Awardees

AAG Names Judith Butler as the 2016 Honorary Geographer

The Association of American Geographers has named Judith Butler as its 2016 Honorary Geographer. She is the Maxine Elliot Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature and Program in Critical Theory at the University of California at Berkeley.

Butler has advocated lesbian and gay rights movements and has been outspoken on many modern political matters. Two of her influential books, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity and Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex, challenge notions of gender and develop her theory of gender performativity, which is now a prominent position in feminist and queer scholarship. Butler studied philosophy at Yale University where she received her B.A. and her Ph.D.

In making its selection, the AAG recognized Butler’s foundational contributions to feminist and queer theory, cultural studies, and feminist and moral philosophy. Her work has transformed the ways in which scholars have understood gender and sexual identities and has thus fundamentally reshaped the theoretical underpinnings of the social and the spatial.

As such, her continuing interrogations of identity and subjectivity have inspired and informed feminist geography, queer, critical, and political theory in geography, and sexuality and space studies. In addition, as a political academic and activist she has served as a role model for many geographers who understand the deep entanglements of the academic and the political. This award, therefore, acknowledges her fundamental role in shaping geographic practices, theories, and actions.

AAG Past President Mona Domosh will confer the 2016 AAG Honorary Geographer Award upon Judith Butler at the 2016 AAG Annual Meeting in San Francisco during her plenary session, “Demography in the Ethics of Non-Violence,” on Tuesday, March 29. Butler’s plenary will focus on “A principled approach to non-violence that often admits to exceptions where violence is conceded as legitimate. To what extent does the exception to nonviolence in the name of self-defense or for close kin implicitly make a distinction between lives worth saving and dispensable lives? A practice of non-violence has to take into account the demographic distribution of grievability that establishes which lives are worthy of safeguarding and which are less worthy or not worthy at all. Otherwise, both biopolitics and the logic of war can permeate calculations about when and where non-violence can be invoked. Does the demographic challenge revise our approach to non-violence? and if so, how?”

Every year the AAG bestows its Honorary Geographer Award on an individual to recognize excellence in the arts, research, teaching, and writing on geographic topics by non-geographers. Previous awardees have included sociologist Saskia Sassen, architect Maya Lin, economist Jeffrey Sachs, biologist Stephen J. Gould, political scientist Cynthia Enloe, Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman, neuroscientist Nora Volkow, and authors Calvin Trillin, Barbara Kingsolver, and Barry Lopez.

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Edward Soja

Ed Soja, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Urban Planning at UCLA, who made considerable contributions to postmodern political geography and urban theory, passed away on November 2, 2015, at the age of 75, after a long battle with illness.

Edward William Soja was born on May 4, 1940, to a family of Polish immigrants and grew up in the Bronx, New York. He was “nurtured in its dense diversities” and was “a street geographer by the time he was ten” (book jacket of Thirdspace), formative influences that shaped his urban-centric geographic imagination.

Soja attended Syracuse University where, among his teachers, was Eduardo Mondlane, the first Mozambican to hold a PhD and the founder of the Mozambican liberation movement, FRELIMO. At Syracuse, Mondlane developed the East African Studies Program which caught the interest of Soja.

In the early 1960s, Soja went to Kenya to study urban planning as the country underwent a transition from a traditional society to more modern forms of social, economic, and political organization. On return from fieldwork in February 1965 he taught about East Africa, as well as quantitative techniques.

His thesis, entitled “The Geography of Modernization in Kenya: A Spatial Analysis of Social, Economic, and Political Change,” was completed in 1967 and published by Syracuse University Press in 1968 as part of the Syracuse Geographical Series.

Soja took up a position as Assistant Professor at Northwestern University, continuing to specialize in the political geography of modernization and nation-building in Africa. During his seven years at Northwestern he also held visiting appointments at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, and the University of Nairobi, Kenya.

In 1972 Soja was recruited to the Graduate School of Architecture and Urban Planning at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) where he remained for the rest of his career. There he began focusing his research on urban restructuring in Los Angeles, as well as the critical study of cities and regions. His interests were wide-ranging, including questions of regional development, planning and governance, and the spatiality of social life.

