{"id":910,"date":"2024-12-19T10:30:22","date_gmt":"2024-12-19T15:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.golive.clarku.edu\/faculty\/profiles\/asha-best\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T21:35:49","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T01:35:49","slug":"asha-best","status":"publish","type":"cu_faculty","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/faculty\/profiles\/asha-best\/","title":{"rendered":"Asha Best"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span>Dr. Asha Best received her Ph.D. (2017) in American Studies from Rutgers University-Newark. She is an urbanist whose research and teaching is interdisciplinary. Her work links mobilities studies, post-colonial and black studies, critical race theory and studies of urban informality. She is particularly interested in popular, improvised and often unofficial urban practices deployed by black and migrant groups, and her research looks at how those practices impact how cities are understood, planned and mapped. She is developing a comparative research project around black and migrant place-making, informality and mobilities in the context of Johannesburg.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":38540,"parent":0,"template":"","meta":{"cu_faculty_f180_userid":"C70247747","cu_faculty_first_name":"Asha","cu_faculty_last_name":"Best","cu_faculty_employment_status":"Full Time","cu_faculty_rank":"Assistant Professor","cu_faculty_position":"Assistant Professor","cu_faculty_phone":"","cu_faculty_email":"ABest@clarku.edu","cu_faculty_location":"","cu_faculty_about":"<p><span>Dr. Asha Best received her Ph.D. (2017) in American Studies from Rutgers University-Newark. She is an urbanist whose research and teaching is interdisciplinary. Her work links mobilities studies, post-colonial and black studies, critical race theory and studies of urban informality. 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She is developing a comparative research project around black and migrant place-making, informality and mobilities in the context of Johannesburg.<\/span><\/p>","cu_faculty_degrees":"<span>Ph.D. in American Studies,<\/span> Rutgers University, 2017\n<span>M.A. in Pan African Studies,<\/span> Syracuse University, 2008\n<span>B.A. in ,<\/span> University of Southern California, 2005","cu_faculty_cv":"https:\/\/faculty180.interfolio.com\/public\/download.php?key=SDRwNCtxSUpsamxBQ213WS9ucHFuNnMwT0hzQU11b2RPQkJ2cWc3amxyUmNRdVVXTkF4MU1zT21qREtJZEdWZzFUQmdteVFWbUlodFVkQU9GL3NYQm1EYTMrNWxKcENVVFQxVmRKVnRiWXZEV0EvTmNuSEQ5bnl4VGZsNDNsdHE%3D","cu_faculty_links":"[]","cu_faculty_scholarly_interests":"","cu_faculty_scholarly_works":"[{\"activityid\":13832,\"fields\":{\"Type\":\"Exhibits, Shows, Performances &amp; Readings\",\"Title\":\"&lt;span&gt;&lt;span style=&quot;font-size:14pt;background-color:transparent;&quot;&gt;Possible Futures: Visions&lt;\\\/span&gt;&lt;span style=&quot;font-size:14pt;background-color:transparent;&quot;&gt;&lt;span style=&quot;font-size:0.6em;&quot;&gt;3 &lt;\\\/span&gt;&lt;\\\/span&gt;&lt;\\\/span&gt;\",\"Year\":2024,\"Date\":\"\",\"Medium (for artworks)\":\"mixed installation, video, projection\",\"Venue \\\/ Institution\":\"CGRAS\",\"Location\":\"\",\"Status\":\"Completed\",\"Co-contributor\":null,\"URL\":\"\",\"Description\":\"\",\"Include description in output citation\":0,\"Origin\":\"Manual\"},\"facultyid\":\"C70247747\",\"status\":[{\"id\":13832,\"status\":\"Completed\\\/Published\",\"term\":\"Fall\",\"year\":2024,\"termid\":\"2024\\\/01\",\"listingorder\":6,\"completionorder\":6}],\"userid\":\"C70247747\",\"attachments\":[],\"coauthors_list\":[\"Asha S Best\",\"Terrasa Ulm\",\"Amanda L Theinert\",\"James Maurelle\"],\"sort_date\":\"2024-9-01\"},{\"activityid\":3938,\"fields\":{\"Type\":\"Other Media (social media, blogs, podcasts, etc)\",\"Title\":\"Series on COVID, Prisons and Abolition\",\"Episode Title\":\"COVID