My subject area in general is the social and cultural context of spatial planning and design. My research and teaching have developed at the intersections of critical and cultural geography, urban and environmental sociology, cultural studies, and planning and design forming particular decolonial critical theory approach to planning and landscape architectural history, theory and criticism revolving around social and spatial justice and politics of space. My current studies cross cut topics such as green gentrification, racialization, socio-spatial epistemologies of whiteness, socio-spatial inequality and segregation, environmental racism, migration, cultural heritage, visible and invisible borders, border making, coloniality, architecture space and race, place (place-making), public space, and spatial/environmental justice, critical, insurgent, transformative planning and design practices, urban and environmental movements, subaltern knowledges.
I have also been an article editor for JoLA since 2022 (the Journal of Landscape Architecture) https://www.tandfonline.com/journals/rjla20
I am the Director of Studies for the Masters in Landscape Architecture for Sustainable Urbanisation.
The courses I teach:
LK0313 Landscape Architecture: History, Theory, and Practice (course leader)
EX0945 Independent Project in Landscape Architecture, A2E – Landscape Architecture for Sustainable Urbanisation – Master’s Programme (course leader)
PhD Course - Creative research methodologies for urban contexts (PNG0097) (course leader)
Supervision:
I would welcome master and PhD students with research interests in any of the topics I listed.
Urban Planning/Design and Social Sustainability
In between 2020 and 2023, I was working in FORMAS project ‘Norra Sorgenfri planned, populated and problematised: the role of social sustainability in urban renewal’ in collaboration with Erik Jönsson, Uppsala University, Geography Department, Johan Pries and Mattias Qviström, SLU, Department of Urban and Rural Development, Division of Landscape Architecture, and Guy Beaten and Carina Listerborn, Malmö University, Urban Studies Department. See https://www.iuresearch.se/norrasorgenfri-past-and-future/
Socio-Spatial Segregation and Social Justice
I have been working on a research proposal 'Desegregating Landscapes', which questions the role of urban and landscape planning and design in (re)production and countering socio-spatial segregation. The proposal development was funded by SLU, Urban Futures Seed Funding (lead applicant) (2019)
Borders, Borderlands in Urban Areas, Public Space and Landscape Planning and Design
I worked as part of MISTRA URBAN FUTURES SKLIP – Skåne Local Interactive Platform IMUD – International Migration and Urban Development Panel led by Malmö University (2018-2019) in a research project on migration, formation of social borders and boundaries in public spaces in socially diverse urban landscapes.
I have degrees in landscape architecture, and PhD in urban planning. I worked in different geographic contexts (i.e. Turkey, The Netherlands, Austria, United States) before Sweden, as practitioner, educator, and researcher.
I obtained my Ph.D. (2009) degree in Urban Planning and Design from Vienna University of Technology with dissertation titled “Complexity of Meanings in Urban Landscapes: between the imagined and the real” that I defended with honor degree.
PhD Theses
Mia Ågren (2020-2024) Social justice, landscape and urban planning (Co-supervisor)
Sanga Edson (2021 completed) Production and Appropriation of Spaces for Recreation in Informal Settlements The case of Manzese, Dar es salaam (Co-supervisor)
Eiman Elwidaa (2020, May completed) Housing as if Low-income-women mattered: The case of Masese Women Low-income Housing Project in Jinja Uganda (Co-supervisor)
Master Theses
Johannesson, Emma and Östlund, Maria, 2020. Participation and inclusiveness in process and design : a case study of the urban upgrading of two parks in Jaffna, Sri Lanka. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Rosenberg, Erik, 2021. Urbana mellanrum : sammankoppling eller frånkoppling av tid, plats och mikroklimat. Second cycle, A2E. Alnarp: (LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Landscape Architecture, Planning and Management (from 130101)
Frennesson, Johanna, 2022. Questioning public green space & affordable housing in times of densifying cities : a case study of the districts Eriksberg & Norby in Uppsala, Sweden. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Matamoros Raudales, Fredy, 2023. Fokus Järva : a case study on Stockholm municipality’s strategies to break residential segregation. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Raisa, Mashiat, 2023. Stigmatization and its overshadow on urban green spaces in Gottsunda : the study of a segregated suburban area where existing green spaces are fading away. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Shehata, Nihal, 2023. Toward inclusive cities: exploring migrant participation in Swedish urban planning : a case study of Stockholm’s Hagsätra-Rågsved. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Briz Toriello, Mariana, 2024. From Kiruna to Giron : reimagining Kiruna by integrating indigenous perspectives in landscape rehabilitation. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Ghallab, Reham, 2024. Cultivating connections: exploring the impact of community garden on social cohesion : in a socio-economic disadvantaged neighbourhood in Sweden. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Kubala, Jakub, 2024. Animals “got to go” : a conceptual proposal for developing wildlife corridors and enhancing the Älby overpass in Nynäshamn Municipality, Sweden. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Nordqvist, Elvira and Kallifatides, Cassandra, 2024. A historically multilayered conceptual design proposal for Fremantle port redevelopment area : learning how to incorporate indigenous values to create a contextualized design. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Guiu Cervera, Helena, 2025. Exploratory study of a rehabilitative heat-resilient green-blue infrastructure : case study: Lleida, Catalonia, Spain. Second cycle, A2E. Uppsala: (NL, NJ) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
(LTJ, LTV) > Dept. of Urban and Rural Development
Burcu Yiğit-Turan, Melissa Cate Christ and Cristina Cerulli (Forthcoming 2025 June). Getting Political in the Neoliberal City: Resistance, Transformation, and the Practice of Design for Social and Environmental Justice. New York and London: Routledge. https://www.amazon.com/Getting-Political-Neoliberal-City-Environmental/dp/0367859297
Burcu Yiğit-Turan, Cristina Cerulli and Melissa Cate Christ (Forthcoming 2025 June). Why Getting Political, Why Now? In Getting Political in the Neoliberal City: Resistance, Transformation, and the Practice of Design for Social and Environmental Justice. New York and London: Routledge.
