Reflections on a White Discipline

Utilizing a partially autobiographical format, this article considers the practice and study of race within geography. I argue that the overwhelmingly white composition of the discipline has very real implications for both individual experiences and our intellectual production and disciplinary culture. I explore these issues by drawing on my own experiences as a Chicana within geography, and by examining the extent to which one area of research, environmental justice, has engaged questions of race and the consequences of that engagement. I conclude with some general remarks on what it might take to significantly diversify geography.     

Reflections on a White Discipline

Utilizing a partially autobiographical format, this article considers the practice and study of race within geography. I argue that the overwhelmingly white composition of the discipline has very real implications for both individual experiences and our intellectual production and disciplinary culture. I explore these issues by drawing on my own experiences as a Chicana within geography, and by examining the extent to which one area of research, environmental justice, has engaged questions of race and the consequences of that engagement. I conclude with some general remarks on what it might take to significantly diversify geography.     

Stages on Journeys: Some Remarks about Human Geography andPsychotherapeutic Practice

This paper attempts to open up discussion about interconnectionsbetween psychotherapeutic practice and human geography. I offer brief “here and now” observations to introduce the importance of personal experience and interpersonal relationships. I then construct an autobiographical narrative to elaborate the themes of separation and connection. This frames my preliminary explorations of tensions and convergences between ideas flowing from psychotherapeutic practice and human geography. I conclude by stressing limits to knowledge.     

Courtroom Ethnography: Researching the Intersection of Law,Space, and Everyday Practices

This article argues for a more sustained use of courtroom ethnography by geographers as a means to research legal phenomena, especially in matters of court trials. To do this, I begin by referencing two main threads of courtroom ethnographies conducted in disciplines outside geography, specifically the spaces of the courthouse and courtrooms and the study of emotion and bodily performances by sociolegal and sociology scholars. To then underscore the ways in which a geographical perspective can enhance this existing research and point to topical and theoretical interventions that courtroom ethnography might offer geography, I draw on my experiences with courtroom ethnography on the criminal trial against former Enron chief executives Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling. This experience produced a nuanced and lively understanding of how law, justice, and space comingle through the court’s physical spaces and performative embodiments. My conclusions emphasize courtroom ethnographies’ scholarly opportunities for researchers who study the intersection of law and space, while also reflecting on its challenges. Key Words: corporation, courtroom, Enron, ethnography, legal geography.     

关系经济地理的研究脉络与中国实践理论创新

关系经济地理学是当前经济地理学界的主要流派之一,当前国内研究对该流派中的全球生产网络分析框架较为熟悉,但是对流派本身的认识不足。本文全面回顾了该流派的缘起、孕育、成型和深化拓展的历程,对存在问题展开评述。主要得到三个结论：① 关系经济地理有鲜明的地理学科特色,是全球化研究不可或缺的中坚力量,是提升经济地理学科地位的重要支撑。② 关系经济地理当前的理论模型存在体系复杂、变量过多的问题,同时核心解释变量缺乏完整的理论推导逻辑,依然需要靠案例来完善实证,而无法定量测度。③ 当前学者已经在国际期刊上基于中国实践进行理论修补与创新,为我们提供了良好的示范。本文为此评述了两个系列的研究,评述基于中国实践进行理论创新的方法和路径。本文有助于推动中国经济地理研究的国际化,对探讨中国经济发展实践经验的理论创新,有着积极的科学意义。     

Exploring the Benefits of Field Trips in a Food Geography Course

University students often cite field experiences as some of their most important and memorable. Yet research shows that field trips are on the decline in many colleges and universities; this shift may impact geography courses that are traditionally field based. Often cited is the problem of instructor time, increased enrollment, and concerns over liability. However, field experiences give students opportunities to develop competencies, forge community connections, and provide tangible experiences that encourage deep learning. This project employs survey data from a food geography course to understand how field experiences combined with classroom discussion help students internalize and reexamine course content.     

