Reginald Golledge
Reginald Golledge, an internationallyrecognized scholar and a past President of the Association of American Geographers, died recently at the age of 71. Golledge served as Professor of Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara for more than three decades. The recipient of numerous national and international awards and honors, he was recently appointed to one of UCSB’s highest posts as faculty Research Lecturer. In announcing the award this past March, the UCSB Senate noted that Golledge had made “extraordinary contributions to science, and created at least three distinct subfields of geography” in the course of his career. Upon his passing, UCSB Chancellor Henry T. yang said, “We have lost a model teacher and a superb scholar” and called Golledge “a giant in his field.” Golledge received BA and MA degrees from the University of New England in Armidale, Australia (1958 and ‘61) and earned his PhD from the University of Iowa (1966). He served as a faculty member at the University of British Columbia (1965-66) and ohio State University (1966-77) before moving to the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1977. Golledge also served as a visiting professor at numerous institutions between 1967-76, including the University of California at Berkeley, UCLA, and the University of Texas. He was a founding member of the Department of Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara, which he helped lead to international prominence as chair (1980-84).
Golledge pioneered new approaches to the study of spatial cognition. In an interview with Nature magazine published in June of 2009, Golledge reflected on his contributions to the discipline of geography: “More than anything else, I think I opened the field’s eyes to the fact that the geography you carry in your mind, your mental map and the way you process spatial information, is equally as important as recording the facts of human existence on the surface of the Earth.” A founder of analytical behavioral geography and a substantial contributor to geography’s quantitative revolution, he pioneered many significant innovations to research in cognitive mapping, individual decision-making, theories of spatial learning, spatial choice modeling, and other areas throughout the course of his career. When a degenerative disease of the optic nerve caused Golledge to lose his eyesight in the early 1980s, he began an intense 25-year collaboration with two UCSB psychologists— Jack Loomis and Roberta klatzky— who began meeting with him weekly to read and discuss papers. In the Nature magazine interview, Golledge credited these meetings with allowing him to continue his academic career and take his work in a new direction as he turned his attention to the field of disabilities geography. Most recently, Golledge had been developing, along with colleagues at UCSB, a personal guidance system for people with limited vision and other disabilities, allowing them to navigate without the use of guide dogs or human assistance. Now under production by companies in several countries, this system is similar to vehicle guidance systems, utilizing GPS, electronic maps, and spatial databases. A prodigious scholar, Golledge published extensively in several fields, including geography, behavioral psychology, cognitive psychology, and regional science. He wrote or edited 16 books, 100 chapters for other books. More than 140 of his papers have appeared in academic journals and other publications. Golledge served on the editorial boards of seven international journals, and was an editor of Geographical Analysis and the founding editor of Urban Geography. Golledge received many awards, honors and other accolades over the course of his career. These include the AAG Enhancing Diversity Award in 2008, AAG Lifetime Achievement Honors in 2007, and AAG Honors in 1981. He was a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Regional Science Association International, and the Gilbert Grosvenor Center for Geographic Education. Golledge received a Guggenheim fellowship in 1987.At the University of California, Santa Barbara, he earned the outstanding Graduate Mentor Award. In recent years, he was presented with an honorary PhD by Goteborg University in Sweden, and an honorary law degree from Simon fraser University in Canada. Golledge was awarded the International Geography Gold Medal by the Institute of Australian Geographers in 2000. He was also a recipient of the Grosvenor Medal for Geographic Education. Golledge served as President of the Association of American Geographers 1999- 2000.
Reginald Golledge (Necrology). 2009. AAG Newsletter 44(8) 20.
