On Dittmer's Popular Culture,Geopolitics, and Identity as a classroom resource

In this intervention, four geographers, all of whom have used Jason Dittmer's book, Popular Culture, Geopolitics, and Identity, in their classes, assess its status as a teaching resource. All have had considerable success using Dittmer's book, alongside other resources, to cultivate critical thinking and critical knowledge production in a wide range of classes.     

Research note: The Scottish household survey

Abstract

My personal recollection of the ‘relevance revolution’ in the 1970s is that it was a reaction to a quantitative geography that was overly-focused on technique and under-concerned with real-world issues. The consequent search for relevance took the form of a commitment to liberal- and left-leaning ideologies and issues. This differed from concepts of relevance as pertinence/timeliness, or as applied geography. Postmodern thought is significant in current debates on relevance in all three of its manifestations: relevance as commitment, pertinence and application.     

Announcing: The Janice Monk Lecture in Feminist Geography

In this brief announcement we have the pleasure of introducing the inaugural Janice Monk Lecture in Feminist Geography. The lecture will appear annually in the pages of Gender, Place and Culture. The first lecture, printed here, is by Ruth Fincher of the University of Melbourne. Her article is preceded by four papers that pay tribute to Jan Monk's academic achievements and her dedication to encouraging and guiding the careers of emerging scholars around the world.     

Dreaming of a Golden Bengal: Discontinuities of Place and Identity in South Asia

This article analyses five different representations of the homeland category “Bengal”. The region of Bengal was partitioned twice in the twentieth century and imagined in a multitude of forms at different historical moments. The article describes the conditions that allowed different territories and peoples to crystallise as “Bengal” and “the Bengalis”, and investigates why some versions of the Bengali homeland proved durable as others faded away. Rather than asking who is the real Bengali and where is the real Bengal, it investigates how particular identity categories become popularly practised and why particular images of the homeland come to be perceived as true, legitimate and authentic. It concludes that homeland categories are never fixed and finalised, but are rather always in a process of becoming, and are contested, reimagined and redefined as socio-political contexts change.     

Geographers in Their Ivory Tower: Academic Geography and Popular Geography in Paris 1931

Abstract: French academic geography achieved remarkable success during the 1920s making Paris an appropriate location for the XIIIth International Geographical Congress to meet in 1931. These scholarly activities were counterpoised by expressions of an exotic 'popular geography' at the great Exposition Coloniale staged in the French capital at the same time. At the Congress, French academics displayed their research achievements in denudation chronology, rural settlement studies and cartography, extending their work from the Hexagon to parts of the Empire. Patronage by leading professors in Paris and Grenoble clearly played a vital role in shaping the discipline. The location and content of excursions for visiting scholars also highlighted French achievements and suggested what remained to be done. Scrutiny of activities at the XIIIth IGC reveals a profession whose official pronouncements appear isolated from the momentous economic and political changes triggered by global depression at that time.     

Edgar Kant and The Rise of Modern Urban Geography

In every theory and worldview there are subjective and contextual elements. While knowledge is embedded and rooted in socio‐spatial contexts, it is also located in the bodies of researchers and travels with them. A travelling theory of knowledge is based on several context‐sensitive theories and concepts. This paper discusses Edgar Kant (1902–1978) and his work in the context of its important contribution to early modern urban geography. Kant as a person and his work is seen in the Estonian societal and academic context.     

试论旅游形象的理念识别

本文从遗产类旅游产品和现代类旅游产品两个侧面,探讨了文化学范畴的旅游形象理念识别.     

社会心理学视域中的“社会认同”

社会认同理论是二十世纪八十年代以后逐渐兴起的社会心理学理论。伴随着全球化浪潮与社会认同、自我认同危机的逐渐显现,社会认同理论逐渐蔓延到社会学、政治学、民族学、人类学等社会科学研究之中,成为当代社会、文化、族群心理研究的重要理论之一。为了使我们更好地了解、运用社会认同理论,本文从社会心理学的角度就社会认同的概念、内涵及形成机制、支撑体系进行了梳理。     

Cardinal Markers of Finland's Identity Politics and National Identity

This paper analyzes geopolitical themes prevailing in dominant sectors of the Finnish government and society that have shaped Finland's national identity from the early 19th century to the present. The focus is on the ways cardinal markers (compass directions) have become geopolitical and identity markers. Notions of "West," "Between East and West," "Neither West nor East," and "North" have been used both to position Finland on the world political map and to forge a Finnish national identity. The influence of Russia and Karelians are examined at some length as part of the eastern dimension of Finnish identity. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: O52, Z13. 1 figure, 1 table, 94 references.     

海外印度移民及印度政府的侨务政策

作为人口大国之一 ,印度与中国一样 ,有着庞大的海外移民群体及其后裔。目前 ,海外印度人已超过二千万人 ,分布在 1 1 0个国家和地区。上世纪 90年代以来 ,随着海外印度人对所在国和印度影响的增强 ,海外印度人在印度及海外都引起了比以前更多的关注。印度政府采取了一系列措施 ,以吸引更多的海外印度人投身印度国内的经济建设 ,为印度的发展作贡献。本文概述海外印度移民的基本情况 ,分析海外印度人与印度的联系及对印度的影响以及印度政府对海外移民的政策 ,希望从中能得到某些启示 ,从而对中国的侨务政策提供某些参考和借鉴。     

Shades of Orange: The Electoral Geography of Ukraine's 2004 Presidential Elections

Two American geographers and noted specialists on the electoral geography of post-Soviet Russia and Ukraine describe and analyze the three rounds of Ukraine's pivotal and highly contested presidential elections in late 2004. In an effort to shed light on the underlying demographic and socio-economic correlates of the vote (e.g., age, income, urban/rural residence, language/ethnicity), the authors pay special attention to changes among the rounds, providing background to widespread allegations of electoral fraud in round two (first runoff). Finally, they summarize results of bivariate and multivariate regression analyses that reveal which among the various correlates contribute most to explaining differences in the vote. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: H10, O18, R10. 6 figures, 5 tables, 26 references.     

