A Review of “Turf Wars: Discourse,Diversity, and the Politics of Place”

The spatial correlation, or colocation, of two or more variables is a fundamental issue in geographical analysis but has received much less attention than the spatial correlation of values within a single variable, or autocorrelation. A recent paper by Leslie and Kronenfeld (2011) contributes to spatial correlation analysis in its development of a colocation statistic for categorical data that is interpreted in the same way as a location quotient, a frequently used measure in human geography and other branches of regional analysis. Geographically weighted colocation measures for categorical data are further developed in this article by generalizing Leslie and Kronenfeld's global measure as well as specifying a local counterpart for each global statistic using two different types of spatial filters: fixed and adaptive. These geographically weighted colocation quotients are applied to the spatial distribution of housing types to demonstrate their utility and interpretation.     

A Review of “Politics and Practice in Economic Geography”

Abstract

This study examines the spatial distribution and enforcement of air polluting facilities in the state of New Jersey, as listed in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Aerometric Information Retrieval System. Results show that air-polluting facilities tend to concentrate near minority neighborhoods, although this relationship is partially explained by factors of population density, manufacturing employment, and land use. Other results suggest that facilities in areas with a relatively high percentage of minority population tend to have a weaker record of environmental enforcement as compared to other facilities. Of the socioeconomic variables considered, employment in manufacturing appears to be the most strongly related to environmental enforcement.     

A Review of “Politics of Urban Runoff: Nature,Technology, and the Sustainable City”

California sage scrub (CSS) is a highly threatened vegetation community in coastal Southern California, 90 percent of which has been lost. Understanding CSS recovery is critical to its survival. This study compares long-term effects of grazing, cultivation, and mechanical disturbance in Southern California by tracking the extent of exotic grassland in two valleys in the Santa Monica Mountains over sixty years using aerial image analysis. Native shrubs returned to the grazed valley over one and one-half times faster than they did in the cultivated valley. Cultivation might result in a type conversion of CSS to exotic annual grassland that resembles a new steady state.     

A Review of “India and South Asia: Economic Developments in the Age of Globalization”

Any analysis of health service problems facing the world today must consider that these problems exist in a geographic context. This fact has led to an increased need for accurate and current information to support emergency planning and decision making. In this article we combine geographic information systems (GIS) and neural networks for performing health emergency assessments and generating hazard maps that show areas that are potentially at high risk for emergencies. Through the use of neural networks we predict the location of future emergency events. On these events we use a kernel density estimator to create maps of areas that have a high risk for future emergencies. As a result, emergency services will know in advance where there is a high possibility of an emergency event occurring and can formulate a response, thus improving incident management and health planning. For example, the service can locate ambulances in places near the expected emergency cases, minimizing response time. The approach was tested in stroke-event analysis in the city of Athens, Greece.     

A Review of “The Tsunami of 2004 in Sri Lanka: Impacts and Policy in the Shadow of Civil War”

Abstract

Zionist geographers in Israel were highly involved in institutionalizing Israel's national identity. In search for interpretative schemes, they were highly committed both to Western paradigms and to Zionist narratives. Until the 1970s, organicist models of regional geography were popular despite contradictions between the use of tragic and comic narratives in Western models and the need to adopt romantic narratives for Zionist purposes. The emergence of historical geography in the 1950s helped to solve these contradictions by adopting a contextual mode of explanation in which the national story has been described in terms of a unique one and as an example for the power of Zionist civilization to transform bewildered nature. During the last two decades, new forms of criticism have emerged that changed the discourse from a particularistic story of nation building to a more general story of colonization and territorial control.     

A Review of “Villages,Women and the Success of Dairy Cooperatives in India: Making Place for Rural Development”

Conceptual advances for understanding the organization of family farms have not yet initiated parallel debates about how they might be aligned with the methods used to understand them. Customization of a novel research approach—farm life history—for an investigation of the socioeconomic organization of forty Australian farms responds to this literature gap. Individual farm life histories were initiated using farm tours (truck journeys) in which changes to the composition of land parcels prompted research conversations. The researcher and participants benefited from using motorized transport and traveling while talking, but the benefits were experienced unevenly across research encounters.     

