Perspectives on the contribution of Arabs and Muslims to geography

Conclusion The fact that Arab and Muslim geographers had contributed in a substantial way to geographical thought is well-recognized by many scholars of international standing including orientalists. It has now also been proved beyond any doubt that Muslim geographic thought was transmitted through Spain (Andalusia), Italy and Sicily during the Middle Ages to Europe. The Muslims had more advanced culture than did most of medieval Europe, and had made great discoveries in various fields of study (Hasan 1967). They had also preserved many of the writings of ancient Greek, Roman and other oriental civilizations. It was through Spain that the Muslims made these works as well as their own contribution available for European scholars. The centres of learning in Muslim Spain were thriving, with scholars from many places and particularly so from Europe. As Arabic was the language of culture and learning, many books were translated from Arabic into Latin and other European languages including German, French and English (Ahmed 1947; Hasan 1967; Kish 1978; James & Martin 1981; Muhammadain 1988).It is also understood that when geographical works were not translated some of the ideas and concepts revealed in them were adopted in other translated works. With the final collapse of Muslim rule in Spain (1492 AD), Muslim intellectual centres were opened to Christians from all over Europe. Indeed, translations from Arabic into European languages continued well into the 16th century, and some of the translated books remained in use until the 17th century.To ignore, as did some writers, the contribution of Muslims to geography during the Middle Ages, and to claim that the European Renaissance developed independently of what was happening in the Islamic world, is to dismiss seven centuries of Muslim leadership of world culture. Surely, no one nation or group of people can claim all the achievements of our present civilization. Present-day civilization is actually the sum total of all the past human efforts which have been accumulated over the long years of man's existence on earth, and as such there can be no gaps in human cultural history. While accepting the fact that the contribution of the various groups of people to the advancement of culture has not been the same, all are participants and have shared in its building and development. By looking at human cultural history in this spirit, it would not be difficult to appreciate the positive role played by the Arabs and Muslims in the advancement of knowledge during the Middle Ages. One of these branches of knowledge, which we have been trying to explain in this essay, is geography. To put the contribution of Arab and Muslim geographers into even more perspective, one can say that their most outstanding and original contributions, as has been stated before, were in the field of regional and mathematical geography as well as surveying. Although most of the studies were concerned with regions or individual countries, some contributions were highly specialized dealing with only one topic, such as climate or plants. The regional approach is represented by the many books written with the title: Al-Masalik wa Al-Mamalik or Roads and Provinces, and those with the title: Al-Bilad or Countries. As has been indicated earlier in this essay, treatment in these regional studies has beencomprehensive covering almost all aspects of physical and human geography.To contemporary Muslim people the science of geography will continue to be as appealing as it was to their predecessors, partly because of religious needs and partly because of the Muslim love for his environment. To sum up, in the following quotations from the Holy Quran Muslims are asked to contemplate four things: qu]Do they not look At the Camels, How they are made? And at the sky, How it is raised high? And at the mountains, How they are fixed firm? And at the Earth, How it is spread out? (Holy Quran: Sura LXXXVIII, verses 17\2–20).The contemplation of these things does not only make Muslims sense the absolute powers of their Creator, but also makes them constantly aware of their geographical surroundings.     

Space in geography

The concept of space is one of the most fundamental of geographical concepts. There is no work in geography that does not certain it. Nevertheless, geography has not as yet formulated an explicit and unambiguous definition of geographical space. This fact has had negative consequences for geographical theory, methodology and application. In the effort of contributing to its elimination we will try to outline the basic connotations of the concept.The concept of geographical space is a relational one. It acquires meaning and sense only when related to other concepts. The concept of space may be conceived as a supplement to things, i.e. substantively conceived objects. Space conceived in this way is the synonym of emptiness. The concept of space may be also conceived in relation ti individual landscape elements as their environments. Space conceived in this way has the character of a field of force. And, finally, space may be conceived also with respect to the totality of landscape elements, i.e. the system expressed by the term synergic. It is only this third variant of space which should be understood as the geographical space in the full menaing of the term. It is only this conception of geographical space as the space filled with qualities in relations and proportions that is considered as one of the basic prerequisites for the formulation of the theory of geography as science capable of prediction and thus also of practical utilization.     

