Teaching critical thinking in world regional geography through stakeholder debate

Using a stakeholder debate based on a real-world case of regional construction – that of Turkey's application to join the European Union – improved students' critical thinking in an introductory world regional geography course. Such courses are a staple offering among US geography departments, and often the only exposure of non-majors to geographic thinking. A stakeholder debate highlighting regional construction, using structured learning activities and reflection on their own thinking, improved students' critical thinking. We describe the stakeholder debate and its revision after one semester, and provide data from assessment and thematic coding of students' reflection papers.     

The service sector,regional specialization,and economic growth in the Victorian economy

During the Victorian period there were substantial regional variations in employment in the service industries. Explanations of economic growth in this period have been dominated by the notion that it was industry-led. If that were so, service growth would be a function of industrial growth. Testing of this thesis by econometric methods suggested that industry provided a poor explanation for variations in services, and that the main explanation was provided by variations in income. This raised other questions, since income per head in the industrial areas was generally much lower than in the less industrialized and service-oriented south of England. There is an abundance of evidence to suggest that this service-oriented regional growth was not derived from industrial development but from international trade and finance together with the consumer spending of a wealthy landed society. There was thus a substantial element of economic and spatial dualism in the Victorian economy. The role of heavy industry in Victorian growth thus needs to be revised considerably downward, and the importance of services and the South East region in particular revised considerably upward. Indeed it is by no means sure that the industrial regions provided the principal stimulus to Victorian growth: the evidence of this study would suggest otherwise.     

Archaeomagnetic research in the Andean highlands

Eleven archaeomagnetic samples were collected from several sites near Porco, Bolivia as part of the Proyecto Arqueológico Porco-Potosí. These samples were collected in order to 1) explore the availability of appropriate sample materials in the Bolivian Andes, and 2) assess the feasibility of pursuing reference curve research for this region. In addition, this research explored the archaeomagnetic dating application of reference curves constructed from the global geomagnetic field model gufm1 (Jackson et al., 2000), which covers the period from AD 1590–1990. This model is particularly applicable to our project, since many of the project sites are late prehispanic (pre-AD 1532) and early historic (ca. AD 1532–1825) in age. Of the 11 samples, three appeared to contain an insufficient amount of ferromagnetic minerals to provide reliable results, while eight samples produced acceptable-to-good results. The data from the eight good samples were compared to a reference curve for the period of AD 1600–2000 that was calculated for this project from the global field model, gufm1. The archaeomagnetic dates obtained for two of the samples agreed with archaeological expectations, while those for four other samples marginally or greatly postdated the archaeological age expectations. Two additional samples produced significantly different directions and could not be dated against the reference curve. It is likely that the age discrepancies for four of the samples stem from inaccuracies in the archaeomagnetic data, the archaeological age expectations, the calculated reference curve, or some combination of these factors.     

Global shift. Mapping the changing contours of the world economy (5th edition) * Peter Dicken

Being asked to review Global Shift is a somewhat daunting task.Most if not all of the readers of this will be familiar withthe book, if not in its current form then in previous editions.The fourth edition of the book, published in 2004, was describedby Nigel Thrift in his back-cover endorsement as being ‘beyonddefinitive’ whilst Thrift suggests the fifth edition is‘not just recommended but essential’. It, therefore,goes without saying that the book continues to act as a seminalcontribution to our understanding of processes of globalisation.Taking this as read, I want to consider here how the changesand additions made to the latest version of the book advanceour understanding and further build on the strengths of earliereditions [see Musson (2004) for a review of edition four].