人文主义地理学蕴含的现象学——对大卫·西蒙《生活世界地理学》的评介

中国大陆地理学界对人文主义地理学与现象学之关系的介绍不甚充分,引介的文章数量十分有限,且多集中介绍段义孚先生的作品和观点。文章通过评介另一位著名人文主义地理学家大卫·西蒙的《生活世界地理学--动、静和相遇》,旨在促进人们更为深入地了解人文主义地理学。此书是人文主义地理学的代表著作之一,出版之际正值西方人文主义地理学盛行。全书共分为5大部分,其中第二、三、四部分集中了作者的学术观点,分别对应该书副标题中的“动”“静”和“相遇”。现象学是人文主义地理学的哲学基础,内容比较艰涩。因此文章结合该书提到的例子和经验中的例子,凝练出该书的重要观点,并使其形象化。文章评介该书的基本观点是：第一,该书通过抽象的现象学的概念和方法实现了对大量日常环境经验的描述;第二,该书内容对规划设计以及环境教育相关人士具有启发性和指导意义;第三,该书并没有实现人文主义地理学与“科学的”现代地理学的直观对比,因此尚未显性化现象学研究方法的优长;第四,以现象学态度反观本评介,本评介当然也带有两位作者的主体性。     

超越地理学二元性: 混合地理学的思考

20世纪的地理学经历了“空间-分析”地理学和“社会-文化”地理学的分裂,对学科的发展带来了持久的影响。本文从历史角度探究“空间-分析”地理学和“社会-文化”地理学分裂的原因,提出保持地理学观点的多样性、促进不同领域的沟通是地理学学科发展的理性选择。在实现“空间-分析”地理学与“社会-文化”地理学沟通的方式方面,地理学认识论与研究方法之间并不存在一一对应的关系,定量方法与定性方法可以在不同领域中混合使用,从而实现对社会-理论与空间-分析隔阂的超越。本文阐释了“混合性”的理念在超越地理学社会-文化/空间-分析二元性中所具备的潜质,并简要总结了混合地理学已有的研究实践,对以“混合性”为基础、面向“后社会-理论、后空间-分析”的地理学未来进行了展望。     

The significance of the personal within disability geography

Drawing on in-depth qualitative data, this article critically examines disability geography as a subfield where the personal is highly valued. The value and the risks inherent in this personal approach will be evaluated, including the usefulness of being an 'insider' and the difficulties of being reflexive and critically making use of one's positionality. The article concludes with reflections regarding how disability geography can confront its marginal status, appealing to researchers who claim no experience of disability while also supporting and encouraging those with personal experiences of disability to participate in the field.     

Preparing Geographers for Interdisciplinary Research: Graduate Training at the Interface of the Natural and Social Sciences

Recent debates about the state of geography raise valuable questions about how the discipline can and should change in response to shifting institutional realities. Focusing on the breadth and interdisciplinarity of geography, these discussions often overlook the role of pedagogy—particularly graduate training—in adapting the discipline to new institutional landscapes. Drawing on experiences as current and recent geography doctoral students, we identify institutional seedlings of opportunity that can be cultivated toward a spectrum of alternative doctoral training models. These alternatives offer significant opportunities to better prepare early-career geographers for success and to solidify geography's position as a leader in interdisciplinary research.     

Unintentional Transgressions and Other Reflections on the Job Search Process

In this article I examine connections between my past experiences on the academic job market and my research interests, particularly in regard to the notion of transgression. I offer my personal “story” of job seeking as a contribution to the dialogue concerning the relationships between personal lives and professional experiences, and as a case study of how considerations of merit can become clouded by personal and social discomfort with difference.     

Engaging Reflexivity and Positionality

Debates about research methodologies have recently gained currency in human geography. This paper examines my response to qualitative research I recently undertook on female single parents and their residential location choice. I discuss the methodology and examine issue of positionality and reflexivity as their elate to my research.     

声景学及其在旅游地理研究中的应用

声音是旅游者旅游体验的活动构成要素之一,也是强化旅游者对旅游地地方感知的重要内容,对于塑造旅游者完整深刻的旅游体验具有重要意义。从旅游地理研究的现状来看,在旅游资源开发利用、旅游产品包装设计、旅游设施空间配置、旅游形象塑造构建、目的地营销拓展等方面,研究者普遍关注了旅游系统中的视觉要素,对听觉、嗅觉、触觉等其他要素却关注得较少。基于此,在对旅游系统中声音要素进行重要性分析的基础上,将声景学及其相关理念引入旅游研究的范畴,为研究旅游系统中与声音相关的现象和关系提供了新的视角,并指出了拓展现有旅游地理研究的一个重要方向。声景学的引入,对完善和深化旅游地理研究具有重要意义。     

What kind of quantitative methods for what kind of geography?

This paper asks why we teach what we teach to geography undergraduates in quantitative methods courses. We re-consider the origins of quantitative geography and note how partial and historically contingent the traditional syllabus is. From this basis, we suggest that other approaches should be considered in order to provide a broader training in quantitative methods. We then propose an example syllabus that attempts to integrate a range of quantitative methodologies within a common, applied context that is also connected to relevant social, economic and political issues. We conclude that students with a better understanding of methods in physical and social science could be very valuable to the betterment of society, but to achieve this may require a change to our quantitative methods teaching.     

