Human Geography Test 2 Flashcards
Chapter 5
The Cultural Turn
Reshaped social sciences 1980s.
Suggest two things:
1. Different understanding of culture
2. Increased appreciation of importance of culture in understanding humans and their political and economic activites.
Symbolic Interactionism
- Plurality of Cultures
Humans learn things through social interactions; our behaviour is
a product of our response to the perceived environment.
- No single fixed entity called culture
- Plurality of cultures: values that members of human groups share in particular places at particular times.
Rethinking Culture, Identitiy and Difference.
- New Approaches
New Approaches Emphasized
- The dynamic nature of culture
- Plurality of cultures
Inequalities within society examined
Landscape was re-examined as socially constructed.
- Symbolic: read with iconography - Description/interpretation of visual images in order to uncover their symbolic meanings.
- Representations: depiction of the world - subjective as they are affected by identity of person making them.
Focus on Difference
Culturl turn explores culture as a process
- People create landscapes as places
- Identity seen as socially created
- Examined the role of power - ability to dominate
Hegemony can shape identity creation.
- members of society interpret their interests in terms of the world view of the dominant group.
Space and place connected to axes of power (class, gender, sexuality)
Defining Race
Problematic classification based on skin color and other physical characteristics.
Race is a social construct
Racialization: process by which people and groups are viewed through a cultural invented framework.
Myths of Race
1
- Human evolution is not a ladder of progress resulting in a finished product.
- Stephen Gould: evolution seen as a branch with endless branching twigs producing species over time.
Myths of Race
2
- Race reps human subspecies - Not True: Different physical characteristics due to environments.
- Minor and changeable over time.
Myths of Race
3
- Races classified via intellegence level
- All humans members of the same species. We have secondary characteristics.
Racism, Identities, and Genocide
- Minority groups can be labeled negatively and treated poorly.
Genocide
- Organized, systematic effort ot destroy a group.
- requires spacial distancing of group indicating they do not belong.
- Requires power and authority - Justification of attacks.
Racism, Identities, and Apartheid “seperate development”
European colonization practice.
- 1948-94
- South african policy by which four groups were spacially seperated.
- Created seperate Black and White states meant to allow for independence and equal rights.
- Really it allowed whites to continue way of life exploiting black labor.
Racism and Migration
- Slavery
- Direct/Indirect immigration policies.
- Usually involuntary
Slavery
- Abolshed by Brits in 1834, French in 1848 and Dutch in 1863.
- Then turned to indentured service: Contracted labour via migration to work plantation fields. Cheap labour.
Forced Migration a problem
- Human trafficking 3rd most lucritive in the world.
Immigration Policies
- Effect migration
- Direct ratial or ethnic exclusion - Chinese head tax.
- Indirect exclusion: Language and literacy requirments.
- Prompted by nativism: Favoring the rights of native born over foreign born.
Ethnic Migration
Often times immigrants moving urban placed in social and spatial isolation creating enclaves or ethnic colonies (Ghetto).
Local groups identity reinforced through chain migration.
- Migrants follow same path as friends or family who migrated first.
Ethnicity
Shared cultural traits
- Language/religion
- Often defined as a minority
- Shared history and identity
- Identity can change over time.
Both inclusionary and Exclusionary
- Some considered insider due to shared identity of group.
- Others outsiders due to being different.
Assimilation or Acculturation
Most immigrants experience one or the other when moving into cities.
Assimilation: Group absorbed into larger society and loses identity.
Acculturation: Absorbed into society but retains identity. Usually due to living closely with others from same group.
Multiculturalism
State policy that endorses the right for ethnic groups to remain distinct.
Canada
- Two official languages, but many cultures.
- Fed policy dating back to 1971
- Canadian Multiculturalism Act 1988 - all Canadians full and equal participants in society.
Gender
Socially constructed differences between men and women.
Vs.
Biological and anatomical differences.
- Involves power relations between dominant males and subordinate females
- Meghalaya uses matrilineal line where all wealth passes thourgh females.
Feminist Geography
At forefront of geographic research about production of difference.