During his long and distinguished career as a scholar at UCLA, Soja devoted himself to teaching graduate and undergraduate students. He taught courses on regional and international development, urban political economy and planning theory. He also served as academic advisor to numerous doctoral candidates from the department of urban planning. He was twice the department chair and, for nine years, the Associate Dean.

For many years, Soja was also a visiting professor at the London School of Economics, specifically the Cities Program, an international center dedicated to the understanding of contemporary urban society, where he taught on the MSc City Design and Social Sciences course.

Soja was one of the key figures associated with the ‘spatial turn’ in geography. He brought the insights of critical social theory – including political economy, postmodernism, and cultural theory – to create innovative analyses of space and society, especially struggles over control of space in the city and the emergence of new forms of urbanization.

His work focused on Los Angeles, an enormously diverse metropolis with pronounced social and spatial inequalities. He sought to understand different aspects of urban life – its everyday rhythms, the division of labor, public policy, struggles over places, and the relations among distant locals – through the conceptual lens of spatiality.

His canonical paper on “The Socio-Spatial Dialectic” (Annals of the Association of American Geographers, June 1980) drew on the work of French Marxist urban sociologist Henri Lefebvre and other social theorists to argue that society produces, organizes and gives meaning to space, but that these spatialities in turn shape society and the relations of production.

Soja’s book Postmodern Geographies: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory (Verso, 1989) and the concurrent work of David Harvey introduced postmodernism as a new kind of problematic of which geographers should take note. Postmodern Geographies drew enormous favourable attention worldwide and established him as one of the discipline’s leading theoreticians.

One of his greatest contributions to spatial theory and the field of cultural geography was his use of Lefebvre, author of The Production of Space (1974). Soja updated Lefebvre’s concept of the ‘spatial triad’ with his own concept of ‘spatial trialectics’ which included ‘thirdspace,’ or spaces that are both real and imagined. These ideas were published in two further works: Thirdspace: Journeys to Real-and-Imagined-Places (Blackwell, 1996) and Postmetropolis: Critical Studies of Cities and Regions (Blackwell, 2000).

Soja also worked with Allen J. Scott to edit a volume on The City: Los Angeles and Urban Theory at the End of the Twentieth Century (University of California Press, 1996) which brought together a variety of essays by experts in urban planning, architecture, geography, and sociology examining the built environment and human dynamics of Los Angeles, emphasizing dramatic changes that had occurred since 1960.

More recently he wrote Seeking Spatial Justice (University of Minnesota Press, 2010) where he offered new ways of understanding and changing the unjust geographies in which we live, and My Los Angeles: From Urban Restructuring to Regional Urbanization (University of California Press, 2014) which covered more than four decades of urban development in LA and other urban regions.

A characteristic of Soja’s work was his interweaving of theory and practice; his theoretical interpretations of place, location, landscape, city and region were grounded in his inquiry into the shaping of space and society in Los Angeles including the rise of the city region, the revival of inner cities, and social movements for the right to the city.

In 2013, the Association of American Geographers conferred Lifetime Achievement Honors on Soja in recognition of his path-breaking contributions to geographic theory and urban studies, especially his arguments for the importance of space in understanding society and the city, and his insights into postmodernity and the Los Angeles metropolis. It was especially fitting that the award was presented at the Annual Meeting in Los Angeles that year.

In 2015, Soja was awarded the 2015 Vautrin-Lud Prize, considered to be geography’s Nobel Prize. The prize honors the career of a distinguished geographer whose work has been very influential within and beyond the discipline. Unfortunately, Soja was unable to be present at the event in Saint-Dié, France, in October 2015 but his work was explored in a roundtable discussion between many of his international peers.

How to sum up the career and contributions of this remarkable man which started with modernization in Kenya and transitioned to postmodernity in Los Angeles? He was one of human geography’s most passionate and articulate advocates. His work reshaped urban studies. His writings on space, spatial justice, and cities have inspired many. His critical thinking continues to open new research directions for the theoretical and practical understanding of contemporary cities and regions.