DECLINING STUDENT PERFORMANCE IN COLLEGE GEOGRAPHY AND THE DOWN-WRITING OF TEXTS

Student preparation for college showed significant declines through the 1970s, according to Scholastic Aptitude Tests and other indices. During the same period, scores declined on my standardized, mid-term exam used for introductory physical geography at UCLA. I suggest that the latter is primarily caused by the former. As a result of declining preparation and abilities, many physical geography texts have been down-written to a high-school level. These texts have grave implications for the quality of learning, recruiting of quality students, and academic respect for geography as a discipline.     

The engaged geographer: Research in the wider community

After 55 years in geography, it might be useful to look back at the why, how, what and where of my public involvement, as a suggestive guide to younger geographers, in and out of academia who may be interested in putting their geographic knowledge and skills to use in the wider community. Although my motivations may usually have been altruistic, there have often been substantial benefits, for example, in the form of recognition, supplementary income, positions for students, and publications. Projects will be divided into three sets: (1) more ‘pure’ non-reimbursed service activities; often in the local community (2) contractual public sector projects, and (3) court case participation.     

Locating the Melody of the Drives

Psychoanalysis has profoundly influenced those social theories that inform qualitative methodology in human geography. Yet many geographers are skeptical about the value and viability of psychoanalytic methodology because of its alleged reductionist causal explanations and relativistic interpretations of data. Drawing on the work of Slavoj ?i?ek, which affirms Jacques Lacan's undermining of the dualism of causality versus sense, this article illustrates the potential value of Lacanian psychoanalysis as a qualitative methodology in geography. Using a methodological case study from my research on Jamaican tourism, I illustrate how we can locate a Lacanian understanding of the drives in the interactions between tourists and hotel workers. In so doing, the article provides new insights into the enduring allures of tourism's commodity-form by focusing on how the object petit a—a chimerical object that incites desire and an unattainable object that the drives encircle—takes place in customer service and entertainment activities.     

Witches, children and Kiva-the-research-dog: striking problems encountered in the field

This paper examines how power, privilege and vulnerability can surface in unexpected ways during fieldwork. Drawing from my experiences working with indigenous women and children who beg and sell on the streets of Ecuador, I suggest that researchers do not always hold as much power as we might assume. By positioning myself within stories about witches and children, I discuss how multiple research identities can shift power dynamics in unsettling and unexpected ways. In this paper, I also reflect upon a particularly unorthodox research method: using my dog as a research assistant. My dog inadvertently became instrumental in providing access to children's life stories; however, her presence also highlighted some of the dramatic incongruities between their life experiences and my own.     

Intimate Distance: The Unconscious Dimensions of the Rapport Between Researcher and Researched

To explore how psychoanalysis might contribute to the methodology of human geography, this article returns to Freud's experiences of psycho-logical analysis before he develops psychoanalysis as a distinct understanding of the mind, identity formation, and subjectivity. Going back over the early history of psychoanalysis, Freud's psychoanalysis can be seen as an attempt to solve a set of problems inherent in late nineteenth-century psycho-logical analysis. Thus, it is possible to cast his methodological solutions in a new light. In particular, this article explores the problems associated with the unconscious rapport that developed in the therapeutic use of hypnotism in the cure of hysterical symptoms, for both doctor and patient. Freud's techniques can be seen as a way to produce an appropriate detachment—or intimate distance—between himself and his clients. This intimate distance is instructive. As a corrective to certain trajectories within human geography, this article identifies five methodological propositions that might inform future research.     

地理学是一门脆弱的学科吗?——哈佛大学撤销地理系事件及其反思

在历史上,中外地理系或地理专业被撤销或改名的事件不断重演,催生出地理学是否为一门脆弱的学科的关键问题。文章选取在地理学思想史上有重大影响的哈佛大学撤销地理系事件作为典型案例,在分析其背景的基础上,根据多种文献资料,深入透视该事件的真相及其后续影响。哈佛大学撤销地理系的原因非常复杂,主要是科学主义盛行的氛围、大学管理者的傲慢、自然与人文的内斗、政治因素、歧视同性恋、大学财政拨款受限、特定的时代背景等。地理学的脆弱性实际上是学科身份认同和如何定位的问题,它主要取决于如何处理地理学与其他学科、社会、政府与管理部门的关系,也就是地理学的科学性、社会性和政治性。作为一门早已独立且历史悠久的交叉学科,地理学与其他学科、社会和政治的密切关联既是其脆弱之处,也是其优势所在。