Cultural Geography Flashcards
3 broad usages of culture
Raymond Williams, 1981
3 uses of culture:
1: A process of intellectual, spiritual development
2: As a ‘way of life’ characteristic of particular groups
3: Works & practices of intellectual & artistic activity
Cultural forms: Films, paintings, theatre, museums, music
Broad concerns for cultural geography
Difference & identity:
(Carl Saver) He saw that cultures & societies both developed out of their landscape, but also shaped then too
LANDSCAPE:
•Imprint of human culture upon the earth - traditional
•Landscape is a framework for visualising & depicting the world
CRUCIALLY:
•Landscape takes shape between the realms of human perception & human imagination
•Landscape is a way of seeing things (Wylie, 2007)
•How we see is biological, how we look is a cultural matter
POWER: Shapes understanding of landscape, for whom and how do landscapes reinforce power relations
MEMORY pt.1
Memory is a lens on the present not the history of the past
“Memory is not just info that individuals recall…it is a process of continually remaking & remembering the past in the present rather than a process of discovering objective historical ‘facts’ (Karen Till, 2005)
MEMORY pt.2
Memory is collective:
•memory is an ongoing & active process —>& is given meaning through performance & repetition
Memory is contested:
•Shaped by struggles over what & whose past should be remembered & how
•These struggles are often shaped by identity politics: class, gender, race, sexuality
Animal geog
‘The very conception of what an animal might be, & by implication what it means to be human is itself culturally relative’
‘The term animal is now commonly employed in 2 contra-dictionary senses: One inclusive of humanity, the other negative & exclusive, denoting all that is considered inhuman or anti-human
Human/Animal
This binary between human & animal is problematic
Consequences:
•treat animals as inert, passive objects of our knowledge-ethical consequences
•Treat animals as resources which to exploit - ethical consequences
The zoo
Kay Anderson, ‘culture & nature at the Adelaide Zoo’ (1995)
•The zoo ‘an institution that inscribes various human strategies for domesticating, mythologising & aestheticising The animal universe
Main reasons for animal geography
1: Conservation - ecological concern
2: Animal welfare - ethical concern
3: Describe the world more fully - theoretical
4: To question & understand humanity - what does it mean to be human ?
Gender & geog
Feminism
Aims to identify & dismantle systematic gender inequality & the mynaid ways in which gender differentiation…naturalise, anchor & relay all kinds of social exclusion
Issues: violence, sexual harassment, education
Waves of feminism
1st wave
1st:
-Late 19th To early 20th century
-Europe & N.America
Context: Urban industrialisation, liberal & socialist policies
Characteristics: Open opportunities for women beyond the domestic sphere strive to achieve suffrage
—>Focus on education, employment, marriage laws
-Issues were mainly from middle class, white women
2nd wave of feminism
2nd:
1960s-80s
Context: Civil rights & anti-war movements, increased awareness & concern about minority groups
Characteristics: Raise awareness of sexism & patriarchy, reproductive rights, equal political & economic rights, sexual liberation, radical politics
3rd wave of feminism
3rd:
80s-90s
Context: post colonial & postmodern
Focus: Destabilise constructs of gender, sexuality & sex
Characteristics: expression of 2nd wave feminism but not essentializing all women as having the same issues, concern with the ‘subaltern’, challenge gender norms
Splintered into diverse groups: Marxist, Feminism
Post feminism
Belief that 2nd wave feminism though once useful has created a ‘victim mentality’
—>Women in the west achieved social & legal protections they required to be equal
-Assume feminism is unfemine & irreconcilable w/family, marriage
4th wave feminism
4th:
Mid 2000s
-social media
Context: Intersectionally, focus on solidarity w/other social justice movements
Characteristics: ‘call-out’ & challenge culture regarding sexism & misogyny
