Scholarship
The origins of my research passions are an inborn love of nature and a lifetime of travel that has exposed me to the complexities of the world. I became a geographer because it was the only discipline that spoke to me by making the connections between peoples, places, environments, and nonhumans a central line of inquiry.
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I aim to produce writing, creative mapping, and multi-media that is easy to understand while inspiring a curiosity about the world that helps move us towards a humane future. Additionally, I am an active peer reviewer for scholarly journals, publishers, and funders.
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I have been fortunate to work with a multitude of people who share my eclectic interests; if you are interested in a collaboration, please feel free to contact me.
Flipboard is a media app that allows user to create "magazines" with curated web-based items. I've created this "flipboard" about animal geography to help keep up with animal-related news. Please feel free to share articles you think I should include!
Bringing ethics to life
In 2023, I became a Fellow at PAN Works, an ethics think tank with a focus on the wellbeing of animals.
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"We cultivate compassion, respect and justice for animals, a reverence for the community of life, and a desire for people, animals and nature [PAN] to thrive together. As a nonprofit based in the US, we are a global platform for ethicists, scholars and civil society working to improve animal wellbeing."
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In this capacity, not only do I get to work alongside a truly inspiring group of Fellows, but my goals are to facilitate the expansion of animal geography work beyond the academy and to develop programs working on multispecies justice.
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Please feel free to reach out with suggestions/collaborations!
I was honored to be invited to join the Ethics Board for the European Research Council (ERC) funded project ABIDE. Led by Principal Investigator Verónica Policarpo at the University of Lisbon, ABIDE stands for Animal ABidings: recoverIng from DisastErs in more-than-human communities.
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What and how can we learn from animals about recovering from disasters? How can we hear them in their own terms, translate their stories, and include their perspectives, in human knowledge about disasters? This project explores the resilience of multispecies
communities, and their capacities for healing and bouncing back from disasters, through the point of view of nonhuman animals. The multi-year study will compare three countries where wildfires
have taken on increasingly critical proportions every year: Brazil, Australia and Portugal.
Drawing on contributions from sociologists, anthropologists, ethologists, biologists and geographers, ABIDE aims at attuning to,
translating and including the perspectives, experiences and stories of animals into our knowledge of how multispecies communities can better recover from the traumatic experience of wildfires.
In the end, we seek to build the foundations for a new
interdisciplinary framework for addressing humans’ and animals’ ability to build and abide in multispecies communities that are more resilient to wildfires and other disasters. In so doing,
we aspire to identify the landmarks of a post-species episteme, and thus push forward the frontiers of knowledge of human-animal relations, as well as contribute to a more-than-human governance of disasters.
It was my privilege to serve as the Managing Editor for the Political Animals section of the Society & Animals Journal. This journal is run by the Animals & Society Institute and published via Brill Publishing.
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Society & Animals is at the forefront of the emerging multi-disciplinary field of Human-Animal Studies, which explores the ways in which nonhuman animals figure in human lives. The journal publishes studies concerning experiences of nonhuman animals from psychology, sociology, anthropology, political science, and other social sciences and history, literary criticism, and other disciplines of the humanities.
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Society & Animals is unique in its breadth and variety, methods of papers published and data-based discussion of ethics and policy regarding the human-animal relationship.
Placing Animals is the first book to survey the ways in which animals have been studied in geography. It includes both a historical overview of the development of animal geography and an assessment of the field today. Through the theme of the role of place in shaping where and why human-animal interactions occur, the chapters in turn explore the history of animal geography and our distinctive relationships in the home, on farms, in the context of labor, in the wider culture, and in the wild.
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Winner: CHOICE outstanding academic title in geography 2013
Always an innovative and eclectic thinker, Urbanik takes us to the multiple places we inhabit with other animals, encouraging us to think more deeply about these relationships with the help of her imaginative and penetrating vision. - Jody Emel, Clark University
It is not often that a text is seminal, but this one is. Urbanik reviews the geographic research that deals with humans' relationships with animals and provides an effective framework to understand how geographic thought has developed on this topic. ...Though rather brief, the book is very readable and deals with rather complex conceptualizations. It is a library-worthy volume, for certain. Summing Up: Essential.
- Choice Library Journal
An engaging and at times sobering look at the coexistence of humans and animals in the 21st century and how their sometimes disparate needs affect environments, politics, economies, and culture worldwide.
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There is an urgent need to understand human-animal interactions and relations as we become increasingly aware of our devastating impact on the natural resources needed for the survival of all animal species. This timely reference explores such topics as climate change and biodiversity, the impact of animal domestication and industrial farming on local and global ecosystems, and the impact of human consumption of wild species for food, entertainment, medicine, and social status. This volume also explores the role of pets in our lives, advocacy movements on behalf of animals, and the role of animals in art and media culture.
Alphabetical entries illustrate key relationships, concepts, practices, and animal species. The book concludes with a comprehensive appendix of select excerpts from key primary source documents relating to animals and a glossary.
