BELGIAN SETTLEMENT AND SOCIETY IN THE INDIANA RUST BELT*

ABSTRACT. At first glance the industrial city of Mishawaka, near the northern border of Indiana, appears to be ethnically homogeneous. Closer examination, however, reveals the rich ethnic heritage of Mishawaka, as it does in so many other Rust Belt cities from Pittsburgh to Chicago. One of the most fascinating of these immigrant stories is the rise of Belgian Town, on Mishawaka's southwest side. This study examines residential, commercial, and social patterns of this evolving ethnic community during the first three decades of the twentieth century. Although industrial jobs attracted immigrants to the city, creation of a Flemish Catholic church provided the foundation on which to build a tightly knit Belgian community.     

GEOGRAPHY IN THREE WORLDS: HOW POPPER'S SYSTEM CAN HELP ELUCIDATE DICHOTOMIES AND CHANGES IN THE DISCIPLINE*

Popper's concept of Worlds 1. 2, and 3 is discussed briefly in the light of idealism and materialism and to illustrate the debate about reification and reductionism. Then six types of change in geography are classified as changes in the phenomenal environment (World 1) and in that part of the behavioral environment that constitutes World 3. These changes involve those comparisons within or between “Worlds” that identify future research problems.     

WOMEN'S WORLDS AT THE AMERICAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY*

ABSTRACT. For much of the twentieth century, women in the United States found it difficult to obtain university positions in geography. Opportunities existed in other types of institutions, however, including the American Geographical Society (ags ). This article addresses ways in which the Society's mission intersected with its historical context from 1895 to 1970 to create niches for women in editorial and library work. It explores the women's origins, their perspectives and experiences with the ags , and the significance of their contributions to the discipline. It suggests the potential of a gendered social approach for enriching understanding of the histories of geographical institutions.     

COMMUNITY,SOCIETY, AND THE INDIVIDUAL

ABSTRACT. “Community” is a good warm word frequently invoked by citizens, social workers, and politicians. “Society,” by contrast, is more ambivalent, invoking something elitist and exclusive, as in the expression “high society.” The word “individual,” or “individualism,” often connoting selfishness and bracketed with society, is even more suspect in our time. I plead for a restoration of balance and esteem among the three terms as a necessary step toward acquiring a fuller understanding of the human condition and potential.     

HYPHENATED GEOGRAPHIES: THE DEINDUSTRIALIZATION OF NATURE‐SOCIETY GEOGRAPHY*

As visions of ecological crisis mark the daily headlines, industrial spaces of intensive energy and material consumption become a more intense object of political and social concern. In this article, I attempt to situate geography's relative neglect of the ecological underpinnings of industrial capitalism within the context of the history of geographical thought. I argue that the ways in which geographers read the hyphen in the phrase “nature‐society” reveals epistemological limits to their object of study. I then offer three dramatically different readings of the hyphen and discuss how they have affected the lineages and trajectories of geographical research—Barrows's human ecology, Sauer's cultural landscape, and critical theories of social nature. I conclude by suggesting that geography needs to let go of its empirical and conceptual fixation on “nature”.     

THE SACRED,THE REGIONAL,AND THE DIGITAL*

ABSTRACT. As an information economy and a cultural hallmark, cyberspace belies traditional boundaries yet involves a distinctive territory, citizenry, literature, technology, capital and finance, ritual, weapons and belligerencies, a recognizable past, and variegated if unspecified futures. Not easily quantified is the geography of so elusive and placeless an entity, and its technology has been variously portrayed as utopian, liberating, elitist, or enslaving; in it are brought to life strains of technological determinism. Maps of cyberspace can be forged only with utmost difficulty, and it is best beloved and imagined in dense cyberpunk fiction. Part sacred space, part ethereal region, part digital fact, cyberspace involves a regional geography perhaps best captured in a koan: What is the place where everyone is but nobody lives?     

REGIONAL IDEAS AND THE MONTANA-ALBERTA BORDERLANDS*

ABSTRACT. The borderland concept is not often applied to the U.S. West's northern boundary, but the northwestern Great Plains have been the subject of at least two border-straddling regional conceptions: Whoop-Up Country, based on a shared regional history; and Chinook Country, based on a shared natural environment. Both ideas can be found to varying degrees in northern Montana and southern Alberta, but as expressions of regional distinction, their significance and meaning differ sharply north and south of the international boundary. In borderlands such as these, nationalism and regionalism intersect.     

