Chris Lukinbeal

Dr. Chris Lukinbeal is a Professor of Geography and the Director of the Geographic Information Systems Technology program at the University of Arizona. The UAGIST program under his leadership has grown into one of the largest nationally recognized program for professional education in geospatial technologies. Dr. Lukinbeal has made foundational contributions to the fields of film and media geography, cultural geography, and geographic information science. Holding a PhD in Geography from San Diego State University and the University of California, Santa Barbara, his work bridges the social sciences, the humanities, and spatial technologies. His recent books include Geography’s Media Turn (2026), Cinematic Cartography: Scale, Analysis, Topography (Routledge, 2025) and Media’s Mapping Impulse (Franz Steiner Verlag, 2019). His scholarship investigates how film, cartography and landscape shape, reflect, and reconfigures geographic knowledge, spatial practices and imaginaries. His recent research includes servings as the Head of Applied Geography for Cosmic Explorer, a proposed gravitational wave observatory.