Dr. Catherine Kelly is a geographer with research interests in sustainability, tourism and wellbeing. Her lecturing, research and practices cross a range of these broad categories. Catherine's research areas have varied over her academic career - starting with rural geography, then moving into the field of heritage studies and then tourism (cultural, heritage, wellness and sustainable tourism specifically); with a more recent emphasis on the importance of 'blue spaces' for human wellbeing. She is interested in the importance of water-based 'therapeutic landscapes' for physical, psychological and social wellbeing. Catherine's research also looks at how wellbeing can be used to advocate for personal relationships with the coast and its stewardship/environmental conservation. She is interested in access to the sea - in physical, social and cultural terms. Having joined the School of Business and Law, Catherine is interested in the role of the Blue Economy in tourism development and sustainable business practices.

I welcome the opportunity to supervise PhD students with an interest in the areas of tourism and wellbeing, place and wellbeing, sustainability, nature-based tourism, coastal tourism, blue spaces, water and wellbeing, rural tourism, cultural/heritage tourism, national parks and biospheres.

My appraoch to teaching is a finely tuned sense of 'calm, humorous, authority'.  With many years experience, I like to meet students where they are at...a new first year or a keen Phd student. My teaching style is informative and interactive. Building confidence in student opinion-formation, backed up with research, is a key teaching goal for me. I like to inspire my students with real life examples, stories, case studies, guest speakers and excursions to put learning into practice!