‘Public intellectuals’, geography, its representations and its publics

Recent years have seen academic geographers engaged in a series of debates over the current state of the discipline, its ‘relevance’ to others in the social sciences, to policy-makers, and to those studying geography at school age. This short critical review builds upon an issue raised in this journal [Thrift, N., 2002. The future of geography. Geoforum 33, 291–298], namely the role of geographers as public intellectuals. After reviewing the different ways in which the notion of public intellectuals has been understood, the paper turns to geography’s representations and to its publics. The paper concludes by arguing for an appreciation of the full range of ways in which geographers call forth publics through a range of representational strategies. It suggests that regardless of how geographers perform publicly and intellectually, two things are perhaps worth remembering: it is in the interest of geographers to name what they do as geography and to name themselves as geographers.     

Looking for the critical geographer, or why bodies and geographies matter to the emergence of critical geographies of Latin America

This paper argues that critical geographies of Latin America begin with an analysis of how and why the bodies and geographies of geographers themselves matter. To focus on the geographer as a producer of knowledge is not to advocate the kind of navel gazing so abhorrent to many scholars. Rather, it is an effort to call attention to and critically assess how the geographer's embodied social position and geographic location inform the production of knowledge about and representations of Latin American people and nature. To illustrate how and why bodies and geographies matter, I draw from feminist and post-colonial theory and include examples from my own experiences and those of other researchers doing fieldwork in Latin American countries. I conclude by exploring the notion of situated knowledge as a tactic that writes bodies and geographies into academic texts. Ultimately, situating knowledge represents a political intervention and contribution to the broader goals of emancipatory politics shared by critical human geographers.     

Publication practices in physical and human geography: a comment on Nigel Thrift’s ‘The future of geography’

This note expands on, and in some respects challenges, the distinction Thrift (Geoforum 33 (2002) 291) makes between the publication practices of young human and physical geographers. Evidence on highly-cited papers by eminent British geographers is used to suggest that human geographers have been publishing mainly in human-geography journals, but physical geographers in a wider range of outlets, for at least two decades; and that the most influential papers of all, human or physical, have generally been in multi- or inter-disciplinary journals. Publication in ‘non-geographical’ journals is desirable since it helps geographers have a wider impact. Conversely, the discipline is harmed if influential outsiders perceive geographers as only concerned with internal debates and seeking to impress each other.     

The problem of regionalization among geographers: the case of SwitzerlandDie mühe der geographen mit der regionalisierung am beispiel der SchweizA propos de la problématique de la régionalisation chez les géographes: le cas de l'espace suisse

The lack of any unified view amongst geographers in their conceptions of the articulation of Swiss space is evidence, in the dialectical sense, of the complexity of the reality. It is also, however, a sympton of methodological uncertainty. The purpose of this article is an analysis of this malaise, usually passed over in silence.The evolution of geography during the last hundred years cannot be easily defined, but against a general trend opposed approaches have always been present.The manner of conceiving Swiss space is still affected by the changes in the physiognomy of the country, but the analysis of reality and reality itself are out of phase.It appears possible that the presuppositions admitted by authors or the intellectual paths followed by them in regionalisation should be considered and treated as one of the fundamentals of all studies concerned with the organisation of space.     

The problem of regionalization among geographers: the case of Switzerland

The lack of any unified view amongst geographers in their conceptions of the articulation of Swiss space is evidence, in the dialectical sense, of the complexity of the reality. It is also, however, a sympton of methodological uncertainty. The purpose of this article is an analysis of this malaise, usually passed over in silence.The evolution of geography during the last hundred years cannot be easily defined, but against a general trend opposed approaches have always been present.The manner of conceiving Swiss space is still affected by the changes in the physiognomy of the country, but the analysis of reality and reality itself are out of phase.It appears possible that the presuppositions admitted by authors or the intellectual paths followed by them in regionalisation should be considered and treated as one of the fundamentals of all studies concerned with the organisation of space.     

Towards a normative concept of settlements: the development process and theoretical and conceptual problems in the “Lower limb”

This paper critically evaluates theories of settlement pattern and change which have commonly been employed by geographers. Those discussed include central place, growth pole and modernization theories, as well as notions of settlements as a product of adaptation to environmental conditions, as central places, or as nodes of retail distribution. In all instances criticism centres on the applicability of those notions to the African rural scene. It is suggested that not only are most concepts inappropriate in this context, but they are also partial and historically relative. More suitable, normative concepts of settlements and settlement systems are suggested.     

