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 Influence of American geography on Korean geography

Korean modern geography emerged from the dark age of unfortunate Japanese colonial rule after liberation in 1945, and has grown rapidly since the 1960s. Modern geographical theories and methodologies were introduced to Korea by the Korean geographers who received PhD degrees in the United States and returned home to teach at universities in Korea, especially in the 1970s and early 1980s. American geography has influenced the progress of the modern geography in Korea in various ways — education systems, curricula for college students, training graduate students — and research methodologies in Korean geography during the last half-century have been directly and indirectly influenced by American geography. The influence has had, however, both positive and negative effects in the development of Korean geography. There is a tendency in recent years to reinterpret Western theories and concepts in the Korean context, considering distinctive regional and cultural characteristics.     

Novelist Sarat Chandra's perception of his Bengali home region: a literary geographic study

Sarat Chandra, a Bengali novelist of the first half of the 20th century, has described the landscape of his southern Bengal Region and has interacted through his characters a deep psychological response appropriate to the region and time. His work forms an excellent resource base to reconstruct the region of his time and establish phenomenological relationship through the feelings expressed by the characters of his novels. Sarat Chandra's Home Region is a stream-filled area with people's activity directed to agriculture, though Calcutta was already established as a center of westernization and modernization. Feudal exploitation, Zamindars' tyrrany, degenerative caste-division, child marriage, prohibition of widow's right to remarry, decaying extended family and losing person-to-person relationship of the traditional Bengal were some of the characteristics of the regional cultural geography. The cities, particularly Calcutta, had started to show signs of modernization: industries, equal rights to women, widow re-marriage and elitist ideas. Bramho Samaj was pioneering the social modernization. In summation, the Home Region, being a transitional stage of decaying feudalism and incipient industrialization, was engaged in a struggle between the old and the new, decadent traditional and modern, rural and urban, caste rigidity and liberal social customs, religious fanaticism and rationalism. Sarat Chandra's work, particularly, provides an inroad to understand the cultural aspects of his Home Region.     

Landscapes, places and geographic spaces: Texts of Betrix Potter as cultural communication

This paper highlights connections between literature, culture and society. As a form of cultural communication, literature may shape social relationships and foster particular landscape meanings, attitudes and values. Thus, taking the example of juvenile fiction, specifically Beatrix Potter's illustrated anthropomorphic stories, links between literary images and cultural meanings and practises are explored. Texts of place are encountered in diverse ways; not least through literary tourism. In considering such aspects of reader response, processes of textual appropriation and transformation are also scrutinized. Finally, in assessing the research interface between geography and literature, the paper raises questions about context, textual interpretation, and written and visual narratives.     

Environmentally hazardous industry in South Africa: A spatial view

Akthough issues surrounding the location and relocation of environmentally hazardous industry have attracted international attention, little research has been undertaken in South Africa. The aim is to analyse the geography of dirty industries in South Africa and suggest avenues for future research. The location of environmentally hazardous production in South Africa has not followed the national industrial trend towards polarization reversal.     

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.     

Analysis of Meteorological and Terrain Features Leading to the Izmir Flash Flood, 3–4 November 1995

Flash floods associated with heavy precipitation has become a hazardous phenomenon along the Mediterranean coasts of Turkey in recent years. During 3 and 4 November 1995 heavy and intense rainstorm activity over the Aegean coast led to flash flooding in the city of zmir. Damage exceeded $50 million and 61 people died as a result of the flood. The Karyaka district suffered the most severe damage. This study presents an analysis of the meteorological settings that led to the development of these intense storms and describes the role of the terrain features involved in the zmir flood.The important mesoscale features which initiated the severe weather outbreak included pronounced low-level advection, positive vorticity and strong upper level divergence. A surface low centered over the Aegean Sea enhanced the advection of warm and moist unstable air masses coming from the southwest over the Mediterranean Sea along a southwesterly low level jet (LLJ). A squall line oriented NE-SW over the Aegean Sea also contributed to the storm development, and intensity of the storms was further enhanced by the orographic effect. The presence of a frontal system, the stability indices associated with the event, and other meteorological features are all reminiscent of the synoptic type flash floods identified by Maddox. While the pressure and moisture patterns were favorable for severe storm activity, nonmeteorological factors including the topography, geomporphology, and and land-use contributed to the flooding to a great extent. Settling in the flood-prone zone, insufficient floodwater structures, and the lack of channel improvements in the creeks enhanced flood damage to the city. Many of the deaths occurred in the settlements located in the flood-prone zone of the Ilca and Dallk creeks.     

首位中国国家地质公园诞生回顾与展望

石林喀斯特国际意义的科学价值发现源自时间、空间、演化相融合的地球科学综合考察评价路径,这就发现了"山石冠天下、风情醉游人"石林名胜的科学价值,也提供了石林地质公园可持续利用管理的基础.石林地质公园是集喀斯特地质、地貌、水文水资源、土壤、生物、人群聚落与文化习俗于一体的完整地理区,具有建成可持续发展示范区的科学价值、美学...     

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.     

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.     