Along the way, he motivated and provoked students and colleagues alike through his passion and enthusiasm for theory, criticism, cities, and social justice. Derek Gregory, recalling a sabbatical that Soja spent at Cambridge University, remembered that “Ed enlivened the Department of Geography no end too, and delighted the graduate students with his healthy irreverence, his sense of intellectual adventure – and by his evident happiness at spending time with them.” He will be sorely missed by many friends who knew his warm and generous personality.

Soja is survived by his wife, Maureen, and their children, Christopher and Erika. Following his death, the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs decided to establish the Edward Soja Memorial Fellowship in his memory.

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Tony Hambly

Tony Hambly, an eccentric and well-loved teacher, who taught geography at schools in Zimbabwe and South Africa for 46 years, passed away on October 30, 2015, aged 73.

Anthony Hambly was born in October 1942 in Bulawayo, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and educated nearby at Falcon College.

His father was a Latin teacher. While Tony also loved the subject and had intentions of following in his footsteps, his father warned of a dying subject with few job prospects. Meanwhile an enthusiastic teacher sparked his interest in geography and Hambly transferred his affections.

He studied for a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology and geography at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa. He also obtained a teaching diploma which he later followed up with a Bachelor of Education degree through the University of South Africa.

Hambly began teaching in 1964 in Southern Rhodesia. His first post was as a geography teacher at Churchill School in Harare. From there he went on to become head of geography at Jameson High School in Kadoma, then moved to Oriel Boys’ School in Harare, where he was also deputy headmaster.

He moved his family to South Africa in 1978 to take up a post as the head of geography at Treverton College. Over the years he taught all sorts of subjects including Latin, English, music and maths, but geography remained his main love.

“Geography is topical, it’s relevant, and it’s all around you,” said Hambly in an interview in 2011. “It’s about modern life and why things work. It’s a mixture of all subjects — physics, biology, history, economics — geography is at the middle of it all. Geography examines current topics, housing problems, economic problems, why this river runs where it does, why it rains, why it doesn’t rain.”

Hambly believed that the key job of a teacher was to teach critical thinking. He said: “With any subject it’s important to develop critical thinking, not accepting things at face value and simply accepting what people say. If I’ve produced some discriminating thinkers then I’ve succeeded as a teacher.”

This he achieved through an eccentric teaching style. Fellow Treverton College geography teacher, Dave Purdon, said Hambly was an “absolute character but a teacher at heart. He loved children and he found ways to really connect with them. He always said to me that he didn’t teach, he ‘told stories.’”

He was also well-known across the country as the chairperson of the Flat Earth ­South Africa (FESA), an offshoot of the Flat Earth Society, an organization that believes the Earth is flat rather than round. It started as a bit of a joke but became a means of stimulating critical thinking among students.

Hambly was always active in the wider life of the college, producing several dramatic productions, as well as coaching rugby and cricket at all levels. He also served as deputy headmaster between 1980 and 2003.

Outside the classroom, he was part of the team that set the geography exam for the Independent Examinations Board in South Africa. He also edited a number of textbooks for Heinemann.

After 30 years at Treverton College, Hambly moved to Maritzburg Christian School in Pietermaritzburg in 2008 where he taught for two further years before retiring at the end of 2010.

After retirement, he remained actively involved in education, working on new textbooks, generating teaching-support materials, and co-authoring a new atlas for South Africa.

Hambly will be remembered as a quirky but ­well-loved character. Colleagues and friends paid tribute to someone who taught ­life-long lessons rather than standard classroom lectures. He is survived by his wife Maureen and their two daughters, Clare and Vivienne.

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Journals

AAG Publishes New ‘GeoHumanities’ Journal

This month sees the publication of the first issue of a brand new journal from the Association of American Geographers: GeoHumanities.

GeoHumanities is a new kind of journal, connecting the traditional humanities to both science and the creative arts.

Dr. David Green, Publishing Director International for Routledge Journals, explains: “In the past decade, there has been a convergence of transdisciplinary thought characterized by geography’s engagement with the humanities, and the humanities’ integration of place and the tools of geography into its studies. GeoHumanities journal will now provide the latest, cutting edge information and peer-reviewed research in the field.”

