The Dictionary of Human Geography (112 page)

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Latin America
In conventional usage, the term refers to those countries of the American contin ent that share a history of Spanish, Portuguese and French colonialism. However, the term also is widely used to denote all countries south of the USA (Lewis and Wigen, 1997, p. 182). The term?s ambiguity has led to academic disputes over how the category is defined and which coun tries properly belong within it. For instance, Quebec is not included, despite a history of French colonialism; nor are the Mexican states annexed by the USA in 1848. The problem with such debates is that they presume a natural con gruence between geographical categories and an underlying social reality, which can be accurately mapped. Obscured are ontological questions concerned with how categories are constituted through intersecting discourses and interlocking power geometries. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Since its inception, the term ?Latin America? has been tangled in colonial and post colonial contests over identity and terri tory (Mignolo, 2005). John Phelan (1968) attributes the term to nineteenth century French scholars, who positioned France as the leader of a Latin ?race? engaged in a strug gle for domination against Anglo Saxon and Slavic racial blocs. According to Phelan (1968, p. 296), the term ?Latin America? was baptized in 1861 in La revue des races Latines, a maga zine ?dedicated to the cause of Pan Latinism?. Theories of Pan Latinism were called upon to naturalize attempts by Napoleon III to expand imperial power in what was then commonly called Hispanic America. (NEW PARAGRAPH) However, the idea of pan Latinism also cir culated in Spain and Hispanic America in the mid nineteenth century, as intellectuals from the Creole elite expressed anxiety about the imperial ambitions of Anglo Saxon America (Ardao, 1992). Chilean scholar Miguel Rojas Mix (1986) attributes the term to Francisco Bilbao (1823 65), an exiled Chilean writer living in Paris in the mid nineteenth century. According to Rojas Mix, Bilbao used the term in a speech in 1856. Arturo Ardao (1992) credits the Colombian writer Jose Maria Torres Caicedo (1830 89), also living in Paris, with its christening in 1856 in his poem ?The Two Americas?. In any case, both authors used the term to delineate fundamental cul tural and political distinctions between a Latin America characterized by spirituality and a quest for independence versus a materialist, individualistic and imperialist Anglo Saxon America. With the US invasion and dismem berment of Mexico in mind, Bilbao, Torres Caicedo and others echoed Simon Bolivar in calling for a union of South American nations to detain the imperialist interests of the USA. (NEW PARAGRAPH) According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term ?Latin America? appears in the USA in 1890, the year of the First International Conference of American states, held in Washington, DC. A precursor to the Pan American Union, the conference led to increased academic interest in the countries south of the Rio Grande. The first academic course on ?Spanish American History and Institutions? was offered at the University of California in 1895 (Hanke, 1964, p. 10). In 1917 the Encyclopedia of Latin America was published, with a foreword from the then Director General of the Pan American Union, who suggested that the spread of ?ac curate information will serve Pan American solidarity and community of action and pur pose? (Wilcox and Rines, 1917, p. 4). His message explicitly positions ?Latin America? as an important object of study at a time when the USA sought to bring the region in line with its policies; here, knowledge is made a key instrument of geopolitical power. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Drawing from Edward Said?s understanding of orientaLism, Mark T. Berger (1995) argues that ideas about Latin America in the USA are inseparable from and the effect of US imperialism in the region. Berger elaborates this argument along three lines. First, he points to the blurred boundaries between the state and Latin American studies. Not only have academics moved back and forth between academia and the various agencies of the government, but the state has also attempted to shape the kinds of research undertaken. Hence, ideas about Latin America tend to reflect and constitute state interests. For example, Santana (1996, p. 459) illustrates how US based geographical researchers in Puerto Rico advanced a theory of ?non viability?, suggesting that the island was ?not viable as an independent state?. Such studies were used to support arguments for continued US occupation. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Second, Latin American studies scholars have used organizing concepts that facilitate reductionism and allow the region to be ana lysed as a coherent unit. This is especially true after the Second World War, when the US government began to promote area studies. In the newly conceived world region frame work, the term ?Latin America? replaced ?South America? (Martin and Wigen, 1997, p. 162). Area studies presumed the existence of coherent, naturally bounded regions, wherein human environment relations had produced unique cultural groups. Contem porary regionaL geographies of Latin America continue in this tradition by seeking to delineate the core cultural traits organizing the region. Thus, Clawson?s (1997, p. 7) text book defines Latin America as a ?cultural entity? bound by ?a common Latin, or Roman, heritage?. Clawson identifies the core as that area where Latin or Hispanic culture is dominant: in fringe areas such as the US Southwest and the Caribbean, ?traditional Hispanic values are largely missing?. Such demarcations between what properly belongs inside and outside a region are deeply prob lematic, for they obscure differences within nations and render invisible the interconnec tions and interdependencies between them. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Third, Latin American studies tend to use the USA as the frame of reference or bench mark for encoding representations of, and measuring the material progress in, Latin America (Berger, 1995; Schoultz, 1998). As a result, academic knowledge tends to be under written by a United Statesian Self/Latin American Other binary, which constitutes difference and distance within a hierarchical framing. No matter the theoretical approach used in the USA, from environmental deter minism in the 1930s to area studies, regional geographies and development studies from the 1940s on, Latin America is conjured to embody everything that the USA is not: handicapped by climate and geography, isolated, backward, traditional, violent, per ipheral, underdeveloped and poor. Such imaginative geographies are called upon to authorize or legitimize US intervention in the region, whether to protect national interests or foster development (Santana, 1996). (NEW PARAGRAPH) When the term ?Latin America? began to have broad circulation in English and Spanish in the early decades of the twentieth century, some Spanish intellectuals decried its use. Writing in 1918, Ramon Menendez Pidal complained that the term deprived Spain of its historical and geographical titles in the New World (Ardao, 1992, p. 17). (NEW PARAGRAPH) South of the Rio Bravo, the idea of Latin America has conjured ambivalence and passion ate attachment. For Daniel Mato (1998), the continuing salience of Latinoamericanismo stems from its association with nationalist, anti imperialist struggles. Thus, for example, Alonso Aguilar (1968, p. 30) contrasts the US vision of Pan Americanism with the ?Latin Americanism ofBolivar, San Martin, and Morelos which stood for the struggle oftheir people for full independ ence?. Appropriating such associations, ruling elites and state bureaucracies, Mato argues, re peatedly constitute and address a pan ethnic group called Latinoamericanos to advance na tion building projects founded upon the myth of mestizaje (?racial mixing?). For instance, in ùExiste America Latina?, Luis Alberto Sanchez (1945, p. 239) suggests that the future of the region depends upon accepting mestizaje in a positive sense, as integration and creation. In Mato?s view, the notion of a mestizo ?extended ethnic group? perpetuates the exclusion of indigenous and African descendent peoples. (NEW PARAGRAPH) The idea of Latin America has come under intense public criticism since the Columbus Quincentennial in 1992. While state officials planned elaborate celebrations many funded by the Spanish government indigenous and Afro Latin American groups took to the streets throughout the region in an organized effort to posit alternative perspectives on the conquest and its aftermath. The increasing political power of such groups calls into question hege monic views of the region?s Latin heritage, which work to obscure the contributions ofindigenous and African descendent peoples, as well as the many other immigrant groups involved in pro ducing the cultural landscapes of the Americas. Since the 1990s, a number of Latin American countries have ratified new constitutions recog nizing their multicultural foundations. In this context, a number of indigenous social move ments have formed viable political parties. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Currently, social movements in Latin America are fostering new geographical ima ginaries to contest the US driven Free Trade Area of the Americas, which would unify all of the Americas under a single free trade agreement promising to benefit trans national corporations. Hugo Chavez?s Boli varian alternative for the Americas aims to create a socially oriented trade bloc built upon effective mechanisms to eradicate the economic disparities that exist within and be tween countries. jsu (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Ardao (1980, 1992); Berger (1995); Mignolo (NEW PARAGRAPH) ; Van Cott (2000). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
law
An enforceable body of rules and related norms governing social conduct. Geographers have long been interested in law, defined more or less broadly. Historically, analyses tended to divide into those, such as Ellen Semple, who sought to ground law in place, and others, like Derwent Whittlesey, who focused on what he termed the ?impress of effective central author ity upon the landscape?. Whether law is explained by reference to space, or space seen as produced by law, the tendency was to impose separations on law, space and society. From the 1980s onwards, when the ?spatial turn? in social theory made such a separation untenable, such binaries came under attack. Influenced by debates within social and legal theory, critical legal geographers have devel oped a very different reading of law, space and their mutual relation, with scepticism towards existing legal structures and the social rela tions that they embody. The distinguishing feature of this perspective is its refusal to ac cept either law or space as pre political or as the unproblematic outcome of external