Ioannis Georgikopoulos is Associate Professor of Geography at the Catholic University of Paris (ICP) and Teaching Fellow at the Sorbonne University. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science and Public Administration from the National University of Athens, three Master’s degrees in Political Science, International Relations, and Politics and Communication from the Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas University, as well as a Ph.D. in Geopolitics from the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne with a thesis on the Geopolitics of the Dodecanese archipelago (2018). Dr. Georgikopoulos is a member of the French Geographical Association (CNFG), the International Political Science Association (IPSA), and has been awarded the A.G. Leventis Foundation Fellowship, the London School of Economics (LSE) Mobility Grant, as well as the French School at Athens (EFA) Scholarship. He is the author of many scientific articles on the Dodecanese archipelago and the Geopolitics of the Euro-Mediterranean in French and Greek, to name a few: Géopolitique de la religion chrétienne orthodoxe. Des spatialités composites dans un nouveau contexte schismatique (Les Analyses de Population & Avenir, nº 49, 2024); Grèce: une démographie ponctuée par des soubresauts politiques et économiques (Population & Avenir, nº 765, 2023); Η Μεσογειακή ιδιαιτερότητα της Δωδεκανήσου (chapter in 1821-2021: Η Ελλάδα στη Μεσόγειο, εκδ. Παπαζήση, 2022); Géopolitique de la diaspora dodécanésienne: La spécificité régionale d’un réseau grec (L’Espace Géographique, vol. 49, n° 2, 2020); De l’accueil des réfugiés à la gestion des migrations. Les îles du Dodécanèse: une zone tampon à fort potentiel entre la Grèce et la Turquie (Anatoli, n° 9, CNRS éditions, 2018); Quand l’alisverissi transfrontalier fait vivre: Castellorizo et Kaş face aux crises (L’Espace pPolitique, vol. 33, n° 3, 2017).

“How to hold a ‘Conversation in the Library’? Both a challenge and a responsibility to talk about the political and cultural geography of an island and an archipelago deeply rooted in my family’s history. Rhodes, my maternal grandparents’ homeland, where history, heritage, and fate have shaped identity-building processes through deeply grounded human connections. Endless stories about Ottoman and Italian heritage, local myths and legends, patterns of cross-cultural interactions and trust that my mother, Marianthi, used to tell me, and which made me familiar with the specificities of both Dodecanese geohistory and maritime emotionscapes. If that, a conversation in the library should not be loud and noisy; but rather gentle and introspective. It became clearer to me after a while, Tarik Tüten’s kind invitation to participate in this project was not only about multicultural heritage, multilayered history and co-existing communities; it was also about reflecting on the salient relevance of collective memory, on negotiating our differences and, eventually, on who we are and how we would like to be remembered. Thank you for the opportunity to be a part of this Conversation.”

Ioannis Georgikopoulos