David Sadoway

I am a faculty member and teacher in Kwantlen's Geography and Environment Department and am grateful to be working at a university that derives its name from the Kwantlen First Nation along with other Coast Salish Peoples on whose territories we live, work, play and learn.

My training is as an urban planner and an environmental manager. At the moment I am the Human Rights and International Solidarity representative of the Kwantlen Faculty Association to the Federation of Post-Secondary Educators of B.C. In 2023 I joined the KPU Climate+ Challenge ("Climate Plus Challenge") as an advising faculty member involved with climate change-related course/curriculum planning, student-faculty relations and credential development. In 2020-21 I have also been involved with colleagues from KPU as a United Nations SDGs Open Pedagogy Fellow. I am also currently one of the CityLab instructors in The Department of Policy Studies (POST), with a focus on student projects and provocations linked to the KPU 2050 Campus Plan. And I am involved with the Arts Practicum, an interdisciplinary practical course experience linking KPU students to local community/activist groups, non-profits, governments and businesses. 

Prior to coming to KPU, I lived and worked in Asia for over 15 years. I was a Research Fellow in the Division of Sociology at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore (2015-17), where besides teaching, I was involved in research on soundscapes and noise impacts on urban quality of life and livability. Before that I was a Postdoc Fellow at Concordia University (Montréal) (2012-14), where besides teaching, I studied the politics and governance of urban infrastructure in Indian cities.  I have also been a visiting scholar, most recently at Norway's Bergen University, Department of Geography (Centre for Climate and Energy Transformation) (2019); and previously at Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany (Topology of Technology Faculty) (2013); as well as the National Institute of Urban Affairs, New Delhi, India (2013); and Academia Sinica, Taiwan (Center for Asia-Pacific Area Studies) (2008). My PhD work at the University of Hong Kong (2007-12) focused on civic environmentalists' uses of information communications technologies in Hong Kong, Singapore and Taipei.  I also have previous work experiences with the United Nations system, government, non-profits; and with urban planning consultants in Toronto and Vancouver.

Collaborating with scholars close to home and around the globe, I maintain writing and research interests in: urban (im)mobilities; community informatics and participatory science; sonic urbanism; Canadian and global carbonscapes; and decolonization methodologies. I am interested in how people around the globe are working together to address common ecological, socio-economic, technological and political dilemmas and controversies.