Press release

Edward Huijbens appointed new professor of Cultural Geography in Wageningen

article_published_on_label: February 14, 2019

Prof Edward Huijbens has been appointed the new professor and chair holder of Cultural Geography at Wageningen University & Research. This decision was taken by the WUR Executive Board. Huijbens succeeds Prof Claudio Minca, who accepted a position in Sydney in 2017. The appointment took effect from 1 February.

Previously, Prof Huijbens worked as a professor at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Akureyri, Iceland, where he also headed the Faculty of Social Sciences and Law.

Edward Hákon Huijbens (Akureyri, Iceland, 1976) studied Geography at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik and, from 2000, at the University of Durham, where he received his doctorate in 2005. His exceptional achievements earned him an Overseas Research Scholarship (ORS) in Durham for outstanding young foreign researchers, in addition to a full departmental scholarship.

Edward Huijbens nieuwe hoogleraar Culturele geografie in Wageningen

Prof Huijbens is active on many platforms. In 2017, he was appointed a member of the Standing Committee on Transportation Needs of National Parks and Public Lands on behalf of the American National Science Foundation. He was also appointed to the Department of Geography and Geology at Western Kentucky University.

Prof Huijbens has an impressive number of publications to his name. Many of his research projects have been financed by various Scandinavian funds.

In his research, Prof Huijbens focuses on promoting the interaction between environmental science and critical social science with the goal of bringing current problems caused by global warming and other effects of manmade climate change closer to a solution. He concentrates specifically on the geography of tourism and transport, and on the interaction between human behaviour in nature and the natural landscape.

The Cultural Geography Group is part of the Environmental Sciences Group (ESG). The chair was temporarily occupied by Prof René van der Duim (professor holding a personal Chair in Tourism and Sustainable Development).