La Nuit de la Géographie 2018

In 2017, the French National Geographical Committee initiated the first Night of Geography, in Paris and a dozen other French cities. It was highly successful, with a great diversity of public and organizers, and hundreds of people attending the events.

The second edition will take place on Friday, April 6th, 2018, and it will expand to the European scale.

General goals

This event aims to put forward geography and geographers, give the greater public a chance to know them better, make geographical research more accessible. The proposed events should, whenever possible, be free and open to all public.

A variety of events

The events should take place in the evening and during the night, so as to welcome various kinds of public, not only academics. Organizers are invited to put forward unusual, maybe playful aspects of geographical sciences.

Some of the events should take place inside a building, so as to foster exchanges and togetherness, with workshops that will be quite varied, from the more academic (conferences, exhibitions, round tables…) to the more playful (buffets, multi-sensorial geographical games, performances…). Organizers can present jobs linked to geographical education, GIS software or new technologies, dreams or crazy geographical projects…

Other events will take place outside : small fieldtrips and urban walks can be organized, with a variety of purposes : perception analysis, benchmarking, drawing and mapping, interviews, photography… during the night, geography changes !

General organization

The French National Geographical Committee has initiated and promotes the Night of Geography at the European scale, but the spirit is that all events should be organized in a decentralized manner, from a logistic and a financiary standpoint.

The goal is to put forward the creativity of local initiative and the variety of persons, institutions, associations, that can feel concerned and would like to participate.

There is no numerical goal to be reached. Local organizers can set up just a small geographical café or a short thematic walk through the city, or put together a larger event involving many scientific interventions.

A small international organizing committee is set up to coordinate some actions, give pieces of advice, communicate about the events; but mostly the job is done by the local organizers, in order to keep things simple!

Costs

Budgets can be maintained at a low level, since the spirit of the Night of Geography relies on openness and flexibility. Locations can be outside, in cultural or academic institutions, or in cafés, in places organizers do not necessarily have to rent. Technical material can be lent by research labs or universities, or sponsors. Students and associations can volunteer to help with logistics and assistance to the public. Communication made via social media costs nothing…

However, possible costs such as security issues will be paid by the local organizers, so we suggest you mobilize research labs and possible sponsors, or ask for public subsidies, which would in turn give more visibility to the event. The French Committee cannot fund the events.

It should be highlighted that these costs entail also strong benefits: people get to change their ideas on what is geography and what geographers do, more people can get involved (more students and more professional stakeholders…), and let’s not forget the pleasure we have in spending time together and live a plural and amazing geography!

Contact: nuitgeo@cnfg.fr