It's a long way to the other geographers and geographic knowledges

Geographic knowledge is usually understood as the knowledge produced by geographers. Yet, it is also produced by people outside of the academia. But as Western science claimed for its exclusive self the status of ‘knowledge’, others have long been denied the production and possession of a true knowledge, and recognised merely the mastering of practical skills. The binary opposition between scientific and other forms of knowledge has been central to the construction of academic geography until the late 1980s, when postmodern thought cast some doubt on the universality of scientific knowledge. This led to critical analyses of academic geography, revealing its situatedness, as well as to a new interest for the geographies of the ‘Others’. Examining how geographers have dealt with other knowledge sets so far, and how they have labelled them, this paper argues that other geographies should be given more attention. This means focusing on the knowledges themselves, and considering implementing a true dialogue between these and academic geography. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Labouring geography: Negotiating scales, strategies and future directions

In our editorial introduction to this themed issue on labour geography, we outline some important on-going debates in the relatively young field of labour geography and suggest future directions for research. First, there is the key question of labour as an active agent in the production of economic landscapes. The agency of labour will likely remain a defining feature of labour geography, but perhaps it is not as important to construct theoretical analytical boundaries as it is to define labour geography as a political project. Second, debates continue surrounding the production of scale and the multiscalarity of organized labour. Third, labour geographers have yet to engage in any sustained fashion with unpacking the complex identities of workers and the way in which those identities simultaneously are shaped by and shape the economic and cultural landscape. Fourth, there is some debate on the costs and benefits of a ‘normative’ labour geography which emphasizes what workers and their organizations ‘could’ or even ‘should’ do. Lastly, we challenge the assumption that labour geographers have not yet asserted themselves as activists in their own right. We conclude the editorial by introducing the articles included in the issue. While these articles may not address every gap in the literature, they do contribute in significant ways to move the labour geography project forward.     

Meanings of place and aspects of the Self: an interdisciplinary and empirical account

Although geographers have largely investigated the notion of place, the relationship between place and Self does not seem to have received a similar attention, both theoretically and empirically. After the initial interest expressed by humanistic geographers, social constructivism and cultural materialism (two dominant paradigms in use since at least the 1980s) have somewhat moved the interest towards a sort of social(izing) discourse, which has pushed the individual dimension to the margin. Accordingly, this dimension has been treated as a mere product of social discourses, as purely embodying and (re)enacting certain social categories (gender, sex, race, etc.) or, again, it has been discredited as psychologically ‘mentalistic’ and geographically ‘trivial’. In the present article, I aim to rescue this personal, intimate dimension and show how, beyond an all-encompassing social(izing) logic, it remains at work in the ways people relate to place. Theoretically, the study builds on the early contributions of humanistic geography, complemented with more recent works in environmental and social psychology. Empirically, it is grounded in narratives of place collected during interviews and focus groups administered in four regional case studies in Western Europe. The article advances and illustrates, with empirical materials, a simple theoretical framework, which aims to contribute to the understanding of how meanings of place implicate and are implicated in the construction of the Self.     

Fractured space: a geographical reflection on the digital divide

What does it mean to reflect upon space in connection to telecommunications? If we start with a conception of urban space as being fully integrated, including on an equal footing both information and communication technologies (ICT) and mobility techniques, as well as the founding notion of copresence that we find at the heart of all urban organization, we might then be able to examine the notion of the ‘digital divide’ in a new light. This clearly experimental approach is conducted by a research group called ‘Urbatic’, which is composed of geographers who, for the last three years, have been conducting theoretical research whose objective is to take into account two fields of social science: the theory of urbanity and the theory of telecommunication. Surveys conducted in this perspective focus on the analysis of the choices people make between the different means they can use to cope with distances (copresence, mobility and telecommunication) with a view to constructing their own space. The analysis of these choices leads us to propose a new theorized interpretation of the ‘digital divide’.     

Mobile bodies: Animal migration in North American history

North Americans have had a profound affect on wildlife, especially migratory animals such as elk, bison, salmon, and many species of birds. Migration is a vital adaptation for these and other species. Yet despite this importance and the myriad ways in which people have influenced and understood migration, environmental geographers have devoted scant attention to it. This paper examines the role of animal migration in North American history. North Americans have affected and managed animal migrants in six primary ways: transforming migrant habitats; harvesting migrants; obstructing and facilitating migrants; working across borders; visualizing migrants; and accepting and resisting migrants. I examine these different aspects of animal migration history in North America and end with a discussion of how other geographers such as environmental historical geographers, political ecologists, and animal geographers can employ this framework.     

