MAPPING GLOBAL CHICAGO

Mapping Global Chicago is a collaborative undergraduate research lab and part of the University of Chicago’s Global Studies Program. Students in this lab work together to create public scholarship investigating the idea of the “global city” here in Chicago. Lab participants have studied such diverse subjects as the practice of traditional Tibetan medicine, the effect of the global COVID pandemic on education in Chicago, and most recently, the links between community efforts for environmental justice and the fight against gentrification among Chicago’s Latin American diaspora. In 2023, our lab forged a partnership with El Paseo Community Garden in Pilsen. Students produced, among other output, a podcast and maps of the garden and the Pilsen neighborhood. Future labs will focus on other concerns based on student proposals, researching specific neighborhoods, industries, or institutions connecting Chicago to a broader, “global” space through flows of capital, bodies, and ideas. Both this year and moving forward, these projects involve diverse and interdisciplinary research methods undertaken by students from across the University.