The journal’s editing is being shared by two scholars well qualified for the job. Tim Cresswell is Professor of History and International Affairs at Northeastern University in Boston, as well as Associate Director for Public Humanities at its Humanities Center. Deborah Dixon is Professor of Geography at the University of Glasgow in the UK.

Dixon explains: “GeoHumanities is an opportunity to bring together original, scholarly articles that blur and blend disciplinary specialisms, but that also carve out new lines of inquiry, and new ways of doing research. And, it is an opportunity to present these alongside practice-based commentaries that speak to all manner of timely issues, from the wicked problems of the Anthropocene to the shifting sense of place created by geolocative media.”

In Issue 1, Cresswell notes, “a philosopher considers the role of place in western movies, a creative video artist engages with the politics of the Amazonian forest, a geographer explores the strange history of a perfumer, a poet contemplates the global connections enacted by a desert train, and a historian uses GIS to study eighth century China.”

This exciting new title adds to the AAG’s historic and prestigious portfolio of journals. As Executive Director Douglas Richardson points out, “This new GeoHumanities journal builds on a decade-long AAG initiative to engage research and scholarship at the intersections and convergences of Geography and the Humanities, as well as the recent publication (also by Routledge) of two ground-breaking AAG books examining these trends and interactions.”

Green adds: “It is Routledge’s pleasure to extend our publishing partnership with the AAG. We are most grateful to the Association, and specifically Doug Richardson and the teams of Editors, for continuing to entrust their journals to Routledge, one of the world’s leading geography publishers.”

All content in the first issue is freely available until the end of January 2016. Browse the papers on the Taylor and Francis website. New submissions are welcome at any time. Visit the AAG website for further information and guidelines.

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John Wolter

John Wolter, a cartographer and librarian who served as Chief of the Geography and Map Division at the Library of Congress, passed away on October 22, 2015 at the age of 90.

John Amadeus Wolter was born on July 25, 1925 in St Paul, Minnesota, the eldest son of Amadeus and Marjorie Wolter. He traced his lifelong fascination with maps back to his childhood days when he collected railroad timetables and route maps.

Between 1943 and 1945, Wolter served in the Merchant Marine with the Isthmian Steamship Company, whose vessels had been requisitioned for wartime service. After the Second World War he continued with the company as a deck officer until 1950, voyaging on passenger and cargo vessels to ports in the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, India, Ceylon, Indochina and Indonesia, and from New York west-bound ‘round the world.’

After a brief stint at the College of St. Thomas, Minnesota he entered the United States Army in 1950 starting with service in the Far East during the Korean War.

In 1956 he received a bachelor’s degree in geography from the University Minnesota then spent a year in Washington, DC working as a marine transportation officer for the Military Sea Transportation Service and also undertaking postgraduate studies at Georgetown University. He then returned to the Isthmian Steamship Company for the remainder of the 1950s. During his many years at sea as a navigating officer and cargo officer he used, and made additions and corrections to, a variety of navigational charts and maps.

Back on terra firma in 1960, Wolter returned to the University Minnesota. He served as map librarian, assistant to the director of university libraries, and as lecturer and research fellow in the geography department, as well as completing a master’s degree in library science in 1965. During this time he participated in several Library of Congress Geography and Map Division map processing projects and became familiar with the varied cartographic collections.

In 1966 took a post as assistant professor Wisconsin State University­­–River Falls, teaching geography but only stayed two years until being appointed Assistant Chief in the Library of Congress’s Geography and Map Division in 1968.

Alongside his position in Washington, DC, he carried out doctoral research in geography through the University Minnesota. His dissertation, completed in 1975, was entitled “The Emerging Discipline of Cartography.” Using bibliometric methods, he traced the history of subject bibliographies of cartography back to the nineteenth century, demonstrating the increasing independence and strength of the field of cartography. He also looked at the growth of textbooks and manuals written for students of cartography, and provision for the education and training of cartographers in the US.