Landscape and labyrinths

In the endeavour to reveal the politics behind landscape production, cultural geographers often neglect the most fundamental question of landscape, namely the question of how: how does the landscape work as both a visual and material space? How does it ‘stick' in the mind and in the world? By relying on concepts such as ideology, hegemony and naturalized discourse, cultural geographers have parried the question by assuming a structural connection between the landscape's appearance in the world and people's everyday consciousness. The goal of this paper is to provide an alternative account of the landscape's existence. I argue that the landscape comes to appear in the world as it is put to task. This means that the landscape's existence is not founded on its capacity to inscribe or normalize consciousness through its appearance in the world but on the landscape's capacity to be called forth through practice. The argument is elaborated through the work of George Bataille whose concept of the labyrinth provides the theoretical groundwork for an alternative understanding of what the landscape is as well as how it can be studied.     

Articulating an Indian diaspora in South Africa: The Consulate General of India,diaspora associations and practices of collaboration

Engagements between sending states and their diasporas have come under increasing critical scrutiny. Whilst political geographers have driven critical analysis of national level policies, debates have largely overlooked the broader range of actors, transactions and practices involved in implementing national policies in a geohistorically diverse array of diasporic contexts and settings. Over the last decade, the Indian government has invested significant resources in overseas diplomatic missions, consulates and high commissions to administer its diaspora outreach strategies. This paper examines the role of the Consulate General of India (CGI) in Durban, South Africa, focusing in particular on the networks of agents, associations, groups and political actors involved in collaborating with the CGI Durban in diaspora outreach practices. This paper draws on two periods of fieldwork in Durban between 2004 and 2005 and was supplemented by ongoing visual and textual analysis of news articles, promotional material, reports and websites. Using the concept of articulation, the paper highlights the discursive and performative practices involved in bringing together the agendas of the GOI with those of South African Indian diaspora associations through the outreach practices of the CGI in Durban. It argues that articulatory practices are essential to resolving some of the subjective and embodied dilemmas and contestations of belonging inherent in South African Indians’ participation in diaspora outreach initiatives. Investigating how articulation contributes to drawing diverse and even competing agendas together makes room for further understanding the ways in which diaspora outreach practices can travel across a wide network, and the diverse agencies that can become catalysed in the process.     

Measuring association in link-node problems

In this paper we have attempted to pose a methodological problem, and to provide answers to some fundamental measurement problems in research. In the search for the regularities which are thought to underlie the phenomena we study, geographers and others have often had recourse to Graph Theory to represent certain situations. Once some pattern of interaction can be depicted by using a group of points (nodes) joined by lines (links or edges), interest is often centered around the degree of correpondence between two graph-theoretic representations of empirical evidence. We have suggested methods for answering the question: are the link patterns for the two graphs so similar that they could not reasonably have arisen by chance? The approach to the solutions are based on probability theory and the properties of certain statistical distributions — the binomial, the hypergeometric, the hypergeometric?onominal and other combinations. In each case we have provided a rationale for the suggested solution as well as tables and computational procedures. The examples have been chosen from a wide variety of situations, for graph-theoretic representations are found in many fields of investigation.     

Weak ties, immigrant women and neoliberal states: Moving beyond the public/private binary

This paper engages with the vacillations in provincial and federal gender specific service funding in Canada between 2001 and 2007. I connect this state scale analysis to local settlement experiences of Sikh immigrant women living in a small British Columbia community. Using the concept of network analysis, particularly the idea of weak ties, I offer a corrective to the overly positive appraisals of strong ties and institutional completeness. I argue that experiences of settlement, especially in cases where women face various forms of domestic violence, are shaped by the articulation of neoliberalism and patriarchy. This analysis contributes to the ongoing reformulation advanced by feminist geographers with regard to the public/private binary. In its place this case study reveals the multiple public and private intersections and continuums that exist, and how the recognition of these geographies can assist in building effective public resources to tackle the challenges faced by some immigrant women.     

The geography of tourism in France: definition,scope and themes

Conclusions The substantial body of literature produced in the last two decades bears witness to the marked development of the geography of tourism in France over this period. This research has been strongly influenced by traditional geographic thought and is notable for the logic which underlies it. At the same time much remains to be done, with various avenues for future research being suggested in this paper. French geographers might also look increasingly outwards and to the work of others. By considering new and different methodologies, theories and fields of interest, the conceptual base of the subject might be enlarged and a more systematic approach developed. This need is keenly felt and this opening up is starting to occur, particularly through the exchange of ideas with foreign geographers at meetings of the national or international (IGU) commissions on the geography of tourism.     