The unity of geography in the USA and the USSR

Summary The discipline of geography, both ancient and new, is periodically subject to centrifugal tendencies, threatening its integrity and cohesion as a subject. From very different traditions, this question of philosophical unity has lain at the heart of many controversies and re-examinations of the value and place of geography in the Soviet Union and the United States in recent years, both as an academic subject and with respect to its practical applicability. This article attempts a comparative and personal view of what has happened to geography, mainly over the last quarter of a century, in these two countries, focussed on this unity question.     

Sakmarian geography

The known palaeontological and stratigraphical evidence is used as a basis for the construction of maps of the continents showing the extent of their inundation by the sea in Sakmarian time in the Upper Palaeozoic. In the northern hemisphere apart from India the evidence is sufficiently reliable to give reasonable maps, and the great extent of the inundations suggests that the climate would be considerably modified from that of today; no undoubted Sakmarian glacials occur there. In Southern continents and India, the Gondwana biogeographical province has made correlation with the northern continents controversial, but reasons are given for assuming that Gondwana glacial deposits were at least in part Sakmarian; the resultant maps show that the Gondwana land surfaces were but little reduced in area, and that the main glacials (except for India) lie within a belt between 40 S and 20 S. Present lack of knowledge of Sakmarian conditions in Antarctica makes reconstructions of climatic belts too hazardous for possible use in enunciating or checking hypotheses of continental drift and polar wandering.     

An electoral geography of Western Europe

The European Parliament elections give the opportunity to map voting behaviour in Western Europe. The main methodological difficulty is related to the classification of the parties. The cleavage theory is not a sufficient basis for an operational typology. The left-right axis remains an important basis for a classification. We have discriminated three groups of parties (the left, including the ecologists; the moderate centre-right and classical right; a growing populist reactionary right and the extreme-right, with a different geographical pattern). Beyond those families, the regionalist parties can also be isolated. The green voting pattern is more specific to the central regions and not linked to that of the traditional left, which is related to the traditions of the workers' movement or more specific to the peripheral regions. In general, the metropolitan regions vote more to the left than the surrounding regions, today more and more often on the basis of an intellectual voting pattern, including some well to-do urban and periurban districts. The centre-right and classical right voting pattern designate two main spaces: a conservative mid-European area, with a strong Christian-democracy in the Catholic countries with a quite recent State building (however recently collapsed in Italy), and rural peripheral spaces, mainly those dominated for a long time by small familial rural enterprises and/or by strong and conservative religious practices. At the European scale, the new populist reactionary right is stronger in the `central' regions than the traditional extreme right, even if the latter is also present in some central deprived urban and old industrial districts.     

The problem of historicity in physical geography

Historicity forms for logic the direct antithesis of regularity. In recognition of this dialectical premise physical geography has attempted to remove the historical contingent element of its phenomena in order to emphasise the regularity, and by so doing legimitise its status as a scientific discipline. This has resulted in a schism between empirical knowledge and the accepted theoretical structures. The regularity of geodynamic processes is apparent only on the basis of contingent clusters that in their essential characteristics are subject to historical change. Analysis becomes therefore a question of attribution, reconstructing individual clusters of causal determinants, each cluster being described as an individual outcome rather than the embodiment of necessary laws. The concept of the historical within geography must be clearly separated from the pseudo-historical development concept, as employed in relation to the theory of deterministic chaos. The scientific methodological problem, present in geography because of the incongruence between the logical assessment and the empirical subject matter, is here considered as the basis for the application of the evolutionary epistomological theory which not only recognises this incongruence but also clarifies and makes explicable its origin.The authors gratefully acknowledge the translation of this paper rendered by Prof. Dr. E. M. Yates, King's College, London.     

The geography of modernisation: some unresolved issues

Within the last two decades or so, geographers have become increasingly interested in studying modernisation especially in the third world countries. Some remarkable results have been obtained concerning the spatial pattern of modernisation and the factors explaining this pattern. However, several issues remain unresolved, the most important of which is the definition and measurement of modernisation. This paper contends that the modernisation surface arrived at as well as the explanation depend critically on the variables used to measure modernisation in the first place. The paper then calls for a spatial theory of modernisation and certain conceptual clarifications which should provide a guide in the selection of appropriate indicators of modernisation. Until this is achieved, not only will geographical studies on modernisation continue to be value-loaded, but they will also not yield any meaningful insight into the process of modernisation in the third world countries.     