Co-learning: Re-linking Research and Teaching in Geography

Focusing on Digital Worlds, a first-year geography blended learning course at the University of Auckland, this paper gives voice to the students, examining how they perceived e-learning versus traditional learning mechanisms; how e-learning mechanisms have affected their learning behaviour; and why certain e-learning mechanisms offered in the course were more appealing than others. It demonstrates that students' views are determined by their individual learning styles and how they perceive the university experience. Information and communication technologies were recognized to provide complementary learning benefits, especially when other factors inhibited learning, but traditional mechanisms such as lectures were still greatly valued.     

Fear and Foreign Bodies: The Bible and "Post-Racial" American Identity

Abstract

The Bible has played a prominent role in US political discourse, shaping ideas of race, ethnicity and identity. Its influence on the political landscape today is most evident within conservative politics—among evangelical Christians and the Tea Party Movement. At least in perception, its influence has been divisive. What role do biblical scholars and academic theologians have to play in contemporary social and political discourse, particularly with respect to race? This article approaches the question first by way of the concept of the political as espoused by Carl Schmitt and the category "race," both as applied to antiquity and to the modern period; second, through a reading of Genesis 20; and third, through attention to contemporary discussions of race among contextual and liberation theologians, focusing on the problem of essentialism in the constitution of identity. The article concludes by drawing together these elements to offer thoughts on a future course of American identity in the context of post-race desires and fears.     

The Form and Function of Poverty: Examining National Identity through Public Housing Architecture

Abstract

Lawrence J. Vale tells us that “grand symbolic state buildings need to be understood in terms of the political and cultural contexts that helped to bring them into being,” ¹ 1. Lawrence J. Vale, Architecture, Power, and National Identity (London: Routledge, 1992), 3. and that these buildings can help us understand our national identity. But all buildings are part of a broader political and cultural context. Even unimpressive state-funded buildings express meaning about the politics, power, and priorities of a nation. Because these buildings are not purposefully symbolic, their symbolism has the potential to provide a less contrived—though perhaps less appealing—portrayal of the nation in which they are built. Public housing provides an example of this idea. Public housing in the United States is latent with negative meanings that are reinforced and perpetuated by its architecture, siting, and design. This article examines three historical and iconic public housing communities and analyzes the meanings of these spaces through Goodman's four frames of reference—denotation, exemplification, metaphorical expression, and mediated reference—to determine what these spaces, as architecture, say about the American national identity and our relationship with public housing.     

GIS进入历史地理学研究10年回顾

地理信息系统进入中国历史地理学研究已经有10年历史,本文回顾了这10年间以CHGIS为主要代表的历史地理信息化建设的主要成果,显示出这一手段已经成为历史地理某些方向的常规方法,特别在历史河流地貌研究中发挥了很大作用,使历史时期河流的相对精细形态得以呈现。以黄河"京东故道"重建为代表的空间矢量数据获得方法为学界相关研究树立了典范,在矢量数据重建的基础上,"度-簇"结构和"分形"在分析所获得的历史空间矢量数据方面具有很大前景。     

The Relationship Between Teaching and Research in Australian Geography

This paper considers how higher education geography is a discipline that can make a significant contribution to addressing inequality and engaging with the agenda for social change. It adopts the view that the teaching of geography can promote social transformation through the development of knowledge, skills and values in students that encourage social justice and equity. The paper explores how teaching about social transformation is closely interlinked with teaching for social transformation and considers some of the pedagogical approaches that might be used to achieve these. It considers how the lack of diversity of higher education geography teachers impacts on these issues before moving on to consider how the nature of different higher education systems supports or constrains geographers' abilities to teach for social transformation. Finally, the paper ends by asking individuals and geography departments to consider their commitment to teaching for social transformation.     

Teaching Economic Geography in Two Contrasting Asian Contexts: Decentering Anglo-American Economic Geography in China and Singapore

Teaching economic geography outside Anglo-American countries presents a particular pedagogical challenge, as theories and concepts developed in these countries might not be directly applicable outside their intellectual and national contexts. In this paper, the authors show how the peculiar institutional and development environments in China and Singapore have shaped the ways in which the economic geography curriculum is developed and taught in institutions of higher education. They also examine how students respond to the intellectual challenges presented to them. In their view, successful pedagogy in teaching economic geography requires a significant degree of localization of the curriculum.     

近20年来历史地理信息化的发展成就

历史地理信息化是20世纪90年代后期发展起来的历史地理学新兴方向。基于论文、专著、会议报告、访谈等多种材料,回顾了中国历史地理信息化的基本发展历程。从平台、组织、数据、应用、新技术实验和研究视角等角度介绍了历史地理信息化所取得的成就。历史地理学不可能回避信息时代这一大背景,新技术、新方法的利用将有力推动历史地理学取得更大发展。