A Review of “Managing the Infosphere: Governance,Technology, and Cultural Practice in Motion”

The antiquated and undemocratic rules operating in the United Nations Security Council do not reflect and serve today’s integrated global society, nor does the institution adequately represent the diversity of member states. Despite General Assembly discussions that have lasted a quarter-century, no result has materialized on the expansion issue. The author concludes that regional rivalries, the veto, the onerous Charter amendment process, and the failure to devise a truly representative model are responsible for the lack of progress. A model with eighteen rotating seats, based on population, area, and regional position, and four elected seats deserves consideration as an alternative. Key Words: metageography, political geography, population and area ratings, United Nations Security Council.     

A Review of “War,Violence, and Population: Making the Body Count”

An understanding of the contemporary biogeography of a region must be predicated not only on the current environmental conditions that influence species distributions but also on historical factors including anthropogenic disturbance regimes. Increasingly, researchers are using historical data, such as the Public Land Survey System (PLSS) records, to create baselines from which subsequent biogeographic changes can be gauged. The present-day state of Oklahoma is unique in that two separate PLSS surveys were conducted in the state during a relatively short time span. We compare these two historical data sets, from the 1870s and 1890s, respectively, to quantify changes in landscape structure and woody plant assemblages corresponding to rapid demographic changes occurring within the Arbuckle Mountains in Oklahoma. During this period, the PLSS data show a landscape that became increasingly fragmented, as well as differences in stand composition and density. The documentation of these important historical anthropogenic changes occurring on the western fringes of the eastern deciduous forest could serve as a valuable guide for conservation and restoration initiatives.     

A Review of: “Pittsburgh and the Appalachians: Cultural and Natural Resources in a Postindustrial Age”

Abstract

Geography is one of the subjects offered toward a diploma of the International Baccalaureate Organization. Like the others, its syllabus is regularly reviewed and revised to remain current. The advent of a revised syllabus brings overlap that can be challenging for teachers. The syllabus that is now coming to an end was described in 107(4–5) of the Journal of Geography. The present article compares that syllabus with the new one and, particularly, the demands the new syllabus will place on teachers and students alike.     

A Review of “Shanghai Rising: State Power and Local Transformations in a Global Megacity. Globalization and Community,Volume 15”

Joan Fitzgerald and Nancey Green Leigh. Thousand Oaks, CA: . Sage Publications. 2002. xi and 267 pp., illustrations, tables, notes, appendices, and index. $89.95 hardcover(ISBN: 0-7619-1655-5) and $39.95 paperback (ISBN: 0-07619-1656-3).     

A Review of “Economic Geography: Places,Networks, and Flows”

Landing a rescue helicopter in a wilderness environment, such as Yosemite National Park, requires suitable areas that are flat, devoid of tree canopy, and not within close proximity to other hazards. The objective of this study was to identify helicopter landing areas that are most likely to exist based on available geographic data using two GIScience methods. The first approach produced an expert model that was derived from predefined feature constraints based on existing knowledge of helicopter landing area requirements (weighted overlay algorithm). The second model is derived using a machine learning technique (maximum entropy algorithm, Maxent) that derives feature constraints from existing presence-only points; that is, geographic one-class data. Both models yielded similar output and successfully classified test coordinates, but Maxent was more efficient and required no user-defined weighting that is typically subject to human bias or disagreement. The pros and cons of each approach are discussed and the comparison reveals important considerations for a variety of future land suitability studies, including ecological niche modeling. The conclusion is that the two approaches complement each other. Overall, we produced an effective geographic information system product to support the identification of suitable landing areas in emergent rescue situations. To our knowledge, this is the first GIScience study focused on estimating the location of landing zones for a search-and-rescue application.