The Dictionary of Human Geography (74 page)

Read The Dictionary of Human Geography Online

Authors: Michael Watts

BOOK: The Dictionary of Human Geography
10.36Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
frontier thesis
The argument developed by Frederick Jackson Turner (1861 1932) concerning ?The significance of the frontier in American history? (Turner, 1893). The US census had been mapping the limit of European settlement as a frontier moving across the land from east to west (Paulin, 1932). In 1890, the Census announced that there was no longer a clear line separating the areas to the east settled at greater than two persons per square mile and those to the west that were more sparsely settled. Instead, there was now a patchwork of less densely settled areas in the west, and the idea of a continuous frontier between more and less densely settled parts was no longer valid. Turner took this to be the end of a distinct process. In 1892, speaking to historians gathered in Chicago on the occasion of the 400th anniversary of European entry to the Americas, Turner addressed the implications of the closing of the American frontier for democracy in the USA. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Turner claimed that, at the frontier, Europeans were forced to revert to more primitive forms of civiLization. In this way they broke their links with Europe and began to create a new and distinctly American soci ety. At the frontier, society passed through all the stages from hunting up to the ultimate form of civilization, urban industrial society. By passing through all these stages, Euro Americans re learned for themselves the need for democracy, lessons that people in Europe took so much for granted as to have almost forgotten. Yet this learning was at the heart of the popular democracy that Turner cherished. With the closing of the frontier, a new way would have to be found to keep these lessons alive. Universities, he argued, would now have to act as the keepers of a truth that would no longer be learned naturally at the frontier. (NEW PARAGRAPH) These ideas have been much criticized, most notably by the so called New Western Historians (Kearns, 1998). Limerick (1987) argues that Turner only credits Euro American men with historical agency, and ignores issues of race, cLass and gender. A historical process that consigns the native peoples of America to a shrinking margin makes it difficult for them to make claims about their right to a future in this land. Limerick also argues that rather than being legible as a process moving from east to west, European coLoniaLism in North America included significant movement of Spanish Americans from the south, and of other Europeans who began not on the east coast, but on the west. The frontier that Turner speaks of is a farming frontier based on family farms, and yet large parts of the USA were taken from native peoples for large scale ranch ing or mining without passing through the sort of family farms and villages that sustained Turner?s nascent democracies. Finally, Turner actually misses many of the distinctive features about the American West, including the con tinuous role of the state in the economy. gk (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Cronon (1987); Turner (1893). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
functionalism
A term found across the social sciences and used to explain variously mental, behavioural and social phenomena by the role that they play which is to say, their function in maintaining the larger system of which they are part. The larger system comes first, reaching back to determine the functional roles of its various parts in enabling its reproduction and development. (NEW PARAGRAPH) As an explanatory strategy, functionalism was first systematically stated in nineteenth century Darwinian evolutionary biology. Physiological characteristics were explained by their functional role in enabling the systemic ends of species survival and repro duction (see darwinism). Not surprisingly, when the French sociologist Emile Durkheim (1858 1917) introduced the same idea into sociology in the late nineteenth century, he drew on a biological analogy and likened the division of labour in society to the functional role of organs within a body. For Durkheim, the larger ends of stability and survival determined how society?s constituent parts functioned. Durkeheim?s work influenced a group of British based anthropologists Bronislaw Malinowski (1884 1942), Alfred Radcliffe Brown (1881 1952), Edward Evans Pritchard (1902 73) and Meyer Fortes (1906 83) who developed structuraL functionaL ism. While on the surface the various cultures that they studied the Trobianders, the Nuer, the Tallensi seemed quite different, they proposed that a common functional operation underpinned all of them: the components of culture worked together to promote smooth equilibrium and effortless reproduction. Structural functionalism entered sociology through the work of American sociologist Talcott Parsons (1902 79) and was later devel oped as ?systems theory? by Parsons and by Niklas Luhmann (1927 99). Outside of the anthropology sociology nexus, functionalism was also incorporated into some forms of Marxism, provoking new theorizing about the nature of functionalist explanation (Cohen, 1978; see also analytical marxism), and in the philosophy of the mind, where mental states are conceived as a function of the cogni tive system of which they are part. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Oddly, given the influence of Darwinism on geography and the magpie quality of geo graphical theorizing, functionalism was never prominent in the discipline. It weaved in and out of some early writings by European geo graphers, including Ratzel?s anthropogeo graphy and Vidal de la Blache?s vision of human geography. There were hints of functionalism in Hartshorne?s (1939) notion of the region as an ?element complex?, and even stronger ones in the systems analysis intro duced to the discipline in the 1970s (although it was mainly confined to environmental issues: see Bennett and Chorley, 1978). The most likely location for structural functionalism within the modern discipline was social geog raphy, but by the time it became interested in theoretical formalization, the star of structural functionalism was fading in both anthropology and sociology. Functionalism was more signifi cant in early radicaL geography. Thus Harvey (1999 [1982]) conceived space and place as functional elements in the reproduction ofcap italism: capitalism reached back to ensure that its landscape regenerated the system. Even crises the annihilation of space, the destruc tion of place were functional. Similarly, the regulation school advocated a posteriori functionalism in its analysis of capitalism (the success of the functional relation is known only after the fact of its success). (NEW PARAGRAPH) All this said, the functionalism found in human geography is often only implicit. Further, given the drubbing that functionalism has received over the past half century it is variously accused of determinism, of neglect ing historical context, of denying individual agency, of imbuing collective entities with characteristics germane only to individuals and of neglecting causal mechanisms it is unlikely ever to become explicit. tb (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Giddens (1977, ch. 2). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
fuzzy sets/fuzzy logic
Sets (categories, clas ses, types) for which the definitions of class membership are vague or ?fuzzy?, and contrast with the sharp, clearly defined definitions used by standard logic and set theory. Thus ?deprived? and ?middle class? are fuzzy cat egories in everyday life and usage, only con verted into precise categories by government or other statistical definitions. Fuzziness describes a type of uncertainty, but it is not the usual uncertainty of probability (e.g. the percentage chance of a US citizen being in the ?deprived? category). It describes ?event ambi guity?, the degree to which an event occurs, not whether it occurs. Most quantitative and statistical modelling assumes non fuzzy sets, and only a few studies have developed fuzzy set applications relevant to geography, notably Openshaw?s work on spatiaL interaction using fuzzy distances (?short?, ?average?, ?long?: Openshaw and Openshaw, 1997). Openshaw (NEW PARAGRAPH) saw fuzzy logic as a key to make ?soft human geography? more scientific, but most would paint a much more modest picture of its potential. Lwh (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Openshaw and Openshaw (1997); Robinson (2003). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
game theory
A theory of interdependent decision making. Individuals (?players?) (NEW PARAGRAPH) choose their actions (?strategies?) with limited or zero knowledge of those of the other players, but with knowledge of the ?payoffs? (costs and benefits) of different joint outcomes. The the ory was taken up by von Neumann and Morgenstern in Theory of games and economic behaviour (1944) and has been extensively developed and applied in economics and other social sciences, notably political science and sociology. In geography a pioneering study was that by Gould (1963), which showed how African farmers? agricultural strategies could be modelled as ?a game against nature?, with the farmers gaining different benefits depending on what they produced and what weather nature chose to throw at them. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Game theory tries to deduce the equilibrium strategies of players under rational decision making. Games may be non co operative (where each player only considers their own benefits and costs) or allow co operation be tween the players. A classic example where individual rational choice leads to collective sub optimality is the prisoner's diLemma. A geographical example of a simple competitive, two person, zero sum game is the model oftwo ice cream sellers on a linear beach, with a uni formly distributed population of consumers. If consumers buy from the nearest seller, then the rational seller strategy is to locate back to back in the centre of the beach any other location gives an advantage to the other seller (see hotening model). Yet, from the consumers? angle, this is sub optimal. They would benefit more if the sellers located one third from the two ends ofthe beach, so that consumers had to walk less. (Of course, this assumes that both sellers have identical prices for identical prod ucts: see hotening model.) Much of the later theory has concerned how non co operative games can lead to non zero sum payoffs under various assumptions, and this work (starting with John Nash?s work in the early 1950s) lies behind much of the modern theory of eco nomic markets and bargaining. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Game theory has been applied to problems of interregional externaLities, where actions in one region are interdependent with those in another, as in water resource development, (NEW PARAGRAPH) poLLution strategies and environmental pol icy, and in economic policies within a federal state such as the USA or an economic union such as the European Union. It has also been extended to dynamic games, where learning takes place and sequences of choices are made and where there may be ?leaders? and ?followers? (the Stackelberg game), as in federal local policies. However, most of these studies are by economists, and, as economic geography has increasingly lost contact with much of recent economics, few geographers have pursued these developments. Lwh (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Gould (1963). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
garden city
A relatively spacious and small, self contained planned settlement. Originally conceived by Ebenezer Howard (1850 1928), the concept was adopted by the British Garden City Movement, which he founded. It formed the basis for two settlements Letchworth (1903) and Welwyn (1920) in Hertfordshire: both are now much larger than Howard originally envisaged (c.32,000 people on a 6,000 acre [~2,430 ha] site). The idea of low density, relatively small, high quality settlements characterized by their ?greenness? was adopted in a number of countries during the twentieth century, as part of a planning ideology based on community (cf. neigh bourhood unit): indeed, the garden city movement was the precursor in the UK of the Town and Country Planning Association, which remains a powerful pressure group. The general concept was transferred to other coun tries and influenced the planning of numerous new settlements such as Canberra and new town movements, as in the USA. rj (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Hall and Ward (1998). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
gated communities
While associated with the large US urban regions (Blakely and Snyder, 1997), gated communities are increas ingly global in their distribution (Webster, Glasze and Frantz, 2002). They are residential encLaves demarcated physically by walls, fences and secured gateways, which are often (NEW PARAGRAPH) patrolled by private security guards. They are also frequently governed by community asso ciations that regulate residents? activities and design decisions. The proliferation of gated enclaves, private governance and security is generally understood to lead to the delegiti mization of pubLic services and is a physical manifestation of growing resistance to ?dem ocratization, social equalization, and [the] ex pansion of citizenship rights? (Caldeira, 2000, p. 4; but see Salcedo and Torres, 2004). Thus, gated communities have been the focus of research not only because of their global pres ence but also because of what they suggest about perceptions of security, community, citizenship, pubLic space, property and the role of the state in contemporary urban soci eties (cf. surveinance). em (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Caldeira (2000). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
gender
A categorical distinction between men and women; a technology of dassifica tion that naturalizes sexual difference and is intertwined with other distinctions, such as na ture/culture, and racial and national differenti ation. pLaces become coded as masculine or feminine, and this can be one important means of naturalizing gender difference (Bondi and Davidson, 2003). Haraway (1991b) provides a thorough discussion of the history and meaning of the term ?gender' within feminist theory through to the mid 1980s (see feminism). The term has a broadly similar history within geography: there has been a move away from theories of relatively static gender roles to gender relations, and towards a fuller exploration of how diverse gender relations are constructed in all spheres of life. Emphasis has been placed on the variety of femininities and masculinities ways of liv ing gender, depending on context and intersec tions with race, cLass, reLigion, sexuaLity, nationality and other social and geographical differences (Bondi and Davidson, 2005; see also feminist geographies). (NEW PARAGRAPH) Within Anglophone feminism, ?gender? is typically contrasted to ?sex?: the former is understood as a sociaL construction, the latter defined by biology. The distinction has been part of an effort to denaturalize conventional understandings of women and femininity, to remove women from nature and place them within cuLture as constructed and self constituting social subjects (see phanocentricism). The treatment of gender within geography is slightly unusual in this regard, as it has not been ?quarantined from the infections of biological sex' (Haraway, 1991b, p. 134) to the same extent as in other disciplines. In an effort to theorize patri archy, for instance, Foord and Gregson (1986) identified necessary relations that con stitute gender relations. Following the analyt ical procedures of reaLism, they reasoned