My current research is situated at the intersection of three interwoven thematic fields. My empirical research experience includes work in the Indian Ocean (Mauritius), the United Arab Emirates (Dubai), North America (USA, Eastern Canada) and Germany. Methodologically, I rely on qualitative social and media science approaches, including ethnographic, reflexive, digital and creative methods.

1) Sustainability utopias and urban futures: Embedded in joint research with Prof. Dr. Veronika Cummings on sustainability utopias and topologies of urban futures in the Indian Ocean region, I am looking at smart cities in Mauritius. These spatial settings, which are primarily created as a strategy of economic diversification on fallow sugar cane land and in coastal regions, are marketed as sustainable visions of the future for the island. From a critical-reflexive perspective, I explore the question of how ideas and dimensions of socio-ecological transformation are negotiated and imagined here. I also question colonialities anchored in place making .

2) Media-geographical perspectives on everyday lifeworlds: I am interested in how audiovisual and digital items shape and transform everyday spaces(digital place making). In this context, I am researching media and film tourism and the question of how media imaginations shape and transform places and spatial identities. I also work (together with Prof. Dr. Veronika Cummings and Paul Hummer M.A.) on the potentials and ethical challenges of creative, audiovisual formats as a method and communication medium in and for geographical research. In connection with my research on urban futures, I am working on another project (together with Dr. Roman Mauer, Film Studies) on the re-mapping of urban futures at the interface of film and the everyday world – we are offering an innovative teaching project on this in the summer semester, which is funded by the Gutenberg Teaching College.

3) Theoretically reflected tourism geography: Inspired by my post- and decolonial research contexts, in which processes and practices of touristification often play a role, I am interested in a heterodox, reflexive examination of the complex connections between tourism and society. I understand tourism as part of a global, space-shaping (im)mobility system that is interwoven with multi-layered spatial dynamics around questions of mobility, power and justice.

• Munich City Museum (2025): Podcast “Time Loops” – Wiesn Rewind. Season 2, episode 5: Greetings from the Oktoberfest! From the postcard to the social media post.
• Current post on the topic “What do vacation pictures have to do with colonialism?” on the Instagram page of JGU Mainz

Current (since 2022)

• Hummel, P., E. Sommerlad & V. Cummings (forthcoming): Doing Reel Geographies: Situating Responsibilities and the (In)Visibility of Migration through Short Vertical Films. In: Annals of the American Association of Geographers. https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2026.2623951
• Sommerlad, E. (forthcoming): Post/Colonial Paradise: Reflections on cross-media paradise myths using the example of Mauritius. In: IMAGE. Journal for interdisciplinary image science 43(1).
• Sommerlad, E. (forthcoming): Film geography. In: Thielmann, T. & M. Kanderske (eds.): Handbuch Medien Geography. Baden-Baden. Nomos.
• Sommerlad, E. & R. Mauer (2025): Panoramas of the future: film cartographic views of cities in science fiction film and Gulf futurism. In: Ullmaier, J., R. Mauer & C. Wörsdörfer (eds.): Phenomena of the Panoramic. Wiesbaden. Springer: 491-535.
• Hartal, G., E. Sommerlad, A. Moreno & Y. David (forthcoming): Pride as Space of Encounter in Ordinary Cities: Observations from Pride Parades in Mainz (Germany) and Ashdod (Israel). In: Meier, L. (ed.): International Handbook of Urban Sociology. London. Routledge.

• Sommerlad, E. & P. Hummel (2025): Researching with moving images: perspectives on an applied film geography. In: Bauer, L., K. Beurskens, J. Dobrusskin, N. Küttel, J. Miggelbrink, A.-L- Müller & E. Nöthen (eds.): Visualizing Qualitative Geographies: A Handbook. Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot: 123-131.
• Becklake, S., T: Freytag, G. Rainer, E. Sommerlad & C. Steiner (2025): Tourism is not an island. Retheorizing tourism geography . Geographical Journal 113 (3): 197-205.
• Sommerlad, E. & A. Jansson (2025): From representation to entanglement: 40 years of media geography. Scottish Geographical Journal (online first). https://doi.org/10.1080/14702541.2025.2544917

• Sommerlad, E. & H. Rapp (2025): Introduction I “Reception Context, Space” & Introduction II “On the Cusp between Sound and Silence”. In: Freitag, F., L M. Mücke & P. Niedermüller (eds.): Silence, Sounds, Music: Acoustic Dimensions of Immersion. London: Routledge.

• Sommerlad, E. & T. Reeh (2024): Media tourism in the Hunsrück. Geographical Review 11: 44-49.

• Sommerlad, E. (2024): Agritourism in Mauritius. Geographical Review (7-8): 42-43.

• Plien, M. & E. Sommerlad (2024): (Self-)reflections with Film: Transformative education on screen. In: Plien, M. (ed.): Designing sustainability education trans-formatively. Scientific, subject didactics and practical teaching approaches from geography. Mainz: 88-113.