In 1978 he was promoted to Chief of the Geography and Map Division, succeeding Wally Ristow, and shortly after oversaw the move of the Division from Pickett Street in Alexandria to the Madison Building on Capitol Hill. It was the first special collections division to make its home in the building and they enjoyed much local and national media coverage given the photogenic nature of maps, charts and atlases.

During his tenure as Chief of the Division, he wrote a number of reference works including an article giving “A Brief History of the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division, 1897-1978,” a co-edited “World Directory of Map Collections,” an article on “Geographical Libraries and Map Collections” in an encyclopedia of libraries, and a piece on “Research Tools and the Literature of Cartography.”

Because of his position, he also sat on many committees including the United States Board on Geographic Names, serving as its Chairman for some time, and the board of directors of the Philip Lee Phillips Map Society aiming to develop, enhance and promote the collections of the Geography and Map Division.

Wolter was also member of many national and international organizations that reflected his interests and specialisms. He was among the founders of the Washington Map Society which was established in 1979 and, under his suggestion, they met in the Geography and Map Division. He was a member of the Society for the History of Discoveries, serving in various executive roles including as President; the International Cartographic Association, including being the US member on its Commission on the History of Cartography; and the International Society for the History of the Map.

He joined the Association of American Geographers in 1961, receiving his 50-year membership in 2011, and he was a member of the International Geographical Union serving two spells on the United States national committee. In addition he was a member of the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping, the North American Society for Oceanic History, the Society for Nautical Research, the Naval Historical Foundation, the American Merchant Marine Veterans, the Disabled American Veterans, the Special Libraries Association, and Theta Delta Chi.

He also served on the editorial boards of Cartographica, American Cartographer, Terrae Incognitae, ACSM Bulletin, Surveying and Mapping, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, and was an editorial advisor for The Portolan and a contributing editor to Imago Mundi.

During 1989-90 he took on the additional role of Acting Director for Public Service and Collections Management before retiring from the Library of Congress in 1991. For all his contributions Wolter was recognized with a Presidential citation from the American Congress Surveying and Mapping (1985), an award from the Smithsonian Institute (1986), and a Distinguished Service Award from the Library of Congress (1992).

In retirement he did some consultancy work, continued his research, and gave occasional lectures. Post-retirement publications included three books: Progress of Discovery: Johann Georg Kohl auf den Spuren der Entdecker (1993), Images of the World: The Atlas Through History (with Ron Grim, 1996), and The Napoleonic War in the Dutch Indies: An Essay and Cartobibliography of the Minto Collection (1999).

Wolter leaves behind his wife of 59 years, Joan, and their four sons, Mark, Thomas, Matthew and David.

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GAO Study Highlights Need for Funding Geography Education

K-12 Geography Proficiency Levels Have Not Improved Since 1994

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released an important report last week that underscores the need for funding K-12 geography education in the United States. The Association of American Geographers (AAG) provided substantial input to GAO during their process of developing this report.

“The GAO report is another clarion call for the need to support geography education in the U.S.,” said AAG Executive Director Douglas Richardson. “Geography is integral to nearly all aspects of life today, ranging from our economy to our foreign policy.”

AAG President Sarah Bednarz added, “This important and timely study reinforces our efforts to promote the importance of K-12 geography education in preparing American students for rapidly-growing job fields.”

The report includes a U.S. Department of Labor projection that the employment of specialists in geography, or geographers, is expected to grow 29 percent from 2012 to 2022—much faster than the average 11 percent growth for all occupations.

According to a statement from GAO, “The growing use of geographic information and location-based technology across multiple sectors of the American economy has prompted questions about whether K-12 students’ skills and exposure to geography are adequate for current and future workforce needs.” GAO conducted this study pursuant to a provision outlined in Senate Report 113-71, which calls for “GAO to report on the status of geography education and challenges elementary and secondary schools face in providing geography education with limited resources.”

