Centre for Port Cities and Maritime Cultures
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The Centre for Port Cities and Maritime Cultures focuses on the past, present and future importance of urban-maritime cultures and communities within a global context.
The increasing concern about social and economic deprivation in coastal communities has underscored the importance of focusing scholarly work on the waterfront. We're dedicated to investigating the opportunities that exist for cultural and heritage enrichment initiatives and community engagement programmes in this area.
Working with academics, creative practitioners, funders and local community groups, we explore the relationships between urban and maritime spaces and seek to empower our disadvantaged communities.
The Centre produces a newsletter called every other month. The next newsletter is out in January. To subscribe email pcmc@port.ac.uk.
Latest news
More news
Landmark women in maritime exhibition comes to СÀ¶ÊÓƵ
СÀ¶ÊÓƵ and Mary Rose Trust forge strategic partnership for maritime heritage
From steam to green: Lloyd's Register Foundation funds maritime energy transition research to understand impact on coastal communities
PhD scholarships will investigate ‘hidden treasures’ to help plan for the future of local institutions
СÀ¶ÊÓƵ and Mary Rose Trust forge strategic alliance for maritime excellence
Latest blogs
More blogs
Call for Papers: Port Cities and Maritime Cultures International Conference, 10-11 June 2025
Apply now for a scholarship to study the port city of Callao, Peru
Podcast explores the unique port city of СÀ¶ÊÓƵ: from banana imports to conserving HMS Victory
Labour has been virtually silent on Britain’s neglected seaside towns – they need a national strategy
Our work focuses on the following key themes:
Construction and experience of urban-maritime cultures
- We're researching the extent to which urban-maritime contexts were and are unique sites of cultural formation.
- We're exploring key themes related to cultural construction, such as whether urban-maritime spaces are shaped by international migratory networks.
Representations of urban-maritime spaces and cultures
- We're exploring how urban-maritime spaces are represented in historical and contemporary literary, film and media contexts.
- We seek to understand how past narratives of urban-maritime spaces have affected our perception of port cities and maritime cultures.
Recovering marginalised voices: Coastal communities and maritime heritage
- We're researching how our dominant urban-maritime heritage is selected and promoted, and how that can be questioned.
- We actively work with coastal communities in co-producing a shared heritage in nationally and international contexts.
Conservation of tangible and intangible heritage
- We're researching how we can develop innovative ways of conserving tangible and intangible heritage.
- Our key aim is to develop inclusive methods of heritage conservation.
Publication highlights
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Various authors. (2021- ), "Global Studies in Social and Cultural Maritime History", Palgrave Macmillan
This series seeks to reconnect the maritime sphere with broader social and cultural histories across the globe. It looks to an emergent area of historiography: how the maritime was a space of global social and cultural exchange.
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Sage Journals.
Coastal Studies & Society aims to coordinate and direct sustained attention to the relationship between the land and sea and society that comprises a nature-culture hybrid territory which has appeared at the periphery of so many academic inquiries, but at the centre of too few.
Research projects
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Sail to Steam, Carbon to Green: Empowering Port Communities in the Global South
A £635,000 grant for a six-year project to learn lessons from past maritime energy transitions has been awarded to the Centre for Port Cities and Maritime Cultures at the СÀ¶ÊÓƵ.
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СÀ¶ÊÓƵ Literary Map
The СÀ¶ÊÓƵ Literary Map project celebrates СÀ¶ÊÓƵ as a current and historical city of literature, through an interactive map and ongoing blog.
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Portsmyth is an interactive game created by Supernatural Cities to showcase creative writing, gaming, and the use of folklore and the supernatural in the creation of new narratives of space and place.
Our members
PhD students
- Charlotte Chan
- Max Dixon
- Jaina Hunt
- Jack Hunter
- Oscar Karlsson
- Callum O’Connell
- Stephanie Rickson
- Daniel Rowley
- Charlotte Steffen
- Daisy Turnbull
- Corey Watson
Associate members
- , Professor of History and Material Culture Studies and Associate Dean of Research, London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London
- Dr John Griffiths, Independent Scholar
- , Associate Professor of Modern Chinese Literature - University of Kobe, Japan
- , Professor of Literature - University of Glasgow
- , Professor of Japanese Historical Literature - University of Kobe, Japan
- Professor Isaac Land, Professor of History - Indiana State University, USA
- , Independent Scholar
- , Curator Emeritus - National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
- , Heritage and Sustainable Impact Manager - Transport for Wales
- , Archaeologist - Rio Göteborg Natur- & Kulturkooperativ, Sweden
- , Senior Lecturer in History - Halmstad University, Sweden
- , Queens College - City University of New York, USA
- , Research Fellow - Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Japan
- , Director of the Academy of Chinese, History, Religion, and Philosophy, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences - Hong Kong Baptist University
Podcasts
Related research areas
Our work also spans these research areas:
History
We're understanding our society through the study of experiences, culture, values and activities of people throughout history.
Area studies
We're exploring international relations, history, politics, economies, cultures, languages and geography across specific regions.
English literature
We're researching how literature provides insight and understanding into the lives of other individuals, communities and cultures.
Physical and human geography
We're researching physical and human geography and the causes and effects of social and environmental crises, and finding solutions to these problems.
