Challenges to geography's public and practitioners

Abstract

Economic geography is in a state of flux. This paper argues that there is a need to develop a relevant and theoretically informed economic geography. Some of the more difficult challenges facing both teachers and students are outlined, and the author describes how such difficulties have been tackled through an Enterprise in Higher Education initiative centering on innovative assessment procedures for group research projects. The project is evaluated in terms of potential gains to both staff and students.     

Linking Research and Teaching: A staff‐student interview project

This paper describes a project used in the first-year curriculum that requires students to interview a member of staff about their research as a possible model to link research and teaching in the university. Through a critical evaluation, which draws upon responses canvassed from students and staff, the value of the project is assessed and its scope for application within other institutions suggested.     

Some Ideas and Reflections on Teaching 'Ideas' in Geography

This paper outlines the characteristics of a seminar on realism which forms part of the teaching of 'ideas and methods in geography' in the department concerned. The seminar requires each of about a dozen students to answer a specific question by reading a single paper, writing a summary answer to the question based on this source, and delivering an oral presentation. The questions are structured to deal with abstract theoretical issues at first, and then to consider the implications of these issues for research practice. The experience of the seminar is intended to help students prepare for an open-book examination, and to develop the research planning for their dissertations. Student feedback is reviewed, and ideas for modification of the seminar structure are discussed.     

Producing African-descent: afro-peruvian music,intangible heritage,authenticity and bureaucracy in a Latin American music compilation

ABSTRACT

Policy and actions for the safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) are laced with politics of representation and meaning-making of expressive culture within and outside communities. This article explores how ICH experts, practitioners, activists, and other actors negotiate and re-construct ideas of racial identity and authenticity in one such initiative. Sponsored by CRESPIAL in 2012, the album Cantos y Música Afrodescendientes de América Latina is a compilation of music of Afro-descendant communities in Latin America. Conceived as a project for safeguarding the musical ICH of these communities, it involved participation from thirteen Latin American governments. This paper, centered on the Peruvian participation in this project, studies the bureaucratic intricacies of this project, exploring how ideas on racial identity and authenticity overlap with political agendas and administrative requirements in order to produce a unified representation of ‘Afro-Latin American’ music. My analysis highlights 1) the local knowledge systems that inform the ideas of racial identity and authenticity advanced by the project’s actors; 2) their adopted strategies within Peru’s bureaucratic network of heritage management; and 3) the positionality, capacity and agency of each actor for achieving their particular goals in this collaborative project.     

Staff selection: the interview and beyond

Abstract

The Teaching Assistant (TA) system operating in the United States has both advantages and disadvantages to graduate students employed as TAs and undergraduates taught by these TAs. The system develops teaching and communication skills and broadens TA capability, understanding and marketability. Discussion and lab sections taught by TAs provide an arena where undergraduates are exposed to everything from simple ideas to difficult ideas that need hands‐on help. However, few quality control procedures are employed to determine prospective TAs. Moreover, TA training is of limited extent and use. TAs either sink or swim; none the less the vast majority do survive and do an excellent job. A number of measures that any university, college or department might employ if they intend to begin employing TAs are recommended: all TAs should attend TA orientation sessions that discuss university‐wide TA issues; departments should also create sessions that specially train TAs in how to teach their respective courses; and departments should develop TA evaluation schemes that quickly identify TA problems.     

ODE to a geography teacher: Sexuality and the classroom

Abstract

This paper explores some of the ways that sexuality is an issue in the course of teaching. It includes discussions of crushes between students and staff, consensual personal relationships between staff and students, sexual harassment and how to create an atmosphere in the classroom/institution that enables lesbian, gay and bisexual students and staff to ‘come out’.     

Student–staff partnerships in learning and teaching: an overview of current practice and discourse

ABSTRACT

Student–staff partnerships in learning and teaching are not a new idea but have seen a growing interest and momentum in recent years. In this article, I provide an overview of the background and context of increased student–staff partnerships, a definition of partnership and some of the benefits. I highlight several examples of practice from different countries, universities and disciplines, and involving different numbers of students, which help to illustrate some of the variety of what is possible in student–staff partnerships in learning and teaching but also some of the challenges. I will focus on key ideas currently being debated in student–staff partnership work in the form of theoretical framing; contested definitions; mixed motivations and concerns about partnership being co-opted by neoliberalism; the imperative of inclusion; and the role of student–staff relationships. I conclude by considering what ways geographers might contribute to future research and practice, by offering some practical strategies for establishing and maintaining good quality partnerships in learning and teaching and with suggestions for enhancing the community and culture within which we operate.     