The report’s cover letter to U.S. Senators Roy Blunt and Patty Murray emphasized that, “Geographic information and geospatial, or location-based, technologies are growing sectors of the American economy, influencing almost every facet of modern life, from tracking lost cell phones to monitoring disease outbreaks like Ebola. The emergence of these technologies has increased demand for workers who can analyze and interpret geographic information. Research suggests that K-12 education is critically important for learning the fundamentals of geography, which is the study of places and the relationship between people and their environment.”

The study’s findings validate the importance of the AAG Resolution Supporting K-12 Geography Education, which demonstrates the need for funding for K-12 geography as part of the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The resolution has been endorsed by four former U.S. Secretaries of State; four former Defense Secretaries; 24 bipartisan incumbent Governors; and over 25 Fortune 500 companies. It can be accessed at: https://www.aag.org/resolution.

A copy of the GAO report can be retrieved from https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-16-7. Questions about the report should be directed to Jacqueline M. Nowicki at (617) 788-0580 or nowickij [at] gao [dot] gov.

For more information, visit the AAG website at www.aag.org, or contact John Wertman, the AAG’s Senior Program Manager for Government Relations, at jwertman [at] aag [dot] org.

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New Books for Geographers

New Books: October 2015

Every month the AAG compiles a list of newly-published books in geography and related areas. Some are selected for review in the AAG Review of Books.

Publishers are welcome to send new volumes to the Editor-in-Chief (Kent Mathewson, Editor-in-Chief, AAG Review of Books, Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803).

Anyone interested in reviewing these or other titles should also contact the Editor-in-Chief.

October, 2015

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Annual Meeting

A Taste of New Deal Alphabet Soup in San Francisco

One of several controversial panels at Coit Tower. A library scene painted by Bernard Zakheim, in which patron (fellow muralist John Langley Howard) pulls a copy of Das Kapital from the shelf. Photo: Shaina Potts for the Living New Deal. Mural: Bernard Zakheim

Coming to San Francisco for the annual meeting next spring will mean inevitably traversing a landscape transformed by the New Deal. For those landing at the San Francisco or Oakland Airports, The Works Progress Administration (WPA), Public Works Administration (PWA), and State Emergency Relief Administration (SERA) all had a hand in their growth into major airports. Crossing over the majestic western span of the Bay Bridge is to rely on the New Deal as well. In 1936 when it was completed at the hands of the WPA, the bridge was the longest suspension bridge in the country. From the bridge, many visitors quickly pick out one of the city’s most visible landmarks, Coit Tower, where the entire interior is covered in New Deal frescos. With funds from the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), the New Deal’s first public arts program, twenty-six artists spent six months in 1934 creating murals of depression era life and the state’s history. The murals were carefully restored last year and are once again on view to the public as a monument not just to California but a historical moment when the federal government invested directly in the arts, infrastructure and its poorest citizens.

Pieces of San Francisco’s history, like that of Coit Tower, are relatively well known. But the extent of the structural and aesthetic improvements made to the city are just now being recovered by a team of researchers and volunteers at the Living New Deal project. Founded and directed by Berkeley Geographers Richard Walker and Gray Brechin (a longer history of the project is available on our website), the Living New Deal works to rediscover, catalog and map the sites of New Deal art and infrastructure. To many people’s surprise, there are no complete records of New Deal programs; this in part because of their emphasis on ending the Depression as quickly as possible, and in part because of long standing efforts to obscure the New Deal’s success in doing just that. Given the enormity of its scope, over the last decade the Living New Deal has grown into a national collaboration of geographers, researchers from disciplines ranging from art history to economics, students, many amateur historians and untold numbers of volunteers submitting information on what the “alphabet soup” of programs created in their regions. In the same spirit of serving the public good that defined the original New Deal, our group works to make all of the information gathered for our database and map freely available via the web, publications and frequent presentations around the country.

