Histories of Geography

15th Century - The age of Exploration

Geography moved away from reading, and towards hands-on experience

18th Century

Emergence of a new form of exploration - pursuit of scientific enquiry

Voyages of James Cook (18th Century)

1768-1771 - South Pacific, HMS Endeavour, 1772-1775 - Australia, 1776-1780 - North America

Alexander Von Humboldt

Naturalist, wanted to know how the local linked with the global

How Humboldt distinguished between Europe and Latin America

Europe: place of culture/civilisation, Latin America: consisted of ‘nature’

Museum named after Humboldt and his brother

The Humboldt Forum

What is Humboldt considered the father of?

Modern Systematic geography

What was formed in 1821?

Paris Geography Society

What was formed in 1828?

Berlin Geographical Society

What was formed in 1830?

Royal Geographical Society

What was Darwin’s theory?

Theory of Evolution

When did Geography start being taught in Universities and schools?

End of the 19th Century

What had a strong influence on geography and other disciplines?

Darwin’s ideas on evolution and natural selection

What is Carl Ritter known for?

He became the first professor of Geography in Berlin in 1920

What is Ritter considered the father of?

Regional Geography

Why is Ritter considered the father of Regional Geography?

He wanted to be able to integrate and draw connections between people and nature

When did Darwin publish his theory of evolution?

1859

What is environmental determinism?

The belief that human societies are shaped and determined by their physical environment.

What is scientific racism?

Geographers see a link between regional climates and racial constitutions

Who was Freidrich Ratzel?

German geographer, who viewed the state as an organism

View of Carl O. Sauer

Geography was the study of ‘culture areas’, Culture + Nature = Landscape

What was the dominant way in which geography was taught from the 1930s - 1950s?

Regional Geography

Who led the rise of Regional Geography

Richard Hartshorne

How did Richard Hartshorne define geography?

The identification and classification of ‘distinct regions’

What was Halford Mackinder’s view?

Geography as a human struggle for space and resources

When did Harvard close their geography department?

1948

Why did Harvard close their Geography department?

After WWII, the future of geography was uncertain

Why did Regional geography fail?

It was too general and dated in an increasingly modern world, there was a desire for more specialist knowledge

When was the Quantitative Revolution?

1950s/60s

What happened in the 1950s?

There was a shift in geography from Regional Geography to Systematic Geography

What is Central Place Theory?

Why settlements are located where they are in geographical areas

Who was Walter Christaller?

Nazi Geographer, who helped influence Nazi influence over Eastern Europe

What happened to geography in the 1960s?

Geography as a spatial science was no longer ‘fit for purpose’

Problems with Spatial science

It had become too abstract and detached from the realities of the real world, and it appeared irrelevant

Who was David Harvey?

He began as a Spatial Scientist, but in 1971 called for the ‘overthrow’ of Spatial science

Marxist thinking

Struggle and antagonism are at the heart of a capitalist society. If we are to enable social change, then you need to change the mechanics/ the base of society not the superstructure.

Aims of Marxist Geographies

To make geographers more politically aware and active, and try to enforce revolution

What is Radical geography?

A geography that seeks to explain society and provide alternatives to existing social inequalities/challenges

When did Humanist geographies emerge?

1970s, as spatial science was rejected.

What is Humanist Geography?

Geography that highlights the way that individuals make the world meaningful, putting ‘humans’ at the centre of geography

Humanism

How humans intend to take action, why they take said action and reflecting on what they have done

What happened in the 1970s/80s?

The number of female students and lecturers began to rise

When was phase 1 of feminist geographies?

1970sW

Phase 1 of Feminist Geographies

Highlighting the problems that women faced - exclusion, social battles for equality for women, many issues seemed to be ‘women’s issues’

When was phase 2 of feminist geographies?

1980s/90s

Phase 2 of Feminist Geographies

Focused on the geographies of gender: gender roles and gender relations, highlighted male hierarchy in society; patriarchy

When was phase 3 of feminist geographies?

1990s

Phase 3 of Feminist Geographies

Feminist geographers showed how geography was ‘masculinist’

What is critical geography?

It investigates how capitalism and patriarchy construct our geographical worlds

What do more than human geographies focus on?

Nature-culture networks, and topics that human geographies had neglected

What do Hybrid Geographies focus on?

How the natural and social interact; nature causes social outcomes, and society causes natural outcomes

What did Tim Cresswell argue?

We may be returning to a world which would be recognised by Humboldt and Ritter in which nature and culture are part of the same intellectual arena