anticipate the current challenges of urbanisation. Controlling urban growth in order to plan the future expansion of cities effectively and sustainably is therefore a fundamental issue, not only to preserve the attractiveness of cities, but also to better scrutinise the future of undeveloped areas and guarantee sustainable urban development.

Noëly Urso-Megimbir
Doctoral student since 2022 in heritage, specializing in heritage studies on the following topic: “Processes of heritage and transformation of contemporary architecture through the prism of twentieth-century architecture and its legacy, an anthology of production in Occitania and Corsica”.
Thesis supervised by : Elizabeth Auclair (Research Director), Anne Hertzog (co-supervisor) and François Goven (co-supervisor).
As a State Urban Planning Architect and Heritage Architect, Noëly Urso-Megimbir contributes to the implementation of national public policies as part of her public service mission as Architecte des Bâtiments de France.
Her research aims to identify the architectural quality of the objects selected in the corpus, detect what makes sense, diagnose and defend their heritage value in terms of their innovation and conceptual intelligence.

Thipphaphone Xayavong
EUTOPIA PhD student in Sustainable Development at the University of Warwick and CY Cergy Paris Université. His thesis project aims to study the effects of education on health beliefs and behaviors within the primary and secondary education system in the People's Republic of Laos. In particular, it will examine in detail the political, cognitive and social aspects linking formal education to health.

Pablo Arango Combariza
Research engineer. Trained as an anthropologist, he is in charge of the 2024-2025 survey for the ANR project Engagements in the city through culture in Europe (ECCE).

Aurélien Martineau
Doctor in social geography from the University of Angers and currently a research engineer in the PLACES laboratory at CY Cergy Paris Université. His work focuses mainly on the ECOMUSIQ action-research project, carried out in collaboration with Basile Michel, associate professor in geography, and the TREMPO cultural association based in Nantes (Pays de la Loire). The aim of this project is to study the challenges of ecological transition in the French contemporary music sector. Within this framework, he adopts a posture of support and scientific backing, bringing his expertise to the realization of the ECOMUSIQ study fields. His previous research experience has led him to become involved in a variety of themes. They have enabled him to specialize in the use of qualitative research tools and methodologies, while developing a keen interest in participatory science projects.

Damien Tassin
Damien Tassin has a PhD in sociology and is a research engineer for the ANR Science with and for society project entitled ECOMUSIQ, supported by PLACES and TREMPO (a cultural structure for contemporary music in Nantes). The project conceptually and operationally explores ways of amplifying the ecological transition (or mutation) in the arts and culture, and more specifically in the contemporary music sector.

Elizabeth Auclair
Emeritus lecturer in town and country planning. Her work is characterized by a wide range of research topics, and focuses on three main areas: territorial cultural and heritage policies, participatory processes and project co-construction, and alternative approaches to sustainable territorial development (degrowth, the commons, etc.).

Abdoul Ba
Doctorate in geography from the University of Paris I-Panthéon Sorbonne, associate professor, specialist in geography of territorial development, international migration and decentralized cooperation.

Fanny Di Tursi
ATER at Grenoble-Alpes University, Fanny Di Tursi obtained her PhD in geography in 2024, on the subject of “Terrorist crisis management in cities: the contribution of geomatic tools”, after obtaining funding from the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences doctoral school. Her thesis was supervised by Alexis Sierra and Damien Masson. Her research focuses on a multi-disciplinary approach, covering both theoretical and methodological aspects, from management sciences and organizational sociology to geopolitics and security issues, crossed with GIS and cartographic tools. It offers a new perspective on the study of crisis management from a spatial and critical perspective.

Claire Fonticelli
Post-doctoral researcher at the University of Geneva, Institut de la Gouvernance de l'Environnement et du Développement Territorial (SdS).
Didactique du Paysage research program, under the supervision of Anne Sgard and Natacha Guillaumont.

Elise Garcia
Doctor of Geography, in charge of the Sustainable Development and International Cooperation Mission within the Urban Planning and Sustainable Development Department of the City of Cergy.

Natacha Gourland
Natacha Gourland is a graduate of the Ecole Normale Supérieure, holds a doctorate in geography and is a contract teacher-researcher at CY Cergy Paris Université. She is also a member of Lab'Urba and the Justice Espace Discriminations Inégalités (JEDI) working group. Her research focuses on cultural practices, gender, the body, relations of domination and inequalities surrounding cultural facilities. Her thesis, completed in June 2023, analyzes dance practice and venues in the Paris suburbs from a critical perspective.