The changing geography of traditional medicine: Urban herbalism on the Witwatersrand,South Africa

While medical geographers have generally ignored medical pluralism in developing countries, a small but significant geographical literature on traditional medicine has emerged. Progress for research by geographers on traditional medicine lies through a broader contextualisation of medical pluralism sensitive to the socio-economic and political context of health and disease. In this paper, a brief overview of medical pluralism in South Africa is presented. Issues surrounding the changing geography of traditional medicine are illustrated with reference to urban herbalism on the Witwatersrand.     

On the role of evidence in physical and human geography

While physical geographers are united in a commitment to the scientific method with its emphasis on quantitative evidence, human geographers face a dilemma in deciding whether to adopt a scientific or humanistic approach in their research. The scientific approach offers a more secure, objective knowledge, but limits the scholar to a relatively narrow range of topics. The humanistic approach allows the scholar to explore a wide range of human experiences, but it lacks rigorous procedures of objective verification. The difficulty of the application of theoretical ideas to human societies can, to some extent, be avoided by adopting an historical approach, with an emphasis on the empirical investigation of human activity as a reflection of ideas. As long as human geographers have a commitment to basing their interpretations of geographical phenomena on objective evidence the possibility of a profitable co-operation exists among proponents of different philosophical approaches. A unified human geography embracing scholars of diverse views depends for its success on the identification of geographical problems that transcend philosophical and theoretical points of view.     

Maada’oonidiwag gete-dibaajimowen (“sharing old stories”): reflections on a place-based reparatory research partnership in Nbisiing Anishinaabeg Territory

In this paper, we reflect on an emerging community-based partnership rooted in place-based reparative research. Braiding knowledges (Atalay, 2012) from Nbisiing Anishinaabeg communities, northern Ontario universities, and multi-scalar museums, the partnership focuses on repatriation, reparative environmental histories, and action-based research in the context of settler colonialism and climate change. We reflect on ongoing projects that attempt to put Anishinaabe gikendaasowin (knowledge) into action alongside historical geographical research. We discuss how the partnership resonates with community geography values of relationship, collaboration, equity, and reciprocity, and urge non-Indigenous geographers to acknowledge how Indigenous knowledges and approaches have shaped these ideas long before geography became a discipline. We contend that historical geographers have a deeper role to play in community geography scholarship, citing examples of two projects related to (1) repatriation of Anishinaabeg cultural heritage and (2) storymapping through historical Geographic Information Systems (HGIS). However, we argue, geographers must continue to acknowledge their own positionality in a discipline that was built through settler colonial violence and knowledge production. Finally, we reflect on the role of academic institutions in facilitating First Nation-university-museum partnerships through access to funding, space, and databases, while addressing the challenges of relying on institutional support for reparatory and decolonizing projects.

     

The future relevance of medical geography for health planning,health and development in the third world

Conclusions: the Future Relevance of Medical Geography in the Third World This article has deliberately ranged widely and suggested various research themes to which medical geographers interested in health and development might turn their attention. The International Geographical Union Commission on Health and Development established in 1988 suggested a research agenda which includes many of them (see IGU Commission on Health and Development, Circular Letter No. 1 published in GeoJournal 17, 4, 659–660 (1988)). The achievement of even part of such an agenda will call for close international collaboration in research amongst medical geographers and allied disciplines.Increasingly, medical geographers are gaining applied experience in health and health care in the developing world. They are obtaining breadth and depth of knowledge and are now, for example, cogniscant of financial matters such as those involved in the cost explosion in health care worlwide which has particularly sinister implications for the health of Third World countries (Josephg and Phillips 1984). They, too, are now increasingly comfortable in dealing with epidemiological and demographic data. Geographers now no longer focus solely on phenomena such as distance decay or environments for disease. They are aware that human resources, intelligence, aspirations, attitudes and finance are all potent variables influencing successful health care and health in populations.In the future, therefore, the wide-ranging ambit of medical geography will increasingly become relevant to health and health care research in the Third World. Contributions of value will emerge both from those geographers adopting more socio-political stances and those adopting a more empiricist approach. However, it is the holistic nature of geography, with its wide academic links, and the courage of geographers to research in new topics and gain sound understanding of them which will increasingly be recognized. The days of extempore contributions to political, policy and practical debates on health and development are now largely past. Well researched, solid and sound medical geography contributions will, it is hoped, forge ahead.