forces. Both are regarded as deeply social and polit ical. Law is seen both as a site in which com peting values, practices and meanings are fought over, and also as the means by which certain meanings and social relations become fixed and naturalized, either in oppressive or potentially empowering ways. Law is under stood not only as a set of operative controls, but also as a powerful repertoire of cultural and political meanings. Similarly, space is regarded as both socially produced and as socially constitutive, with attention being directed to the ?politics? of space. The relation between law, space and society is redefined and extended in important ways, opening up many new areas to critical geographic enquiry. This scholarship is remarkably diverse and lively, engaging with topics such as nature, Landscape, state practice, nationaLism and boundaries. Scholars draw from a range of theoretical sources, including queer theory, urban poLiticaL economy, actor network theory and cultural studies. Scholars also work across a range of scaLes, addressing not only national law (in relation to civil rights, crime, employment and housing, for ex ample) but also international law (in relation to genocide, human rights, the laws of war and spaces of exception). Though fluid and non institutionalized, some foci of interest over the past decade have included the following: (NEW PARAGRAPH) The analysis of the manner in which legal action and interpretation produces cer tain spaces. The role of the legal appar atus especially the judiciary is often given prominence, it being noted that court decisions have profound (and often problematic) effects within local settings in both material and discursive terms, given the manner in which legal categories and discourse can come to frame local debates (cf. Forest, 2001). (NEW PARAGRAPH) The related study of the situated nature of legal interpretation, it being argued that legal practice and interpretation is often bound up in the pLace in which it occurs (cf. Cooper, 1998; also situated knowLedge). (NEW PARAGRAPH) The study of the geographical claims and representations (see representation) contained within legal discourse: in much the same way that law relies on claims concerning history and time, so it both defines and draws upon a com plex range of geographies and spatial understandings. The construction of such spaces can be seen, for example, in relation to the designation of boundaries between private and pubLic spheres (Pratt, 2004), struggle over the meanings of ownership and property rights (Blomley, 2004a) or conceptions of jur isdiction (Ford, 1999). (NEW PARAGRAPH) While insightful, scholarship on law and geog raphy requires further development. While empirical accounts abound, the theorization of (NEW PARAGRAPH) the geographies of law and legal struggles is still undeveloped and somewhat ambiguous. Press ing questions include: What analytical and ethical difference does space make to the analysis of law? What sort(s) of power is law? How can space and law be brought together without suc cumbing to a binary logic? Are legal geographies only discursive? Finally, the ?critical? aspects of this enquiry need to be worked through more carefully. Some years ago, Vera Chouinard (1994a, p. 428) called for ?meaningful political action in and against the legal system?. While this has been embraced in some quarters (Razack, 2002; Mitchell, 2003a), the political edge to critical legal geography remains undeveloped. Whether this entails intellectual challenges to legal ?closure? or grounded and inclusionary re search projects concerning law remains an important question. nkb (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Blomley (1994); Blomley, Delaney and Ford (2001); Clark (1989); Holder and Harrison (NEW PARAGRAPH) ; Sarat and Kearns (2003). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
law (scientific)
A statement of an invariant relationship holding between different phe nomena, or between different states of the same phenomena. The best known formula tion is found in orthodox philosophy of sci ence and is represented in symbolic form as ?If A, then B?. Boyle?s Law, for example, states that if the volume of gas at a given temperature increases, then pressure decreases proportion ately. Similar law like statements have been proposed for geography, of which perhaps the best known is Tobler?s (1970, p. 236) First Law of Geography: ?Everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related than distant things.? In the orthodox rendering, scientific laws are presumed eter nal, universal, absolute, true and capable of expression in formal terms. They form the basis of scientific explanation and prediction ground zero for understanding how the uni verse works. Two major objections have been levelled against these conventional views. First, reaLism argues that the orthodox ?If A, then B? form of a law says nothing about caus ality, instead asserting only the (weak) relation of conjunctional association. A stronger state ment is required assigning causation. Second, work in science studies disputes many of the characteristics attributed to scientific laws by arguing that they represent LocaL knowLedge rather than universal knowledge, and ex post rationalization rather than fundamental ex planation. In this spirit, Barnes (2004a) draws (NEW PARAGRAPH) on science studies to contest Tobler?s First Law of Geography. tb (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Barnes (2004a). (NEW PARAGRAPH)

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