现代冲积河流的河型空间转化模式探讨

论述了现代冲积河流系统中常见河型的自然分布及转化特征,归纳了河型从上游向下游发生空间转化的 5种主要模式。这些河型转化模式发生的相对频率是不同的,其中从辫状河流向曲流河流转化的发生频率最大。文中通过具体实例总结了这些转化模式分别发生时的主要影响因素。     

American geographers and the geography of East Central Europe

In the context of American geography's distinguished record in area studies around the world, East Central Europe stands out as a region that has attracted particular scrutiny over the time-span of activity by the Association of American Geographers. While the work done prior to 1918 was inevitably cast in an imperial framework with some hints of environmental determinism, the subsequent emergence of a new Europe — along with more explicitly humanistic perspectives in a discipline that was continuing to grow rapidly — led to a surge in field activity which was maintained through the communist years despite the formidable restrictions of the early post-war years. While there is a great diversity in the contributions made it is evident that there has been a continuing preoccupation with political power and the region's geopolitical significance evaluated in the context of changing great power relations. Also the big questions of economic and social geography — resources, culture and planning systems — have been examined; while a number of geographers have dedicated significant proportions of their total career activity to in-depth primary research on their chosen specialisms.     

The geography of the coal industry in the United Kingdom in the 1970s: changing directions?

Conclusion This paper has described some of the changes that have occurred in the geography of the UK's coal industry in a period when decline was the keynote, and attempted to illustrate some of the developments that are occurring in the late 1970s with implementation of the Plan for Coal. Launched at a time when the complete collapse of European energy supply seemed a distinct possibility, that Plan is encountering many problems in its implementation, and its unmodified completion must remain in doubt. The Plan 1974 and its successor embody a fundamental change of direction for the coal industry — from contraction to expansion.But although there is a change of direction at the national scale, at the inter- and intra-regional scales the direction remains largely the same. The dominance of the central coalfields is likely to increase further, while within these areas the trend towards large-scale deep mines in the concealed sections remains strong. Indeed achievement of the new desired direction at the national level, based as it must be on an industry that is price-competitive with other energy sources, may be dependent upon an intensification of these regional trends towards concentration of investment in areas where mining conditions are favourable and high-productivity, low-cost production can be achieved. It is also being recognized that removal of the burden of high-cost inefficient collieries in less favoured, mainly peripheral fields may also be vital to the competitive position:-the overall competitiveness of the industry is ... at present adversely affected by a small proportion of capacity where productivity is low and costs are high, mainly as a result of difficult working conditions. Closure of uneconomic pits as they became worked out will improve the industry's ability to compete with other fuels, (Secretary of State for Energy 1978).It thus appears that in the last quarter of the twentieth century the coal industry in the UK will become more and more focused on especially favoured areas in the central parts of the country, through the twin process of shedding loss-making activities in less favoured peripheral fields, and investing in the ample resources that underline the English lowlands.     

Pilgrimage tourism in the Holy Land: The behavioural characteristics of Christian pilgrims

The purpose of this paper is to describe, characterise and analyse the behavioural characteristics of Christian pilgrims to holy sites in the Holy Land at the present time. The method of research used in this study was based on one hundred questionnaires, which the pilgrims themselves were asked to complete. The conclusion is that a scale exists upon which the tourist-behavioural features characterising present-day Christian pilgrims can be rated. This scale covers their world-view which ranks the importance of holy sites and the pilgrims' lack of interest in tourism per se. It was found that behavioural factors are related to the pilgrims' perception of holy sites in general and those in Israel in particular. The scale can be described as secularism versus sacredness and tourism versus pilgrimage. The typology is important because it allows us to classify and create other typologies and also to analyse the subject for practical purposes. Additionally, the survey highlights the increasing convergence of old-fashioned pilgrimage and tourism, which have much in common.     