Yiğit-Turan, B. (2025) Is Landscape Colonial? In Landscape is …. Gareth Doherty and Charles Waldheim (eds.). New York and London: Routledge. DOI: 10.4324/9781003148142-4
Yiğit-Turan, B. and Ågren, M. (2025). Green and Socially Sustainable City Discourse, White Spatial Epistemology: The Reproduction of Racial Landscape Injustice and Segregation in Swedish Planning. The Journal of Planning Theory and Practice https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14649357.2024.2449265
Yigit-Turan, B., Keravel, S., Hellström-Reimer, M., Leger-Smith, A., Lima, F., Arana, U. R., & Benedetti, U. W. (2024). The politics of landscape narratives. Journal of Landscape Architecture, 19(1), 4–5. https://doi.org/10.1080/18626033.2024.2408905
Yiğit-Turan, B. Maria Hellström-Reimer, Sonia Keravel, Anaïs Leger-Smith, Francisca Lima, Usue Ruiz Arana, & Ursula Wieser Benedetti (2022) Landscape architecture criticism in the Anthropocene, Journal of Landscape Architecture, 17:3, 4-5, DOI: 10.1080/18626033.2022.2195222
Yiğit-Turan, B. and Ågren, M. (2022), Segregation and Landscape Injustice in the Shadows of White Planning and Green Exceptionalism in Sweden, Urban Matters Journal, Issue: Dislocating Urban Studies
https://urbanmattersjournal.com/segregation-and-landscape-injustice-in-the-shadows-of-white-planning-and-green-exceptionalism-in-sweden/
Yigit Turan, B. (2021). Superkilen: Coloniality, Citizenship and Border Politics. In Landscape Citizenships. Tim Waterman, Jane Wolff, and Ed Wall (eds.). New York and London: Routledge.
Yigit Turan, B. (2018a) Learning from Occupy Gezi Park: Redefining landscape democracy in an age of ‘planetary urbanism’. In Defining Landscape Democracy: A Path to Spatial Justice Edited by Shelley Egoz, Karsten Jørgensen and Deni Ruggeri. Pp: 210-221. Edward Elgard Publishing, Cheltenham
Yigit Turan, B. (2018b) Revitalizing Yeldeğirmeni Neighbourhood in Istanbul: Towards an Emancipatory Urban Design in the Landscapes of Neoliberal Urbanism. In Public Space Unbound: Urban Emancipation and the Post-Political Condition. Edited by Sabine Knierbein, Tihomir Viderman. Pp: 158-172. Routledge, New York
Yigit Turan, B. (2017) Occupy Gezi Park: in search of a public space, democracy and alternative city making. In Hou, J. and Knierbein, S. (eds.). City Unsilenced: Urban Resistance and Public Space in the Age of Shrinking Democracy. New York: Routledge.
Yigit Turan, B. (2016) Modernist Landscapes of Ankara. JOLA Journal of Landscape Architecture, Vol. 12, Issue 2, p. 14-25 Routledge DOI: 10.1080/18626033.2016.1185230
Yigit-Turan, B. (2012). “Dönüşen İstanbul’un Yeni Peyzajlarında Tasarımın Politik Ekolojisi”(Political Ecology of Design in the New Landscapes of Transforming Istanbul). Mimarlık (Architecture), Dosya 28 Kentsel Dönüşüm Özel Sayısı (Dossier 28 Special Issue: Urban Transformation) Edited by Ipek Yada Akpinar