Political and Social Geography
Associate Professor in the Department of Geography
Office: Burnside Hall 308A
Phone: 514-398-4953
Fax: 514-398-7437
Personal website
benjamin.forest [at] mcgill.ca (E-Mail)
Academic background
- PhD Geography, UCLA (1997)
- Associate Member, Department of Political Science, McGill University
- Member, Centre for the Study of Democratic Citizenship, McGill University
- Research Fellow, McGill Institute for the Study of Canada (2021-2023)
Research interests
I study the geographical nature of identity and identifications, and I am especially concerned with the political representation and construction of race, ethnicity, and nationality. My current research examines the political representation of ethnic minority groups, the use of monuments and memorials for (re)constructing post-Soviet national identities, and various issues of electoral geography, political parties, and governance.
Current projects
- Shaping Democracy: Boundary Commissions, Parties, and Citizens
- The Politics of Complex Diversity in Contested Cities (Montreal)
- The Power of Symbolic Capital: Post-Communist Monuments Project
Some recent publications
Forest, Benjamin (2022) “As Maine Goes, No Goes the Nation: The 2020 Senate Election" in Atlas of the 2020 Elections, edited by Robert H. Watrel, et al. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield: 225-228.
Forest, Benjamin and Mike Medeiros (2021) “Contiguity, Constituencies and the Political Representation of Minorities” EPC: Politics and Space 39 (5): 879-899. doi.org/10.1177/2399654420972401
Medeiros, Mike, Benjamin Forest, and Patrik Öhberg (2020) “The Case for Non-Binary Gender Questions in Surveys” PS: Political Science & Politics 53 (1): 128-135. DOI: doi.org/10.1017/S1049096519001203
Medeiros, Mike, Benjamin Forest, and Chris Erl (2019) “Where Women Stand: Parliamentary Candidate Selection in Canada” Politics, Groups, and Identities 7(2): 389-400. DOI: 10.1080/21565503.2018.1557056