Humanistic geography
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Humanistic Geography emerged in the Anglo-American discipline during the 1970s. Humanistic geography is a manner of approaching within the field of human geography that seeks to put humans at the centre of geography (Gregory et al., 2009 : 356, 357). Human geography, is concerned with the ways in which place, space and environment are both the condition and in part the consequence of human activities. Humanistic geography tries to understand the human world by analysing people’s relations with nature, their geographical behaviour and their feelings and ideas in regard to space and place, these form the fundamental ‘data’ of humanist inquiry. (Tuan, 1976: 266) | Humanistic Geography emerged in the Anglo-American discipline during the 1970s. Humanistic geography is a manner of approaching within the field of human geography that seeks to put humans at the centre of geography (Gregory et al., 2009 : 356, 357). Human geography, is concerned with the ways in which place, space and environment are both the condition and in part the consequence of human activities. Humanistic geography tries to understand the human world by analysing people’s relations with nature, their geographical behaviour and their feelings and ideas in regard to space and place, these form the fundamental ‘data’ of humanist inquiry. (Tuan, 1976: 266) | ||
The main objective of humanistic geography is to bring human beings in all their complexity to the centre stage of human geography (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 58) | The main objective of humanistic geography is to bring human beings in all their complexity to the centre stage of human geography (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 58) | ||
| - | This objective is pursued explicitly in opposition to the curiously ‘peopleless’ character of much that had been previously been passed of as ‘human’ geography. It was a response to the dehumanizing effect of both positivism and Marxism. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357) During late 1960’s science as a whole was under attack for failing to solve human problems or notice human problems. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 69) F.C.S. | + | This objective is pursued explicitly in opposition to the curiously ‘peopleless’ character of much that had been previously been passed of as ‘human’ geography. It was a response to the dehumanizing effect of both positivism and Marxism. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357) During late 1960’s science as a whole was under attack for failing to solve human problems or notice human problems. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 69) F.C.S. [[schiller]] notes that humanist thought sees itself having a ‘practical’ dimension. Schiller is worried that intellectualism with no eye for the individual human beings leads to intellectual debate that is of little practical use to anybody. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 60) |
The humanistic approach pays attention to the role of human beings out there in the real world as they perceive, interprete and shape the human geography of their surroundings. Deliberate stress is given to place: space enriched with the meanings, experiences and knowledge of human beings. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357 & Tuan, 1976 : 266) Humanistic geographers believed that social life was constructed through human actions.(Gregory et al., 2009 : 347) | The humanistic approach pays attention to the role of human beings out there in the real world as they perceive, interprete and shape the human geography of their surroundings. Deliberate stress is given to place: space enriched with the meanings, experiences and knowledge of human beings. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357 & Tuan, 1976 : 266) Humanistic geographers believed that social life was constructed through human actions.(Gregory et al., 2009 : 347) | ||
Revision as of 10:01, 8 September 2011
Humanistic Geography emerged in the Anglo-American discipline during the 1970s. Humanistic geography is a manner of approaching within the field of human geography that seeks to put humans at the centre of geography (Gregory et al., 2009 : 356, 357). Human geography, is concerned with the ways in which place, space and environment are both the condition and in part the consequence of human activities. Humanistic geography tries to understand the human world by analysing people’s relations with nature, their geographical behaviour and their feelings and ideas in regard to space and place, these form the fundamental ‘data’ of humanist inquiry. (Tuan, 1976: 266) The main objective of humanistic geography is to bring human beings in all their complexity to the centre stage of human geography (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 58) This objective is pursued explicitly in opposition to the curiously ‘peopleless’ character of much that had been previously been passed of as ‘human’ geography. It was a response to the dehumanizing effect of both positivism and Marxism. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357) During late 1960’s science as a whole was under attack for failing to solve human problems or notice human problems. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 69) F.C.S. schiller notes that humanist thought sees itself having a ‘practical’ dimension. Schiller is worried that intellectualism with no eye for the individual human beings leads to intellectual debate that is of little practical use to anybody. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 60) The humanistic approach pays attention to the role of human beings out there in the real world as they perceive, interprete and shape the human geography of their surroundings. Deliberate stress is given to place: space enriched with the meanings, experiences and knowledge of human beings. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357 & Tuan, 1976 : 266) Humanistic geographers believed that social life was constructed through human actions.(Gregory et al., 2009 : 347)
The very beginnings for contemporary humanistic geography forms the Renaissance, it gave the humanity a much more important place in the cosmic than had been the case in Medieval times. The human subject was seen as something indispensible to human thought and action (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 61)
Humanistic geography embraces a diversity of philosophies, methods and substantive studies present in geographical literature. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 57) based on philosophies as Essentialism, Idealism, Phenomenology and Pragmatism. (Gregory et al., 2009 : 357)Humanistic geography has developed in a more fragmented way over the past two decades than has been the case with the parallel development of Marxist geography, this can be explained by the fact that humanistic geographers have ranged widely over a diversity of quite incompatible intellectual positions. (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1991 : 57)
The humanistic approach seems to have lot in common with ‘behaviouralism geography’, but these can be distinguished by the fact that the behaviouralism geography uses quantitative methods and the humanistic geography uses particularly qualitative methods for the research on human beings. (Aitkin, Valentine, 2009: 162, 163)
References:
Cloke, P., Philo, Ch. & Sadler, D. (1991) Approaching Human Geography. Chapman, London.
Gregory, D., Johnston, R., Pratt, G., Watts, M., Whatmore, S. (2009). The Dictionary of Human Geography, 5th edition. London: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing.
Ley, D. & Samuels, M. (1978). Humanistic geography: prospects and problems.
Tuan, Y. (1976).Humanistic Geography. University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.
Published by Marjolein Selten & Fleur van der Zandt