Recognizes need to move away from simple bianaries: Gender diveristy
Gender in Landscape
Can reflect inequalities between men and women
- Statues of men
- Domestic design: residential areas to seperate men and women - Kitchen at back of the house.
Modern economic and social structures defined and enforces gender roles.
- Suburban geography - men commuter and women homemakers requiring close access to schools and shops.
Gender and Work
Social structure of modern workforce.
- Wage employment is valued
- Domestic, reproductive and caring activities undervalued.
- New spatial division of labour seeing more women in paid employment.
- Women see sexist practices and gender stereotyping in paid workplaces.
Sexuality
- Queer Theory
- Expression of identity: sexual orientation and practices.
- focuses on challenges to a dominant heterosexual landscape.
Controversial term
- People seen as and/or made to feel different because of their sexual identity.
- Recognized fluidity in sexuality: empowers those who lack power.
- Attitudes towards different sexuality vary over time and cultures.
Identities and Landscapes
- Built landscapes generally reflect dominant culture
- Landscapes reflect identity
Differnet scales reveal different patterns of culture.
- Microcultures - small groups of people within larger culture.
- Youth cultures (music, sports)
Imposing dominant identities can lead to landscapes of resistance.
- Understanding of one place different to different groups which can create conflict over that place.
Occupy Protests
- Began in New York in 2011
Designed to challenge established ideas about how space was occupied, that is, what it was used for and what it meant to people.
Geographies of Well-Being
- Well-being
- Welfare Geography
Well-being: degree to which the needs and wants of a society of individual in satisfied.
Welfare Geography: An approach to human geography that maps and explains social and spatial variations in well-being/welfare.
Indicators of Well-being
7
Smith
1. Income
2. Living environment
3. Physical/Mental health
4. Education
5. Social order
6. social belonging
7. Recreation and leisure
Extreme inequalities in USA.
All have primary goal to avoid harm
Measuring Well-being Cont.
- Capitalist economy allows income inequalities
- Lots of deprivation and poverty correlated to minority groups.
Two Important Areas Where Spatial Differences are Evident.
- Crime: higher rate in inner cities and poverty areas
- Health and Healthcare: health problems related to physical environment, social factors and access to services.
Geography of Happiness
- Happiness how we perceive ourselves and cannot be measured
- Relationship with health, education and prosperity.
- Denmark is happiest country
- Congo least happy
Elite Landscapes
Rich have spatial patterns
- Higher elevations
- Golf courses
- Seperate communities
- Close to lake, river, ocean
- Away from pollution
Landscapes of Stigma
- Pariah
- Dispair
- Fear
Pariah Landscapes
- people in ghettos and on reserves.
Landscapes of Dispair
- prompted by discharges mental patients.
- Inner-city homeless people
Fear
- Elderly people and women most susceptible to violence
- Violence identified with specific locations.
- Mental maps of safe and unsafe areas.
Folk Culture
- Survive mostly in rural areas.
- Resist change
- More homogeneous
- Traditional lifestyle
- Religion and ethnicity unifying variables
- Hutterites, Amish, Mennonites
Popular Culture
- Emerged with industrialization/urbanization
- Trends change quickly
- Landscpaes associated with placelessness - Malls, sport venues, public gardens.
- Heterogeneous and considered mainstream society
- Food, music, fashion.
Tourism
- Originates with economic development and higher income.
- Largest economic activity
- tourists and host communities form identities
- Tourist search for authenticity can conflict with local sense of place.
Styles include
- Mass tourism: form of mass consumption.
- alternative:
- Ecotourism: tourism that is more environmentally sustainable.
Chapter 6
Political Geography
Political Geography
Study of the spatial manifestations of politics and political matters.
- Effects states have on individual and group (nations) behavior.
- Politics often about struggles for power over people and spaces.
Sovereign State
Self-governing sovereign political entity with well-defined, and usually agreed-upon, territorial boundaries.
Supreme authority or right of individual states to control political,
economic, and social affairs within its boundaries without external
interference.