Nassima Hakimi Pradels
PRAG in geography at INSPE, Versailles, mainly assigned to the University of Cergy. Doctoral student completing her thesis at UMR PACTE, Grenoble Alpes University. Associate member of the PLACES laboratory.
Nassima Hakimi Pradels is completing a thesis in social geography. He is studying collective citizen initiatives that are part of the socio-ecological transition in mountain regions (agro-ecology and short circuit projects, recycling centers, eco-housing projects, self-managed businesses, alternative funeral parlors, alternative schools, solidarity garages, collective initiatives in the field of physical and psychological health, associative bars, local currencies, etc.). She analyzes the workings of these initiatives and questions their capacity to act as levers of transformation for the territories in which they are deployed. Her main field is the Limousin Mountains (Massif central), between Creuse, Corrèze and Haute-Vienne, but she has also carried out surveys in Ariège (Pyrenees) and Trièves (Alps).

Pierre Kamdem
University Professor in the Department of Geography at Poitiers and member of the Migrinter Laboratory. His research focuses on understanding the spatial dynamics of international migration in particular, and mobility in general. It proposes to sift through mobility's fundamental notions of space and territory, in order to measure their structuring charges in the various societies concerned, increasingly connected by today's hyper-mobility.

Virginie Linder
Doctor of Public Law, contract lecturer at Cergy Paris Université, and associate member of the PLACES laboratory. She is co-director of the Master MISE (Management and engineering of environmental services).

Avenir Géradine Meikengang
Doctorate in Geography since 2024. Her thesis focused on “Heritage costumes in the Grassfields of Cameroon: identification, social representations and valorization strategies”, funded by the doctoral school Arts, Humanités et Sciences sociales. Supervised by Elizabeth Auclair, it took an analytical look at Cameroon's heritage costume, in order to define the elements needed to better identify and valorize it in Cameroon, Africa and the rest of the world. Reflection on the future of Cameroon's tangible and intangible heritage aims to improve its perception by citizens, public authorities, and the national and international scientific community. It is specifically focused on the analysis of actors, audiences and local communities, modes of production and use, methods of inventorying materials, and processes of cultural and tourist valorization. More generally, it aims to explore how the identification, documentation and valorization of heritage costumes can contribute to local cultural and economic development, poverty reduction and improved living conditions for riverside communities.

Lucas Monsaingeon
Doctor by the EUR Humanités, Création, Patrimoine project, since 2024.
ADE HMONP architect, Richard Morris Hunt Fellow 2016, AAPP associate project director.

Quentin Morcrette
Quentin Morcrette holds a PhD in geography from the Université Lumière Lyon 2, after completing his thesis in December 2018. His current research focuses on French and American cartography over the long term, enabling him to grasp the changes underway with the adoption of predominantly digital representations. His skills and interests cover a wide spectrum, from cartographic expertise to tourism development and teaching.

Chloé Senecat
Doctor of Geography since 2024. Her thesis was funded by the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences doctoral school. Supervised by Samuel Rufat (PLACES, HDR), she focused on the following topic: “Urban policies of the European Union: multi-level governance in Berlin, Paris and Warsaw”. The aim of this research was to understand the extent to which the urban dimension of the European Union's regional policy is leading to a simultaneous recomposition of urban spaces and a redefinition of governance modalities within European cities. It contributed to the theoretical debate on the concept of territoriality, and shed light on the current phenomenon of multi-level urban governance.

Alexis Sierra
Professor at Sorbonne University. His research focuses on the analysis of the urban environment and development through the question of risks and through crises understood as situations of emergency and high uncertainty.

Francisco Cortezzi
Research engineer in spatial information processing, analysis and representation (GIS, Statistics, Cartography). Trained as a geographer-cartographer, he works in collaboration with the laboratory's teacher-researchers on various research themes.

Eric Enderlin
Research engineer in statistical processing and analysis. A demographer by training, he uses data from the ANR Risk-Evacuation-Resilience (RER) 2022 survey.

Sonia Lakic
Sonja Lakić is an internationally-trained architect and urban planner, as well as a researcher with a PhD in Urban Studies. Her work revolves around the everydayness of contemporary cities and architecture, with a particular interest in the anthropological and sociological aspects of architectural design and the built environment and, above all, building forms as they are experienced.

Thomas Rosenthal
ATER equivalent teacher-researcher.

Victor Santoni
A doctorate in geography and postdoctoral researcher with ANR RER (Risque Évacuation Résilience), his work focuses on risk and crisis management. He is currently working on a multi-agent model to analyze population evacuation dynamics in the event of a major flood in the Paris region. His thesis, due in November 2021, proposes a critical quantitative approach to the use of digital social networks by territorialized crisis management systems.