REALISM AND THE PRACTICE OF GEOGRAPHY*

Realism is a philosophy of science wherein researchers attempt to identify structures and agents present in society and how they tend to act. Philosophical debates over realism, which have often been confrontational, have clouded the practical contributions of a realist approach to substantive research. The latter is the focus of this paper. Many realists combine several bodies of theory to explain the complexity of societies. In using these theories, realists clarify the distinctions between questions concerning observable phenomena and the processes that create them. A realist approach illuminates the elusive nature of social “facts” and the problems of meaning, interpretation, and understanding in researching the social world.     

GEOGRAPHERS AND THE TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY*

ABSTRACT. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) was the largest, most comprehensive, and most controversial regional development and planning project in U.S. history. Geographers were involved from its inception and made impressive contributions. Aside from the unit area method of data gathering and mapping, little is known about their contributions, some of which were truly ahead of their time. Although their work and recommendations were often discarded and unheeded because of political turbulence, the geographers rarely complained or entered into the political arena. Their work in the TVA has generally gone unheralded and even unappreciated within the geography profession. The primary purpose of this article is to document their contributions.     

COSMOPOLITICS AND THE MARITIME WORLD CITY*

ABSTRACT. Cosmopolitanism has emerged as a humanistic perspective to express globalizing societal experiences. What are its geographies? World cities are centers of globalizing processes, and their populations and institutions may share elements of cosmopolitical worldviews. Most world cities have also been ports, yet in the contemporary global imaginary, many world cities are not readily understood as places of maritime activity, historic or contemporary. Disjunctures in perceptions of the coastal city-region reflect changes in the world economy and human experiences in modes of travel. This analysis recovers geographical processes of maritime urban areas as a basis for understanding transhistorical and geographical factors of cosmopolitics in globalizing regions and contemporary intellectual thought.     

CAPTAIN BRITAIN AND THE NARRATION OF NATION*

Captain Britain Weekly (1976–1977) was the first comic book specially created for the British market by New York‐based Marvel Comics. The title character was created as an analogue to Captain America, the legendary American nationalist hero of the so‐named comic book, but with key differences meant to resonate in the British context. I utilize visual and textual discourse analysis to study the narrative and imagery used to introduce this character to British comics fans, and I discuss readers' letters to the editor to evaluate audience response to the character and story lines. Attention is drawn to the hero's origin, which fuses science and magic to construct a paradoxically primordial, yet modern, British identity. Villains in these story lines provide hints about “un‐British” behavior and provide lessons for young readers, with direct moral connections to, and contrasts with, the narratives found in Captain America.     

TELECOMMUNICATIONS AND THE GLOBALIZATION OF FINANCIAL SERVICES*

Financial services are undergoing a major period of internationalization. National markets are interlinked by telecommunications, a process induced through deregulation and new communications technologies. This paper reviews the recent, intertwined trends in the finance and telecommunications industries in light of urban and regional restructuring theory, cites several company-specific examples, explores the impacts on the international urban hierarchy and the labor process (e.g., back offices), and assesses the role of teleports. Finally, it offers an agenda for further research.     

THE IODINE FACTOR IN HEALTH AND EVOLUTION*

ABSTRACT. Iodine is essential for modern humans and may have been essential for Neandertals as well. Today about 30 percent of the world's population is at risk of iodine deficiency disorders (idd ), 750 million people suffer from goiter, 43 million have idd -related brain damage and mental retardation, and 5.7 million are afflicted by cretinism, the most severe form of idd . Distinctive Neandertal skeletal traits are identical to those of modern humans who suffer from cretinism. Cro-Magnon Venus figurines also exhibit distinctive traits associated with cretinism among modern humans. This new evidence, coupled with recent mitochondrial dna findings, suggests that a single genetic alteration, which improved the ability of the thyroid gland to extract and utilize iodine, may account for differences between Neandertals and modern humans. Late Pleistocene human evolution, consequently, may be explained by several alternative interpretations involving iodine pathology and/or biological adaptation. Speciation may have resulted from the geographical isolation of inland populations.     

URBAN CARTOGRAPHY AND THE MAPPING OF CHICAGO*

ABSTRACT. City maps are among the oldest and most popular forms of cartographic representation, yet urban cartography has received only limited scholarly attention. A review of the early history of city mapping suggests a progression of representational forms from profile to perspective to plan, a progression that parallels urban growth. The history of urban mapping reflects a desire to comprehend the geography of the city for reasons of curiosity and practical necessity, but the map also may become an icon that engenders a sense of pride and belonging, if not allegiance and control. An examination of Chicago maps indicates that, in addition to evolution in representational styles, the subjects of maps change to serve demands of the moment. City maps not only constitute a rich historical archive but also are dynamic agents in urban development. The urban landscape is shaped by cartographic vision.