The Living New Deal’s origins in the Bay Area are reflected in the density of New Deal sites already uncovered in and around San Francisco. Those first years of research revealed that no corner of the city was left untouched by WPA, PWA, CWA, CCC or one of the other agencies. As shown on the project’s map, the city is literally dotted with parks, playgrounds, schools and public buildings, street and sewer improvements, murals, sculptures, and other works of art. Neighborhoods famous for other reasons turn up New Deal touches everywhere. A walk through the Castro includes sidewalks still stamped with WPA logos. Chinatown’s St. Marys square is home to a 14-foot tall statue of Sun Yat-Sen by the renowned sculptor Beniamino Bufano, paid for by the Federal Arts Project (FAP). Golden Gate Park is chock full of New Deal improvements that endless hippies, yuppies, and tourists have made use of for nearly eight decades without ever likely considering their origins. Federal funds flowed far beyond just the major cities however, even to Republican led communities like Berkeley (yes, it was a different place in the 1930s), where civic structures like the high school and post office are adorned with art extolling the public value of knowledge and beauty. Just slightly further afield are trails and open spaces made possible by the work of the Civilian Conservation Core (CCC), meant to provide even the most destitute Americans access to the therapeutic dimensions of the “great outdoors.” Of course many of those spaces are still readily accessible to us today. The list of New Deal sites that we take advantage of in the 21st century goes on and on, and grows with every passing week of new discoveries.

While the Living New Deal works to reveal and promote the legacy of work in the name of the public good, the archive and map make apparent that this legacy is in no way free of the problematic politics and mainstream thought of the time from which it emerged. From environmental destruction (note how much “reclaimed” land the airport occupies), to the racist representations and exclusions of indigenous peoples in art celebrating California’s colonial history, to the complicated first “progressive” efforts at public housing (coupled with policies that underwrote the mass suburbanization of whites), the Bay Area contains it all.

In juxtaposition to the relics we find abhorrent in the present, the city also contains projects so radical that they have been raising the ire of civic leaders and the “business community,” for decades; probably none more so than the murals at the Rincon Annex. Created by Russian born artist Anton Refregier, who “wanted to paint the past, not as a romantic backdrop, but as part of the living present, a present shaped by the trauma of depression, strikes, and impending war” (Brechin, 2013), the murals adorn the interior of a beautiful post-office building. The works themselves, however, depict a much more violent history underlying San Francisco’s history, beginning with Sir Francis Drake holding a bloodied sword (his hand infamously reappears emerging from a Nazi flag in a later panel, connecting the original conquest to the rise of Fascism), the murals continue on to show a much “truer” depiction of the Mission system, the beating of Chinese during anti-immigrant riots, the murder of striking workers, and the general hardship that befell many of San Francisco’s pre-war inhabitants. Despite many efforts to stop the murals from being produced in the first place and censorship, they are still on display at the building and open to the public—just a few blocks from the Ferry Building.

For those who will be at the conference, several current and former team members from the project will be on hand and always excited to discuss the New Deal. For those who would like to explore New Deal sites on their own, this is San Francisco, so there is of course “an app for that.” Local public media network KQED worked with the Living New Deal and California Historical Society to create an iPhone and Android app called “Let’s Get Lost,” which features interactive tours of both Coit Tower and Rincon Annex Murals. Or, for the adventurous geographers looking to get out and explore, an actual print map of a self-guided tour of New Deal sites in San Francisco is available.

Geographers who won’t be attending the meeting are still able to explore the legacies of the New Deal in their own regions via the project’s website and interactive map. The Living New Deal has just begun to scratch the surface of what was created by the alphabet soup of federal projects, and strongly encourages interested persons with knowledge of unlisted or incomplete entries for their area to be in touch! Whether in the Bay, another town, or the vast rural and wilderness spaces of the US, the Living New Deal hopes our project will encourage our fellow geographers to look for clues to how the New Deal continues to shape not just the history of the country but the places we inhabit every day.

Alex Tarr is the former project manager at the Living New Deal project and currently the Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Spatial Humanities at the Rice University Humanities Research Center. He received his PhD in geography from the University of California, Berkeley in 2015. A more complete list of the many geographers who have contributed to the Living New Deal is available on the website.

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Priya Bhame
Priya Bhame

Vincent P. Gutowski

Vince Gutowski, popular and long-time faculty member at Eastern Illinois University, with diverse interests across applied geography, passed away suddenly on October 5, 2015, aged 70.