Elusive security: The military and political geography of South Lebanon

Israel's quest for security on its northern border with Lebanon has a history dating back to the foundation of the Palestine mandate. In the early period from the First World War to the end of the 1960s the quest was dominated with attaining economic and environmental security by seeking to acquire rights to the waters of South Lebanon. Recent decades in contrast have witnessed the rise in importance of border security and strategic security requirements in the face of military threats to northern Israel. Israel's interventionist policy in South Lebanon has been formalised to include a permanent presence on Lebanese territory in the form of the security zone. It is argued that despite the positive events that have occurred in the region in the early 1990s, it remains unlikely that Israel will easily relinquish its security shield in South Lebanon thus ultimately undermining the possibility of moving away from elusive to permanent security.     

Embracing cultural geography: an army imperative

As an instrument of national strategy, the United States Army has served the American people well for more than two centuries. Its fundamental mission has always been to fight and win America's Wars. As we have moved from the bi-polar nature of world dynamics to that of the new global neighborhood, the American Army has seen an increase in missions related to peacekeeping, disaster relief, and humanitarian actions. From a geography perspective, the Army must operate in numerous countries simultaneously. To succeed, the Army must go beyond physical accomplishments: it must interact and communicate with nations at a level of shared understanding and enthusiasm of each others culture. The American soldier must understand the cultural nature of geography as well as the physical. The hypothesis of this paper is: There is an urgent need for the men and women of the Unites States Army to have a firm conviction that people of other cultures have beliefs, value systems, and customs that result in behaviors and perceptions that may be vastly different than ours. . .and that those differences are legitimate. Beginning with mistakes made during the Vietnam war, the authors give examples, current as well as past, of cultural illiteracy on the part of the military. The role of the Army in the new world order is then addressed with emphasis on the types of missions to be expected in the 21^st Century. The authors point out that significant efforts to grasp customs of foreign countries to which Army units are deployed have been made during recent years; however, much remains to be accomplished. The solution to a lack of cultural awareness is given in the form of improvements to the Army military education system. An overview of the current training environment, with its strengths and weaknesses, is provided as a precursor to recommendations for future training. A multitiered education system is proposed in which cultural awareness education is provided at all levels of authority, from the basic training recruit to senior officers. Given that programs of instruction are already full, it will take a combination of command emphasis and innovation to accomplish the goal of inculcating cultural awareness in the American Army. The paper concludes with the position that the only way the Army can accomplish its changed global missions is by first winning its own war against cultural illiteracy.     

Round sky and square earth (Tian Yuan Di Fang): ancient Chinese geographical thought and its influence

Round sky and square earth is a basic concept in the tradition of ancient Chinese geography. It appeared at least two thousand years ago and has influenced Chinese geography significantly — both for good and for ill. As an academic subject in China, the history of geographical thought is new. It has become the center of geographical history (Yang 1989, p. 7; Wang 1982, p. 4). This transformation began in the 1980s. Earlier studies of the history of ancient Chinese geography paid more attention to the history of exploration, cartography, and geographers themselves. It neglected serious study of the concept and influence of the idea of round sky and square earth. This paper discusses this concept, its influence on ancient Chinese cartography, and its significance in early geographical literature, specifically the Geographical Society Yu Gong (Tribute of Yu).     

Towards a political geography of United Nations peacekeeping: Some considerations

Peacekeeping missions should be viewed from various political and spatial perspectives. Firstly, there is the macro-level perspective of the UN Organization itself, particularly the respective interests of the most powerful members of the UN and permanent seat holders on the Security Council. Secondly, there are the national perspectives of the various resources and troop-contributing states to specific UN operations. Thirdly, there are the interests of the conflicting parties themselves, including governments, national armies, local militia groups, factional political leaders and local communities. An analysis of UN peacekeeping involves a complex multi-dimensional geopolitical framework that incorporates the linkages and contradictions between all these differing perspectives, from macro to micro-spatial scales. Peacekeepers themselves are not passive figures in the political and human landscapes within which they operate. Many of the activities of UN blue helmets alter landscapes and conflict scenarios. Whilst some of these changes are deliberate, such as the creation of demilitarized zones, many are unforeseen and less visible, such as the ways in which local civilian populations are affected by the presence of large numbers of foreign peacekeepers. This paper examines some of the political, social and economic consequences of peacekeeping missions in places as diverse as Cambodia, Somalia, the Lebanon and Cyprus.     

