faculty focus
A plea for human geography
Emeritus professor Peter Curson argues that his discipline is more relevant and useful than ever. By Antonia Maiolo
Peter Curson is the emeritus professor of human geography at Macquarie University and professor of population and security at the University of Sydney. We spoke to him about why he believes his discipline is more relevant and useful than ever.
WHAT IS HUMAN GEOGRAPHY AND HOW HAS ITS PRESENCE IN UNIVERSITIES CHANGED? Human geography has always been concerned with issues of people and places, with identifying, measuring and evaluating dynamic patterns of movement, variability, temporal and spatial change. It has always tried to adopt an integrated approach, particularly when it comes to understanding the interaction between people and their environment.
Once upon a time, human geography was important. It was a critical part of the teaching program of most of our high schools and enjoyed a sterling reputation in most of our universities. Professors of human geography were among the most sought after social and scientific commentators of the day and commanded considerable media and scientific attention.
WHERE DOES HUMAN GEOGRAPHY STAND TODAY? In the first place, in our secondary school system human geography has withered on the branch and no longer is regarded as a critical and important discipline. Unlike history, geography is generally not seen as a vital and compulsory part of our educational system. Its place has been usurped by myriad new subjects like business studies and earth and environmental studies.
In our universities, geography has been rent asunder. Physical geography is now accepted as a respectable science, although often existing under the title of environmental science, while human geography has been banished from science faculties and dispatched to distant pastures. In addition, unlike the situation in New Zealand, no university in Australia has a standalone geography department any more. Now human geography is usually found in the encasement of environmental studies, the built environment, planning and environmental management or geography and urban studies, while physical geography makes its home in environmental science, climatology or geomorphology.
WHAT CHALLENGES DOES THE STUDY OF HUMAN GEOGRAPHY FACE? For many decades in most universities, human and physical geography were close but occasionally uncomfortable bedmates in geography departments. Such proximity encouraged interdisciplinary teaching and research. Despite the fact that physical geographers always saw their future in the mainstream sciences while human geographers tended to lean more towards the social sciences, genuine collaborative research and teaching did flourish and there is little doubt that students benefited from interdisciplinary courses that demonstrated just how complex our world really is. In my own field of medical geography I worked closely with climate scientists and geomorphologists in an effort to understand the physical and human background and impacts of climate change and natural disasters, as well as medical issues like asthma and infectious disease.
What really matters is the fact that decades of productive and valuable cooperation will become much harder to preserve. Formerly, the existing traditional disciplinary boundaries were no barrier to genuine attempts to understand the complexity of our environment and the interaction between people and the biophysical and built environment.
To be sure, some of the fault for the current predicament rests at the door of human geographers themselves, many of whom have abandoned the traditional view of population, social, economic and political geography and embraced a world of feminist studies, of deconstructing space and socio-critical perspectives on modern life.
WHY IS THE STUDY OF HUMAN GEOGRAPHY RELEVANT TO CONTEMPORARY SOCIETY? Human geography studies how we are shaped by the people around us and by the physical space we inhabit. It is particularly relevant today in so many ways following the rise of terrorism and bioterrorism, the ever-increasing threat of epidemics of infectious disease and the growing impact of climate change and natural disasters. Human geographers have much to contribute in the debate about geopolitical events, about the nature of risk and about the role that the biophysical and built environments play in our lives.
In the long run it may not matter where in the university universe human and physical geography sit; what really matters is that an interdisciplinary and integrative approach to world problems is preserved and is available to our students. n campusreview. com. au | 25