Robert MacArthur Shields (born 9 June 1961 in Toronto, Ontario) is a Canadian sociologist and cultural theorist.
He is Professor and Henry Marshall Tory Endowed Research Chair at University of Alberta.
Shields directs the City Region Studies Centre in the Faculty of Extension.
From 1991 to 2004 he rose to Professor of Sociology and Directed the Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies at Carleton University, Ottawa Canada, with an interlude in 1995-97 as a lecturer in Culture and Communications at Lancaster University, Lancaster UK.
Directed Interdisciplinary Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa Canada), Sociology (M.A.
His 1991 book Places on the Margin,[1] won a Library Choice 'Book of the Year' award for demonstrating a theory of Social Spatialisations.
[2] Shields' approach is related to Henri Lefebvre's social production of space.
[3] Shields' interest in spatial and cultural categories led to work on Virtuality[4] in which he argued that intangibles social spatialisations were real, not abstract ideas or "socially constructed" beliefs.
His theory of Cultural Topologies extends spatialisation to time by considering cultural conflicts and collective memory and rhythms of places as time-space manifolds[5] Shields introduces the application of topological concepts to the analysis of cultural senses of temporality as well as spatiality or spatialisation) using the example of the historical problem of the Seven Bridges of Königsburg solved by Leonard Euler.
[6] Recent work includes urban studies of walkability and pedestrians' experience of the city.
[7] Books and Edited Works Spatial Questions: Social Spatialisations and Cultural Topologies.
Edmonton: City Region Studies Centre / Space and Culture Publications.
Co-Editor with Tonya Davidson and Ondine Park, Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
ISBN 9781446225905 Translated into Serbo-Croatian as Kulture Interneta Zagreb: Naklada Jesefnski I Turk, Hrvatscko socioloko drutvo.
Co-Editor with Adam Podgorecki and Jon Alexander, Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1996.