The US army in operations other than War: A time to revive military geography

This paper revisits and interrelates the scope of military geography and the changing role of the military, two themes previously addressed in the 1993 and 1994 special editions ofGeoJournal. I begin by tracing the evolution of military geography in the US from World War I through the end of the Gulf War to reveal the demise of the subfield within American academic geography. Within the context of the post-Cold War era, I describe the military's reorientation and emphasize the need and opportunity to broaden the scope of military geography accordingly. The military's current operating environment is best characterized by operations other than war, undertaken on an unprecedented scale. Military geographers and regional, systematic, and technical experts throughout the discipline now have an unparalleled opportunity to contribute to the success of peacekeeping, humanitarian, and disaster assistance missions with which the military is currently preoccupied. Initiatives by academic geographers would not only enhance mission accomplishment from the military and federal government's perspective, but might also help to revive military geography as a legitimate subfield by demonstrating that military geographic endeavors can be both socially responsible and politically correct, particularly within operations other than war.     

The ancient Chinese notes on hydrogeology

The ancient Chinese notes on hydrogeology are summarized and interpreted, along with records of some related matters, like groundwater exploration and utilization, karst springs, water circulation, water conservation and saline-land transformation, mine drainage, and environmental hydrogeology. The report focuses only on the earliest recorded notes, mostly up until the Han Dynasty (206 BC??C?AD 25). Besides the references cited, the discussion in this report is based mainly on archaeological material, the preserved written classic literature, and some assumptions and/or conclusions that have been handed down in legends to later ages. Although most material relates to ancient China, the lessons learned may have practical significance worldwide. Compared to other contemporary parts of the world, ancient China, without doubt, took the lead in the field of groundwater hydrology. The great achievements and experience of the Chinese ancestors should provide motivation and inspiration for hydrogeologists to carry out their scientific research and exploration passionately and actively.     

The creation and consequences of international refugees: Politics,military and geography

Worldwide, the number and the occurrence of events that create international refugees has been increasing dramatically for at least the past fifty years. Analysis of the distribution of the causes and location of refugees has revealed that refugees more often result from military actions than natural disasters. In many instances, the creation of international refugees is a conscious political and military policy, a practice that seems to be increasing. More importantly, some geographic areas seem to be continuing core areas of such practices. Finally, regardless of their cause, refugees present specific problems to national control of population and territory. States that have been open to refugee settlement seldom are neighbor states and many now find their own populations rebelling against continued aid in the form of increased immigration. Most often, contiguous states are unwilling hosts as well as unwilling sites of refugee camps. Such circumstances can cause serious social, political as well as potential military consequences.     

Locating imaginary homelands: literature, geography, and Salman Rushdie

This paper represents an exploration of the relationships between geographical and fictional literatures. In general, geographers have not made sufficient use of literary sources in their work. In this paper the author goes beyond using literary quotations to provide a feel or impression of a region or place, to regard specific texts as containing a voice which can speak to the geographies created by academics. This means that geographers can regard fictional literature as offering an alternative account of the processes that they are seeking to describe and explain. After a brief introduction to the current relationship between geography and literature, it is discussed how fiction is used as a source in other disciplines. Finally, the suggested approach to literature is applied to the work of Salman Rushdie, especially to his controversial novel The Satanic Verses.     

Urban development and urban geography in Romania: The contribution of Vintila Mihailescu

Urban development has been a dramatic consequence of modernisation in Romania over the last hundred years. Although there are some differences between the periods of capitalism and socialism — notably the socialist emphasis on the central planning of industrial growth rather than the development of a well-rounded urban society — the population resident in towns has increased inexorably from 2.08 million in 1912 (16.3% of the total population to the country) to 3.71 million (23.4%) in 1948 and 10.49 million (47.3%) in 1980. The scope of Romanian geography has plainly altered in response to the shift in the rural-urban balance, all the more so in view of the long-standing concentration of effort on domestic issues. The paper examines the relationship between urban development and urban geography during this century: urban geography has become an integral part of the discipline whereas in 1900 interest was negligible. The transition has not been entirely smooth but considerable coherence arises from the work of Vintila Mihailescu (1890–1978) : a complete geographer but one who always emphasised the importance of urban geography. Since his death new leaders have emerged to ensure a continued commitment to what is now a fundamental element of Romanian geography.