that two genders, male and female, are the basic characteristics of gender relations. In order to theorize the necessary relations between these basic characteristics, they ask ?Under what conditions do men and women require each other?s existence??, to which they answer, for biological reproduction and the practice of heterosexuality. Foord and Gregson's analysis was quickly criticized, because it made it diffi cult to theorize how capitaLism structures gender relations (McDowell, 1986) and for its biologism, especially in terms of its por trayal of heterosexuality as biologically or psy chologically fixed (Knopp and Lauria, 1987). (NEW PARAGRAPH) The latter criticism signalled important new ways of thinking about the relations between sex and gender. The feminist distinction between sex and gender may save gender from essentiaList or naturalizing versions of femininity, but it repeats the problems of the nature/culture dualism insofar as it posits gen der as the (active) social that acts upon the (passive) surface of sex. It is itself thus vulner able to the charge of mascuLinism: ??Is sex to gender as feminine to masculine [as nature to culture]?? (Butler, 1993a, p. 4). A further problem is that within the terms of the sex/ gender dualism sex seems to disappear once it is gendered: gender absorbs and displaces sex (these tendencies within geography are discussed by Nast, 1998). (NEW PARAGRAPH) Drawing upon theories of discourse, deconstruction and psychoanaLysis, Butler (1993a) tackled this problem by arguing that both sex and gender are socially constructed. Neither sex nor gender has ontoLogicaL sta tus and neither can be theorized apart from regimes of (hetero)sexuality. For Butler, sex is neither extra nor pre discursive: the sexed body is brought into being through the regu latory regime of heterosexuality. Within het eronormativity, we must be gendered and sexed as either male or female to be human: she argues that those who are not properly sexed are threatened by psychosis (unstable bodily and psychic boundaries) and abjec tion. Gender is a truth effect of a discourse of a primary and stable identity: this identity emerges out of repetitive gender perform ances, which are instantiations of an ideal/ norm (see performativity; subjectivity). Butler does see opportunities to prise perform ances of sex and gender apart: the subversive potential of drag performances, for example, lies in the disjunction between (an assumed interiorized) sex and exteriorized gender per formances, as well as the performance of the sexually disallowed or unperformable (e.g. men acting out conventions of femininity). The implications of this retheorization of gen der and sex are far reaching: gender is recast as derivative of the regulatory norms of (hetero) sex and as repetitive and unstable practices enacted in different ways in different places and times. This invites close attention to the persistent deployment of regulatory regimes of heterosexuality, to the sexualities that operate at the margins of and exceed the boundaries of these norms, and to the geographies of both (see homophobia and heterosexism; queer theory; sexuality; Nash, 1998; Hubbard, (NEW PARAGRAPH) 2000). (NEW PARAGRAPH) The material limits to social constructivism and a focus on life that exceeds Discourse has drawn increasing attention. Another approach to the problem that the sex/gender dualism replays a phallocentric binary (one that com plements rather than contradicts that of But ler) has been to emphasize the agency and dynamism of nature. Grosz (2005) articulates this strategy when she implores feminists to attend to ?matter? as ?that which preconditions and destabilizes gender and bodies, that which problematizes all identity? (p. 172). Echoing Butler, she understands gender to be a con tained, represented, socialized, phallocentric ideal and, following Irigarary, she directs feminist enquiry away from gender to sexual difference, which she associates with an unbounding and proliferation of identifica tions, ontologies and ways of knowing. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Ramon Garcia, Simonsen and Vaiou (2006) note that the debates about the sex/gender binary are specific to particular LaNguage communities: feminists theorizing within (NEW PARAGRAPH) languages for which there is no distinction between sex and gender have developed non essentialist arguments about gender without drawing on this dualism. Even within Anglo phone feminism, there have been other ap proaches to theorizing the category of woman outside of the gender/sex binary. Bondi and Davidson (2003) call upon Wittgenstein?s notion of ?family resemblance? to theorize the category ?woman? as a loose network of simi larities rather than essential qualities, and Iris Marion Young (1997b) has theorized the gen der of woman as a series brought together (NEW PARAGRAPH) by context specific material conditions rather than as a set of embodied characteristics or an identification. gp (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Bondi and Davidson (2003). (NEW PARAGRAPH)

Other books

Deep Sky by Lee, Patrick
His Firefly Cowgirl by Beth Williamson
Home to Harmony by Dawn Atkins
Fade by Chad West
Eating With the Angels by Sarah-Kate Lynch
The Simple Truth by David Baldacci
Taking Chances by McAdams, Molly
A Simple Song by Melody Carlson