Critical geography
From Geography
Critical geography looks critical to the study and analysis of geography. Maybe the words of Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 25, defines it most properly: ‘A critical geography needs to engage with the everyday practices of all of us who live in the places that we do; it needs to focus on the needs and interests of the poor and the underprivileged; it remains a very modern enterprise, retaining a belief that it is possible to make the world a “better” place.’ It is a very broadly used term for a group of geographical concepts focused on the (un)just power relations in capitalism, colonialism, class and gender for example. To possibly change this focus lies on the role of power and confrontation in production and reproduction of landscape, place and space. Aside of this attentions are made on inequalities within academic geography and its learned societies.
Critical geography can be seen as a critique on positivism introduced by the Quantitative revolution. This geography can be seen as one of the major turning points in the history of geography. Major turning points that came before were, in chronological order, environmental determinism, regional geography and the quantitative revolution.
Critical geography lead to three main schools of thought.
One of them is Behavioural Geography which was not new but made a comeback. It tries to challenge quantitative side of geography and provides a greater understanding of how people perceive space and place.
Radical Geography is the second ideological concept. It argues that quantative research is not usefull when there are no solutions nor alternatives. Therefore it argues that positivist quantative methods are useless.
The last and probably most accepted ideology is Humanistic Geography. It argues that human research should always be qualitative instead of quantitative.
References:
- Harald, B., Engel-Di Mauro (2008). Critical Geographies: A Collection of Readings
- Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 25
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- Page created by Paul van den Hogen --PaulHogen 15:07, 24 September 2012