Discussion papers

Using Africa for the regional context, this article presents an instructional strategy for improving students' awareness of African world-views and the news media's coverage of the continent. After studying about African world-views and the media's representation of Africa, students use a research/writing project to evaluate the media's inclusion of world-views in the coverage of selected African events. The research/writing project helps students to become more inclusive in their awareness of cultures and to develop writing skills and electronic network research skills.     

Bringing Australian foreign policy alive through teaching and assessment practice

ABSTRACT

If we are to help students develop opinions and perspectives on world politics, and understand at the same time what it means to hold these opinions and perspectives in the Australian context, we need to bring the world to the classroom. Information overload has led to feelings of alienation among students, and the way we teach needs to instil in students a sense that they are stakeholders in Australian foreign policy, and help them develop strategies for incorporating the complex information environment into their learning. In this short piece I propose two forms of assessment that authentically place the focus on these learning outcomes.     

Images of the third world: teaching a geography of the third world

Abstract

This paper focuses on how to teach undergraduate students to analyse critically various received images of the Third World. This is achieved through the use of a detailed practical exercise which is based on poster, newspaper and map representation of the Third World. The concepts of identity, positionality and representation are reviewed and there is a discussion of how an awareness of these concepts should help students understand the influencing power of stereotypical images of distant others.     

Internationalisation of the Curriculum: Designing inclusive education for a small world

Responding to the globalisation of commerce and communication and driven by competition in the multi-billion dollar international market for higher education, many universities are seeking to market their educational provision internationally. Feedback from some disappointed 'customers' has created pressure for change in the way that instruction is designed and delivered. This pressure is beginning to affect teachers in subjects perceived as international in perspective. This paper reviews the strategies suggested by Western universities to achieve internationalisation of the curriculum. Internationalisation is a major project that affects all aspects of a university's provision, including its priorities for staff development and career rewards. The challenge for course developers is to design a curriculum that serves global rather than national priorities, which does not rely on prior knowledge of local provenance, where students from all sources share equal opportunities for advancement in an inclusive learning environment, and which serves to introduce stay-at-home students to the demands of an increasingly multinational world of work.     

Learning by ‘design’: how undergraduates in Singapore learn to become engineers

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we explore the evolving norms and dispositions of creativity and enterprise of engineering students using data gathered from a newly established technology and engineering-focused university called ‘UniTech’ located in Singapore. Based on interviews with students, we seek to explain (1) what they learn, reject, adopt and appropriate; (2) the kinds of challenges they face and (3) the unexpected and serendipitous outcomes of their learning. Through an integrated engineering curriculum focusing on design, students learn to be technically competent, creative and entrepreneurial persons. This paper considers how the curriculum works as a set of formal procedures preparing students for a future ‘knowledge-based economy’ imagined to be technology-intensive, dynamic and filled with opportunities but also increasingly uncertain. We analyse how students at UniTech negotiate this design-focused curriculum where experiences of creativity, open-ended possibilities and holistic perspectives intersect with the national economic agenda of a knowledge-based economy.     

Analysing Heritage Landscapes with Historical GIS: Contributions from problem-based inquiry and constructivist pedagogy

This article examines a practical classroom experience using GIS technologies to analyse aspects of a local heritage landscape. An inventory of historic buildings comprising architectural and construction details was revised in the field and then analysed using GIS software. Elements of the geographies of these buildings were displayed using thematic mapping and students used these maps to develop explanatory hypotheses and to suggest policy options for future management of the heritage landscape. Practically, the project demonstrated the contribution GIS can make to historical geography methods, engaged students in an externally supported research partnership working with real-world data, and suggested directions for local public policy formation. Pedagogically, the project demonstrated that historical GIS can be used effectively to shape problem-based inquiry and constructivist learning.     