It is this reviewer’s opinion that Humans and Animals is a highly readable and informative work that deserves a place on the shelves of all public and academic libraries, especially those of the latter that support geography, social studies, or animal rights and welfare curricula.—Michael F. Bemis, Independent Reference Book Reviewer, Oakdale, Minnesota '
The 'Primary Documents' section includes international laws, books, and documents on the legal and moral treatment of animals and provides a fascinating and comprehensive look into the work being done in the area of animal rights. The inclusion of background material on laws and ethics offers more depth, and readers will find the extensive bibliography an ideal jumping-off point for further research. —Library Journal
Our goals with this special issue were to (1) bring wildlife conservation into this journal more prominently, and (2) promote a more intentionally interdisciplinary dialogue about wildlife conservation.
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We are pleased to share with you the following set of papers which represent perspectives from eight disciplines (advocacy groups, animal geography, ecology, environmental studies, ethics, legal studies, science and technology studies, and sociology. The geography of the case studies includes Canada, Finland, India, Romania, the United States, and Uruguay. The wildlife actors in these papers include owls, tigers, wolves, and eyra cats - among others.
Julie's editorial skills made it a pleasure to complete a complex scholarship project with many moving parts. Her collegiality, professionalism, patience, and focus were invaluable throughout. From content brainstorming to author communication and management, her attention to details and communication style also helped keep us on track and ensured we produced a publication that matched our vision.
- Monica Ogra, Gettysburg College
A Selection of Other Work
Select ArticlesU
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Urbanik, J., S. Bortolamiol, & M. Capon. 2024. Animal geographies: an international state of the field survey. Scottish Geographical Journal: 1-26. link
Urbanik, J. & C. Johnston. 2022. Shared spaces, shared suffering: Exploring the effects
of COVID-19 on urban Animal Advocacy Organizations in Chicago and Kansas
City, USA. In COVID-19 and the World of Ad Hoc Geographies, edited by S. Brunn and D. Gilbreath. Springer Publications; pp. 2287-2306.
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Urbanik, J. & A. Hovorka. 2022. Animal geographies in the time of COVID-19: Challenges and opportunities. In COVID-19 and the World of Ad Hoc Geographies, edited by S. Brunn and D. Gilbreath. Springer Publications; pp. 2307-2325.
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​Urbanik, J. 2021. Applied geonarratives: Arts-based social geography in criminal defense mitigation. Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4(1): 1-10. Access full text here.
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Urbanik, J. 2020. Reinforcing boundaries does not contribute to change. Animal Sentience 5
(30): 27. https://www.wellbeingintlstudiesrepository.org/animsent/vol5/iss30/27/
Urbanik, J. and P. DiCandeloro. 2020. Reconstructing Place through Creative Mapping: A Workshop and Gallery Exhibition in Partnership with the Kansas City Veterans Writing Team. Geohumanities 6 (2): 441-468.
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Urbanik, J. 2018. Kansas City: The Morphology of an American Zoöpolis. Rutherford, S. and S. Wilcox (Eds). Historical Animal Geographies. London and New York: Taylor and Francis (pp. 75-87).
Urbanik, J. 2018. Geographies of Nonhuman Animal Communication and Language.Brunn, Stanley. (Ed.) The Changing World Language Map. Springer Publications.
Vitztum, C. and J. Urbanik. 2016. Assessing the dog: A theoretical analysis of the companion animal's actions in human-animal interaction. Society and Animals, v.24, n.2, pp. 172-185.
Urbanik, J. and M. Morgan. 2013. A Tale of Tails: The Place of Dog Parks in the Urban Imaginary. Geoforum, 44, pp. 292-302.
Urbanik, J. 2009. Hooters for Neuters: Sexist or Transgressive Animal Advocacy Campaign? Humanimalia, v.1, n.1, pp. 41-67.
Urbanik, J. 2007. Locating the transgenic landscape: animal biotechnology and politics of place in Massachusetts. Geoforum, v. 38, pp. 1205-1218.
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Select Public Interviews
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2022 LAs Hottest Club: A Members Only Dog Park, April 4th, Mashable.com Article
2021 Placing Animals. Indian Animal Studies Collective Table Talk, October 1st. Videolink
2020 Humans and Animals: A Geography of Coexistence. VeganWorld Radio, March 2nd. Podcast
2019 How Dog Parks Took Over the Urban Landscape. Article by A. Greenberg. Smithsonianmag.com, January 7th 2020. Article
2018 Dog Parks and Dog Life in Kansas City. KCUR Central Standard Show. Podcast
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Kansas City: An American Zoopolis is a ~30 minute documentary about the role of animals in the city's history. It is my first documentary project and was completed with the support of the Missouri Humanities Council. It was also selected for the inaugural Kansas City Local Film Festival in 2016.
For me, Dr. Urbanik has become more than a reader, but a colleague and friend. She is a wonderful listener and communicator and she is phenomenal at refining, reorganizing, and transforming chaotic ideas and thoughts into meaningful discourse. I will be forever grateful to Dr. Urbanik."
- Poppy Di Candeloro
Meridian Herrington has just moved from one side of the country to the other and she must find her way in her new home. In the fields near her house, she discovers that she can talk to Beebo and Felix - two chipmunks who are trying to save themselves and their friends from a farmer's poison. Join Meridian and her friends to see what happens when one determined girl sets her mind to help others.
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This is a children's book for readers ages 9-12
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Dear Aunt Julie, The book you wrote (in my opinion) was a book that you could really picture. I personally think this book is in my Top 10 favorites and that's a lot to say! - Bre Urbanik, age 12