Biography
Giulia is an urban theorist, ethnographer, architect and teacher interested in the plural intersections between the built environment, politics, and socio-natural life. Prior to her PhD she worked in the public planning sector in New York City, for a design-led NGO in Benin, and as magazine editor. She holds a Ph.D. in Urban Studies from the University of Cambridge (2021), a MSc Summa Cum Laude from the University IUAV of Venice and the University of Sheffield (2015), and a BA Summa Cum Laude from the University IUAV of Venice and the Illinois Institute of Technology (2012).
She founded and co-convenes (with Dr Surer Mohamed) the "In War's Wake" Research Network at CRASSH (University of Cambridge). Previously, she co-founded and convened the Urbanism in the Global South interdisciplinary working group (with Dr Noura Wahby and Dr Shreyashi Dasgupta) and the King's College Urban Network (with Prof Matthew Gandy). She has co-convened the Cambridge City Seminar (2016/17), the international conference "Two Mayors, Two Cities: Urban Transformation in Cali and Medellín" (2017), and organised a public keynote with Italo-Ivorian activist and sociologist Aboubakar Soumahoro, on "Race, Labour, Freedom: Refugees and migration in Italy" (2018), among others.
During 2017-2019 she was Visiting Researcher at the Department of Cultural Studies (Centre for Afro-descendant Studies) and at the Faculty of Aesthetics of the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá, Colombia. During 2016-2019 she served as Editor for the independent magazine of academic journalism King’s Review, for which she co-edited and published a book of interviews (2018) with academics like Gayatri C. Spivak, Ilan Pappé, Cornel West, Nancy Fraser, Carlo Rovelli, Saskia Sassen, among many others. She is a member of the grassroots organisation Costurero de la Memoria for the Human Rights of Afro-Colombian and IDP women and their families (Bogotá/transnational).
Research
Giulia’s doctoral research (2016-2020) examined the longue durée of coloniality and racial capitalism in shaping the contemporary urban (physical, mental, and social) space of Latin American cities, adopting a situated perspective from Bogotá: from racial segregation and racial bias in urban planning and governance, to emerging forms of pluri-ethnic urbanism, relational forms of emplacement and urban territoriality, with a particular focus on internally displaced (IDP) Afro-Colombian communities and women. The research involved two years of longitudinal fieldwork in Bogotá, collaborating with Afro-Colombian human rights activists, community leaders, and social organisations. Her research was jointly funded by the AHRC-DTP and King’s College at the University of Cambridge.
Publications
Articles
Torino, G., 2021. The governmentality of multiculturalism: From national pluri-ethnicity to urban cosmopolitanism in Bogotá. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, doi:10.1080/1070289X.2021.1994228.
Torino, G., 2016. Narratives of a transformation: The role of space in the advent of neoliberal planning in Bogotá. International Planning History Society Proceedings, doi:10.7480/iphs.2016.1.1205.
Books
Torino, G., Prendergast, C. and Lernhard, J., 2018. The King’s Review: Magazine of Academic Journalism. Interviews 2013-2018, King's Review.
Thesis
Torino, G., 2021. Racial and Relational Urbanisms: The Spatial Politics of Afro-Colombian Emplacement in Bogotáhttps://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.69741
Torino, G., (2018) “The dystopian/utopian parable of Medellín. An interview with Jorge Pérez-Jaramillo” in The King’s Review:
Magazine of Academic Journalism, 2013-2018. Pp. 322-37.
Torino, G., (2018) “Incerto Tempore Incertisque Loci: The chaotic dance of the universe. An interview with Carlo Rovelli” in The King’s
Review: Magazine of Academic Journalism, 2013-2018. Pp. 308-20.
Torino, G., (2017) “Age of Extraction: An interview with Saskia Sassen,” The King’s Review: 121-28.
Teaching and Supervisions
Giulia has taught undergraduate and postgraduate courses as Affiliated Lecturer at the University of Cambridge (Departments of: Architecture, Geography, Centre for Latin American Studies, Politics and International Studies). She has been an invited lecturer at the University of Sheffield, the University of Basel and the University Externado of Colombia. Her lectures deal with contemporary urbanism and race, decoloniality, citizenship, and new border regimes. She has been also invited as examiner for Undergraduate and Masters (MSc and MPhil) examinations and theses at the University of Cambridge and UCL, and as reviewer in leading academic journals.