as a Public Health Issue\",\"Date Published\":\"\",\"Year\":2023,\"Platform\":\"Antipod Podcast\",\"CoAuthor\":null,\"URL\":\"https:\\\/\\\/thisisantipod.org\",\"Description\":\"\",\"Include description in output citation\":0,\"Origin\":\"Manual\"},\"facultyid\":\"C70247747\",\"status\":[{\"id\":3938,\"status\":\"Completed\\\/Published\",\"term\":\"Spring\",\"year\":2023,\"termid\":\"2022\\\/03\",\"listingorder\":6,\"completionorder\":6},{\"id\":3938,\"status\":\"In Progress\",\"term\":\"Summer\",\"year\":2022,\"termid\":\"2021\\\/05\",\"listingorder\":1,\"completionorder\":1},{\"id\":3938,\"status\":\"In Progress\",\"term\":\"Spring\",\"year\":2022,\"termid\":\"2021\\\/03\",\"listingorder\":1,\"completionorder\":1},{\"id\":3938,\"status\":\"In Progress\",\"term\":\"Summer\",\"year\":2021,\"termid\":\"2020\\\/05\",\"listingorder\":1,\"completionorder\":1},{\"id\":3938,\"status\":\"In Progress\",\"term\":\"May\",\"year\":2021,\"termid\":\"2020\\\/04\",\"listingorder\":1,\"completionorder\":1}],\"userid\":\"C70247747\",\"attachments\":[],\"coauthors_list\":[\"Asha S Best\"],\"sort_date\":\"2023-1-01\"},{\"activityid\":3915,\"fields\":{\"Type\":\"Articles in Refereed Journals\",\"Title\":\"Urban Specters\",\"Journal Title\":\"Environment and Planning D-Society &amp; 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In particular, we aim to operationalize the tools of geospatial analysis and data visualization to analyze and work against contemporary practices of urban policing.\\u00a0&lt;\\\/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;Through an inquiry into state violence, this series bridges the gulf between carceral geographies, urban studies, and critical geospatial analysis in order to reimagine not only urban scholarship but just urban futures.&lt;\\\/span&gt;&lt;\\\/p&gt;\",\"Number of Periods\":1,\"URL\":\"https:\\\/\\\/urbanstudiesfoundation.org\\\/funding\\\/grantees\\\/methodologies-for-just-urban-futures-using-geospatial-tools-to-address-police-violence\\\/\"},\"facultyid\":\"C70247747\",\"funding\":{\"8866\":{\"id\":8866,\"grantid\":1000,\"fundedamount\":\"32633\",\"yearfunded\":1,\"fundedtype\":\"Total\",\"currencytype\":\"USD\",\"startdate\":\"2021-08-09\",\"enddate\":\"2022-08-09\"}},\"coauthors\":{\"8209\":{\"authorid\":8209,\"grantid\":1000,\"firstname\":\"Asha\",\"middleinitial\":\"S\",\"lastname\":\"Best\",\"authortype\":\"PI\",\"percenteffort\":null,\"sameschoolflag\":1,\"facultyid\":\"C70247747\",\"primaryunitid\":14},\"8210\":{\"authorid\":8210,\"grantid\":1000,\"firstname\":\"Lyndon\",\"middleinitial\":\"D.\",\"lastname\":\"Estes\",\"authortype\":\"CoPI\",\"percenteffort\":null,\"sameschoolflag\":1,\"facultyid\":\"C70245777\",\"primaryunitid\":14}},\"status\":[{\"grantid\":1000,\"status\":\"Completed\",\"statuslabel\":\"Completed\",\"term\":\"Spring\",\"year\":2023,\"termid\":\"2022\\\/03\",\"listingorder\":4,\"completionorder\":6}],\"userid\":\"C70247747\",\"attachments\":[],\"sort_date\":\"2021-08-09\"}]","cu_faculty_title":"Assistant Professor, Geography","cu_faculty_department":"Geography","cu_faculty_affiliated_departments":"Geography","footnotes":""},"cu_faculty_group":[55,46],"cu_faculty_department":[12],"cu_faculty_position":[],"class_list":["post-910","cu_faculty","type-cu_faculty","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","cu_faculty_group-africana-studies","cu_faculty_group-ces-geography","cu_faculty_department-geography"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.2 (Yoast SEO v27.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Asha Best | Faculty<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/faculty\/profiles\/asha-best\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Asha Best\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dr. Asha Best received her Ph.D. (2017) in American Studies from Rutgers University-Newark. 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