Geosophy

From Geography

Geosophy

Geosophy is the study of geography from any of all points of view (Wright, 1947). John K. Wright invented this term in his 1946 presidential address to the Association of American geographers (Cloke, Philo & Sadler, 1999). In stead of just looking at the one point of view of the academic geographer, geosophy studies how (groups of) people perceive and imagine the world. This makes geosophy part of humanistic geography.

Geosophy is not an objective study and the stricter methods of analysis can not be applied. A survey of the subsequent use of the term by geographers suggests that some geographical ideas are transmitted largely by undocumented, informal methods.Also, by emphasyzing the role of human nature, geosophy differed from the dominant geographical approaches of that time. With the use of geosophical inquiries it provide us background and perspective of certain elements of geography. It shows us how we think about and observe our place in the bigger picture of the world. From scientist to farmers and from businessman to politicians it shows their view on several elements of geography. This shows different kind of 'opinions' and acknowledges it as a non-objective study of geography. In this way we can understand the relationships of of scientific geography to the historical and cultural conditions better and become better-rounded scientific geographers.

References

• Cloke P, Philo C, Sadler D. (1999). Approaching Human Geography
• Wright, John K. (1947). Terrae Incognitae: The Place of Imagination. Geography Annals of the Association of American Geographers 37: 1-15.

Michael Handley (1993). John K. Wright and Human Nature in Geography

Contributors

• page created by --SusanVerbeij 12:02, 7 September 2011 (UTC)
• page enhanced by Paul van den Hogen --PaulHogen 13:38, 10 September 2012 (UTC)