Critical spatial learning: participatory mapping,spatial histories,and youth civic engagement

As digital technologies become ubiquitous in many places, scholars of civic engagement, youth and political life, and geographic education have explored the potential of teaching critical and spatial thinking through digital technologies. This paper examines interactive digital mapping as a technology environment for teaching and practicing critical spatial thinking, in relation to civic engagement. From this participatory and dialogic mapping project with teenage girls in Seattle, Washington, we develop a conceptualization of critical spatial thinking that emphasizes how social and spatial processes intertwine to generate societal inequalities and show how this learning informs students’ social and spatial civic responses. We show how interactive digital mapping pedagogies offer students an opportunity to develop awareness of what happens in their urban geographies, but also how and what they might do to intervene.     

'An Unbelievable Academic and Personal Experience': Issues around teaching undergraduate field courses in Africa

This paper explores the teaching of geography field courses in Africa for UK university undergraduates. Using largely qualitative feedback, the experiences of students, staff and local communities involved in field courses to Kenya, Zimbabwe and The Gambia are evaluated. Benefits and disbenefits of these field courses to the participating students, the local community and teaching staff are scrutinised. The paper concludes that such field courses to 'exotic' destinations are an effective means to student recruitment and certainly achieve their aims while providing meaningful teaching and learning experiences. Furthermore, the analysis shows that field courses to 'poor' destinations in sub-Saharan Africa can avoid dangers of 'development tourism' if conducted with ethical sensitivity.     

Reflecting on Reflective Learning: The case of geography,earth and environmental sciences

This paper examines how reflective learning can be promoted and developed explicitly within the disciplines of geography, earth and environmental sciences. A review of various theoretical perspectives on reflection is provided, as well as a brief summary of the ways of incorporating reflection in the curriculum. The substantive part of this paper is based on a UK Learning and Teaching Support Network (LTSN) Subject Centre for Geography, Earth and Environmental Science (GEES) funded research project on reflective learning which was completed in 2001. A questionnaire survey was sent to GEES departments/schools to obtain information about the incorporation of reflective learning in the curriculum. From the analysis of the questionnaire returns, the project team identified four themes regarding the relevance of reflective learning to GEES disciplines. Project findings demonstrate how the inclusion of reflective learning exercises and activities is at an embryonic stage in many UK GEES departments/schools. The paper concludes by highlighting certain challenges that geographers, earth and environmental scientists could address if they wish to seek to develop reflective learning and enhance the student learning experience.     

A note from the editors of JGHE

Abstract

Employers were involved in assessing students’ presentations, giving feedback and in the development of staff skills for providing feedback. The curriculum context to the oral presentations is described and the problems and benefits of employer involvement are considered. It is argued that it is possible to develop an effective small‐scale approach to employer involvement as an alternative to major schemes.     

The missing piece of the integrative studies puzzle

ABSTRACT

Within Interdisciplinary Studies (IS), the effectiveness of Integrative Studies has been hampered by the difficulty of effectively integrating/synthesizing theories among multiple disciplines. Without effective integration, we cannot generate theories that will enable highly effective action. This paper presents Integrative Propositional Analysis (IPA) – a tool based on an emerging stream of research on the structure of theories. Using a few simple rules, IPA provides a concrete visual-mapping approach to integrating theories. And, of equal or greater importance, IPA provides an effective method for measuring ‘how integrated’ or ‘how coherent’ theories are as a new way to predict how useful the theory will be for representing our understanding of complex situations and improving the ability of individuals, organizations, and coalitions to take effective action based on those theories. This is expected to be particularly useful for students and interdisciplinary teams for integrating theoretical perspectives in an initial assessment of problems and situations.     

“This is what it is like”. An interview with the writer Geoffrey Moorhouse

Abstract

Observational fieldwork enables the completion of a qualitative research project despite the tight constraints of a research methods course. At the same time, the project enables the illustration of more general features of qualitative research. This paper considers the need to deconstruct the ‘folk myth’ surrounding observational work and provides clear, practical guidance on completing a piece of research. Completion of the project helps to uncover the role of students as analysts. The paper concludes with a discussion of student's reactions to their introduction to qualitative work and the constraints upon its wider adoption.