Unruly topographies: unemployment, citizenship and land settlement in inter-war Wales

Between 1934 and 1939, over 5000 people, mainly ex-miners and their families, were settled in government-owned land settlements in England and Wales. This policy emerged as a response to mass unemployment, and complemented other schemes for the unemployed developed by the inter-war National Government. This paper will consider the geographical conditions that were imagined, realized and contested in these settlements. Acknowledging the hybrid and liminal nature of these spaces, the paper mobilizes new work in cultural and historical geography and draws out the heterotopic potential of the settlement programme.     

A laboratory cave for the study of wall degradation in rock art caves: an implementation in the Vézère area

The aim of this proposal is to present an original approach to the study and preservation of rock art caves. A multidisciplinary study of cave wall alteration will be performed to understand the impact of environmental context on the evolution of wall surfaces. The approach involves the choice of a cave with characteristics similar to painted caves in the studied area (Vézère Valley in Dordogne, France): e.g., cave wall alteration, lithology, morphology, etc. This selected cave is intended to become a laboratory cave, monitored for the acquisition of chemical, physical and biological environmental data on bedrock, air and fluids along with their characteristics. A cave without art or archaeological interest has been chosen specifically to conduct experiments, to make in situ analysis and to obtain samples. The results are to be completed by specific observations in several other caves and compiled in a database.     

Regional survey and the economic geographies of Britain 1930–1939

This paper re-considers the history of economic geography in the interwar period in Britain. The activities of the discipline are considered in the context of the commercial geographies of this time, and the intensive round of industrial and social surveys undertaken at a regional level in Britain in the period. Taken together, these economic geographies constructed a range of representational and material spaces and helped construct industrial regions characterized by particular types of places, peoples and performances. These surveys, and the production of the economic geographies that they facilitated, became a key intellectual arena where conflicting ideas about the political and economic management of the industrial region and the national economic were acted out. Following the intention of recent work into the histories of geographical knowledge, the essay will seek out the lateral associations of economic geography, paying particular attention to politically situated nature of the economic geographies produced by academics, regional organizations and the Labour Party.     

Geographic and Historical Observations on the Future of a Federal Russia

A paper assessing prospects for the future of federalism in Russia investigates geographic and other factors that historically have either promoted or inhibited the unity of the Russian state. Among the major factors complicating the process of forging a new federal relationship among Russia's central government, republics, and oblast-level units, the paper focuses on the question of the Russian state's legitimacy, the only partial character of democratization, limited experience with constitutional federalism, and contradictions between individual and ethnic rights. 2 tables, 19 references.