Beyond the Anglo-American hegemony in human geography: a European perspective

Over the past five years or so, Anglo-American hegemony in human geography has been widely debated. This debate has highlighted the obstacles put in the way of the building of a more international geographical discipline. In this paper, we reflect on the possibilities and also the limitations of Europe as a context for the experimentation with a more cross-national discipline. In doing so, we notice on the one hand the increasing attention towards the Europeanisation of human geography, particularly at an institutional level, but on the other hand we also notice the lack of some basic forms and tools of communication and exchange that might facilitate the mobilisation of scholars around the ‘European project’. The paper tries to offer a contribution to this issue by discussing the ways in which a European journal of human geography might be conceived and also concretely organised. In this respect the paper takes into account issues of language, access to scientific knowledge and recognition of cultural and academic diversities.

Science education in the Republic of Ireland: At first and second levels

In recent years, the geoscience community around the world has been faced with a new series of critical problems associated with the management of waste and protection of the environment. One of the most pressing issues facing our civilization today is the production of enough science capability in geology, hydrogeology, engineering, and biology to meet the demand for the solution of these problems. Many countries are developing special programs similar to those in the United States of the National Academy of sciences,American Geological Institute, Geological Society of America, and the American Association of Petroleum Geologists. The editors of Environmental Geologyhave decided to begin a series of articles for the Views and News section of the journal on programs of this type being implemented around the world. The first of this series is by geoscientist Breda Naughton, Assistant Chief Executive for the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, titled Science Education in the Republic of Ireland: At First and Second Levels, which follows.The overall education policy of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) for first and second level education is to provide a balanced education for our young people which will contribute to their full development as individuals and give them the knowledge, skills, and competencies that will enable them to live productive and creative lives. Science is seen as an essential component of such an education in today's world.     

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.     

The evolution of semi-nomadism in non-desert environment: The case of Galilee in the 19th century

This paper attempts to reconstruct the way of life of a Palestinian Bedouin group living in Galilee, N Palestine, during the 19th century and established as semi-nomads. The term semi-nomadic is used here to indicate a distinctive life-style that is an amalgam of both pastoral nomadic and sedentary habits.The paper is based largely on primary sources, notably the narratives of 19th century European travellers-authors in Palestine. It introduces to the study of the cultural geography of Palestine and nomadism a methodological approach in which fragmentary pieces of information recorded in historical literature are utilized in order to evaluate spatial changes and processes.Paper originally presented at the International Conference of Historical Geographers, Cukanzus, Oxford '83 Oxford 17–23 July 1983.     

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.     

An understanding of geography: The perspectives of English primary trainee teachers

There have been few studies of trainee teachers' conceptions of the term ‘geography’. Building on these, this study identifies a number of conceptions of geography held by primary school trainee teachers in England. Their ideas are compared with their understanding of the reasons for teaching geography to young children. Similar outcomes emerge. While a small number of primary trainee teachers see geography education as concerned with the study of places, a slightly larger group view teaching geography as developing children's sense of responsibility for the earth and its people. However, by far the largest groups of students perceive geography's role to be to develop younger children's awareness and knowledge of the environment. Additionally, a sizeable group of trainees see geography as providing knowledge about the features and countries of the world. The implications of these findings are considered for the brief geography study units which primary teacher trainees take as part of their initial teacher training programme in English higher education. The conclusion is that it is important to widen primary trainee teachers' perspectives during even the briefest of units, not least to enable them to teach the national curriculum requirements for geography in primary schools. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

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).     

State in formation: the Ghetto State as typified in the West Bank and Gaza Strip

State formation is a complex process. Using the notion of the ghetto state, the case of the West Bank and Gaza Strip are analyzed. State formation processes among the Palestinians are shown to be a direct reaction to the processes of political and military control put into operation by Israel since 1967. The continued administrative and political separation of the West Bank and Gaza from the dominant Israeli territory enable the Palestinians to formulate their own independent national identity. This includes the establishment of economic, cultural and local political organizations, providing the foundations for future statehood. Such organizational capability is indicative of the wide range of non-violent forms of power which, in many cases, are more effective than direct acts of violence against Israel. The Intifada — or popular uprising — which has been in operation since 1987 has enforced these processes of statehood formation, through its combination of both violent and non-violent forms of power.     

Late proterozoic island arc volcanics from Gebeit,Red Sea Hills,north-east Sudan

The area of Gebeit Mine in the northern Red Sea Hills, Sudan, is built up of voluminous volcanic rocks and minor volcaniclastic and clastic sequences. According to their chemical and modal compositions the Gebeit volcanics can be devided into four groups: (a) cpx-physic basalts with clinopyroxene and plagioclase as the dominant phenocrysts and minor opaques; (b) hbl-physic basalts with hornblende, clinopyroxene, plagioclase and subordinate magnetite including one rare dacite; (c) pl-phyric andesites with plagioclase phenocrysts in a matrix that is rich in magnetite; and (d) aphyric basalts. The compositional variation within the distinct volcanic groups can only partly be explained by fractional crystallization, and more than one magma source reservoir is required.Mineral and whole rock Sm/Nd data for the cpx-physic and hbl-physic basalts yield an isochron age of 832 ± 26 Ma (Nd_T = 6.74 ± 0.19, MSWD = 0.12) which is interpreted as the age of eruption. The Nd_t values for the aphyric basalts and pl-physic andesites range from 6.7 to 8.3, indicating the involvement of different depleted magma sources. The Nd and Sr isotopic data rule out any significant influence of older continental crust in the formation of the Gebeit volcanics and indicate an intraoceanic origin. This implies that the Gebeit terrane is a segment of juvenile crust that originated in a subduction-related environment and supports the arc accretion model for the Arabian-Nubian Shield.