“And a Charming Wife”: Gender,Marriage, and Manhood in the Job Search Process

The academic job search process, and the applications and reference letters that are constitutive elements of that process, are central to the creation and re‐creation of a discipline. Disciplines and departments renew and re‐create themselves — or do not, and merely replicate themselves — through hirings. A job search process can serve to hinder changes in the membership, culture, “look,” and the norms of the discipline, or it can facilitate dramatic and often rapid transformations. Job search materials thus provide an insight into the prevailing norms and conventions of a discipline. A review of a recent set of such materials reveals subtle gendered and racialized differences in the job search process. Such differences are apparent in the composition of referee committees, in the evocation of marital status both by applicants and by referees, and in the surprising persistence of themes of robust manhood. The referee pool, the applicant pool, and the search committee pool in an academic discipline are interlocked constituencies, and the job search process plays a “gatekeeping” role. The extent to which gender or racial differences are inserted into the job process thus has a bearing on the long term social construction of the discipline.     

“Miss Remington” Goes to Work: Gender,Space, and Technology at the Dawn of the Information Age*

At the end of the 19th century, the financial services sector underwent a technological “revolution” with the invention of the typewriter, dictaphone, and hollerith machine. At the same time, the gender of labor within this sector was also changing, such that by the end of the first quarter of the 20th century, most of the work taking place in white‐collar offices was performed by women. After introducing the broader research project on which this is based, I consider how technology and social relations shaped one another at the level of the body, the workplace, and with broader networks of branch banking, focusing on early 20th‐century Montreal, Canada. I argue that the financial services sector worked to create a system in which men flowed through and women functioned as fixed points. I further argue that this pattern was echoed at different scales within the financial services industry, from the level of the body and the workplace up through spatially dispersed national‐level networks.     

ON “BIOREGIONALISM”AND “WATERSHED CONSCIOUSNESS”*

A diffused but philosophically sophisticated social movement, emphasizing the importance of the sense of place and a locally responsible stewardship of Nature, has been emerging in recent years in various parts of North America. Whether “bioregionalism”is a new way of thinking about our place on Earth and our relationship to it, as some would believe, or simply the ecologic perspective familiar to geographers and environmentalists, romanticized and dressed in a new vocabulary, it deserves our attention for its adherents are kindred souls.     

The Politics of Location: Doing Feminist Research at “Home”*

Feminist research methodologies have many advantages over more traditional positivist methodologies. Feminist research is differentiated from nonfeminist research in terms of its critiques of universality and objectivity and its emancipatory purpose. Drawing on my own research on the survival strategies of low-waged women workers in Worcester, Massachusetts, I argue that we need to examine more critically our feminist research methods in terms of the unequal power relationships on which the research process necessarily rests.     

(Hetero)sexing Space: Gay Men and “Straight” Space in Adelaide,South Australia

This paper examines gay men's perceptions and experiences of everyday places in Adelaide, South Australia. It illustrates the nature of social space as a heterosexual artifact. The paper also outlines ways in which gay men may contribute to the heterosexualization of space. Many gay men monitor the public and private roles they play for fear of the consequences of “discovery,” and through self-policing and restricted behaviors they may contribute to the spatial supremacy of heterosexuality. Acts of nondisclosure and the adoption of straight sexual facades constrain gay men's social and spatial lives.     

Property advertising and the representational production of suburbia: “Functional suburbs” and “lifestyle suburbs” in Auckland

This paper joins literature on suburban advertising with Lefebvre's concept of representational space to analyse property advertisements as part of the representational production of suburban space. Based on comparative analysis of advertising material for suburban residential developments on Auckland's “North Shore” in two time‐periods—1950s and 2010s—the paper examines changes and continuities in thematic content. While property advertisements in the mid‐1900s emphasised the “functional suburb,” paying attention to attributes such as quality of utilities and proximity to the central city, more recently advertisements have more strongly emphasised the “lifestyle suburb,” with a focus on middle‐class community and natural amenity.     

Uncritical Rhetoric: “A Classic Disservice”

All opinions and statements appearing in the following communications are those of their writers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors or the Association of American Geographers, who assume no responsibility for their contents.     

Decentralized Regulation and the “Race to the Top”: The Case of Municipal Saloon Licensing in Turn-of-the-Century Massachusetts*

The spatial spread of policies, usually studied with an emphasis on contagion and demonstration effects, can also reflect considerations of trans-boundary spillovers. The model of the “race to the bottom” criticizes decentralized regulation as inherently tending towards laxity because of competition among jurisdictions for business. There exists also the possibility of a “race to the top,” in which a fear of an influx of an activity being regulated elsewhere causes the regulation to spread. An analysis of turn-of-the-century Massachusetts municipal saloon licensing policy illustrates the latter phenomenon.     

American Migration,Settlement, and “Belonging” in Francophone Canada

More Americans now reside in Canada than at any time since the Vietnam War. Of particular note is the surprisingly large population of immigrants from the United States who now reside in Montreal—Francophone Canada's largest and most diverse city. This article documents and analyzes the migration experiences, spatial patterns, and “sense of belonging” of Americans in Montreal during the post–Vietnam era framed within the larger political and linguistic context of the city's “Two Solitudes.” Findings are based on information compiled from archival materials, census records, structured and unstructured interviews, survey questionnaires, participant observation, and fieldwork. My overarching goal is to embed the experiences and patterns of this English‐speaking group of immigrants in predominately French‐speaking Montreal during the past five decades—one of the most dramatic and divisive periods of time in Montreal and in Quebec as a whole.     

“WOMEN IN GEOGRAPHY” REVISITED: PRESENT STATUS,NEW OPTIONS

The representation of women on geography faculties did not increase appreciably between 1971 and 1977, but women in other academic disciplines have fared somewhat better. The latter have improved their status primarily as a result of actions taken by professional associations representing their fields. When a professional association ignores its female constituency or refuses to commit itself to improving their circumstances, federal agencies now offer alternative channels for obtaining redress.