• Hummel P., Sommerlad, E. & J. Zschocke (2024): Video Documentary. In: IfL Leipzig (ed.): Visqual Methodbox. Online: https://visqual.leibniz-ifl-projekte.de/methodbox/2024/03/21/video-documentary/.

• Sommerlad, E. and R. Mauer (2022): Film cartography: A field of research at the interface of film studies and geography. In: MEDIENwissenschaft. Reviews | Reviews (02): 94-119.

• Sommerlad, S. (2022): Cinematic city of cultural coexistence? Perspectives on intercultural encounters in New York. In: GeoJournal Special Issue “Film Geography”. Online.

• Mauer, R. and E. Sommerlad (2022): The Map in Film. Function, materiality and typology of a space-generating item. In: Bulgakova, O. and R. Mauer (Eds.): Things in Film. Silent monologue. Hidden memory. Wiesbaden: 259-284.

• Lukinbeal, C. and E. Sommerlad (2022): Doing Film Geography. In: GeoJournal Special Issue “Film Geography”. online

Critical and differentiated thinking is at the core of my understanding of teaching. In the sense of a creative-research teaching approach, I combine theoretical-conceptual debates with practical examples in order to understand geographical issues and processes. I am delighted when participants take an active part in shaping the seminar. In my courses, I use creative and multimedia learning, teaching and communication methods (e.g. audiovisual essays, zines, podcasts). The equipment for this can be found in our media lab. I also like to incorporate places of learning outside the seminar room.

Summer 2025

• M6/7 MA: Audiovisual Essay & Mental Mapping of Cinematic Urban Utopias | Cooperation event with Dr. Roman Mauer (Film Studies) | funded by the GLK as an innovative teaching project
• M3 MA: Project Seminar: Media Geography

Winter 2025/26

• M3 MA: Theoretical Approaches to Media Geography
• M3 ED Field internship: Field trip in Germany with preparatory seminar Hunsrück
• M2 Practice class: Human Geography I (Social Geographical Urban Research – Focus: The City as a Meeting Space)

Summer 2026

• M3 MA: Project Seminar: Media Geography

If you would like to write your human geography final thesis (bachelor’s and master’s degree) with me, please contact me with a first idea sketch (title proposal and short abstract, ~200 words).

Ongoing final theses (working title)

• Uncovering Layers of Meaning at the Monument to the Discoveries in Lisbon
• Queer Performance as a form of activism. Drag, Art and Political Performances in the Rhine-Main Region. (Film project)
• Aging in the City. Place Making of Elderly Female Residents in Frankfurt am Main.

Edited Volumes

• Co-Editor of the book series Media Geography at Mainz (Steiner Verlag)

Functions

• Assistant to the management of the Institute of Geography

• Program Director and Academic Advisor of the MA degree program Human Geography: Globalization, Media, and Culture, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz

• Member of the scientific advisory council of the book series “Landschaften in Deutschland” (ed.: Institut für Länderkunde Leipzig, Sächsische Akademie der Wissenschaften)

• Member of the extended board of the Tourism Research Working Group (AKTF)

Memberships

• Research-AG Indian Ocean Confluences, Georg Forster Forum, JGU
• Association of Geographers at German Higher Education Institutions (VGDH)
• American Association of Geographers (AAG) | Specialty Groups: Media & Communication Geography; Recreation, Tourism & Sports; Film & Screening
• AK Tourism Research in the German Society for Geography e.V.
• AK Visual Geography
• Network FilmGeographies

coming

Sommerlad, E.:“Rethinking Plantation Afterlives: Contesting Touristified Futures in Mauritius“. Presentation at the POLLEN Conference, Barcelona (06/2026).

Sommerlad, E. & P. Pombo:“Reimagining the Plantation: Spatial Afterlives of Colonial Landscapes in Mauritius. Presentation at the congress “Colonial and Postcolonial Landscapes – Architecture, Colonialism, Labor”, Lisbon/Portugal (02/2026).

recently held

Plien M. & E. Sommerlad:“In Relationship with the World: Media Narratives of Hope and Connectedness in the Face of Climate Change”. Paper presented at the conference New Cultural Geography, Augsburg.

Sommerlad, E.: “On the trail of” HEIMAT “: Filmgeographische Erkundungen und Medientourismus im Hunsrück”. Lecture at the Geographical Society of Leipzig.

Sommerlad, E. & V. Cummings: “From Sugar Cane to a” Vibrant Urban Symphony “: Transforming Urban Futures in Mauritius”. Presentation at the Geomedia Conference, Karlstad/Sweden.

Cummings, V. & E. Sommerlad: “Transforming Extinction into Passion: Caring for Neo-Natures in Dubai’s Aesthetics of Future-Making”. Presentation at the Geomedia Conference, Karlstad/Sweden.

Sommerlad, E., M. Mießner & K. Heuwinkel: “Perpetual ambivalences? Enzensberger’s “Theory of Tourism”. Presentation at the conference of the AK Tourismusforschung “Umgang mit Ambivalenzen im Tourismus”, Freiburg.

Sommerlad, E. & A. Jansson: “Future Trends in Media Geography”. Organization of a panel at the AAG 2025, Detroit/USA.