Vincent Peter Gutowski was born on February 1, 1945, in Jersey City, NJ. His father, Chester, celebrated the birth of his first son from aboard a ship somewhere in the Pacific where he was on wartime service with the U.S. Coast Guard.

Following the war, the Gutowskis lived in Pittsburgh, PA. Vince graduated from South Catholic High School in 1962 then served in the U.S. Navy. This included time in Panama at Coco Solo, the submarine and naval air base in the Canal Zone. There he met Pamela Maedl, whose father spent most of his career as a high school teacher in the Zone. They married in 1971 in California.

After his military service, Gutowski continued with his education, receiving a B.A. in 1974 and an M.A. in 1977 both from California State University Northridge. He then moved back to his home city for a PhD at the University of Pittsburgh in the Department of Geology and Planetary Science, completing it in 1987.

Much of his early work was on fluvial environments, with publications on topics including stream terraces, riverbank erosion, depositional zones, riverside land use, urban water consumption, and changing urban waterfronts.

Gutowski joined the Department of Geology and Geography at Eastern Illinois University (EIU) in 1983 where he stayed until retirement in 2010. He had a broad spectrum of research and teaching interests including geomorphology, environmental studies, field methods, cartography and applied geography.

The university’s geography major was withdrawn just after his arrival at EIU but Gutowski was credited with its revival into a thriving and growing program. He was a committed teacher, following the example of his own teachers in encouraging his students to do more than just take classes. He made his students aware of their importance and thrived on guiding those who had a zeal for learning. He encouraged students to do research; in fact all of his own research projects had student involvement. His appreciation for student scholarship at the undergraduate level allowed him to successfully steer many into graduate school and he was instrumental in helping his students receive scholarships.

Gutowski led students on field trips throughout the United States, including the southern Appalachians, the Coastal Plain and the Southwest. He also demonstrated the importance of balancing studies with social gatherings, frequently hosting students at his home. Many former students will remember Gutowski as their friend, confidant and greatest advocate, while approaching his duties in a laid-back, yet academically-responsible manner.

As GIS emerged as a geographic tool, he embraced it for his continuing interests in fluvial geomorphology and paleogeography. In the latter field of scholarship, he spent over a decade on field-based investigations – digging through layers of soil, and sorting through seeds and snail shells – to construct a portrait of the climate and ecology of eastern Illinois 20,000 years ago.

He was also involved in a number of projects for local governments in Illinois – Charleston, Coles County and Decatur – applying GIS for regional planning, infrastructure mapping, and water resource management.

He was deeply committed to local environmental issues, including serving on the Embarras River Management Association’s board of directors and as chair of the council of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources Conservation 2000 Program.

Gutowski became a member of the AAG in 1978. He regularly attended the Annual Meeting and was actively involved in the West Lakes Regional Division, as well as a number of Specialty Groups.

During his career at EIU, Gutowski received numerous university awards for his teaching, research and service, including the Luis Clay Mendez Distinguished Service Award in 2008 for his outstanding dedication to the university, his profession, and the community-at-large. On receipt of awards, Gutowski always credited those who had mentored him. A hallmark of his scholarly work, publications and consultancy projects was collaboration, testament to his inclusive approach.

Gutowski generously used personal funds made via his consulting work to buy equipment for student use in EIU laboratories. He and his wife also established the Vincent P. and Pamela R. Gutowski Fund to support students majoring in geography who show outstanding scholarship and dedication.

After retirement, Gutowski remained active in the department at EIU and in the community, including a project to locate and map a lost cemetery. In 1922, non-union miners were killed during the famous Herrin Massacre in Southern Illinois. Gutowski, along with his long-term collaborator Steve Di Naso, and a research team used a variety of geospatial techniques along with detective work to uncover the victims who had been buried in an unmarked potter’s field thereby helping to bring closure to a divisive chapter in the community’s history. Their accomplishments were recognized with a Superior Achievement Award from the Illinois State Historical Society.

He also spent time in retirement playing golf and on the family property along Kickapoo Creek, planting and tending to thousands of trees.

Vince Gutowski was highly respected and regarded by his colleagues and students alike. Fellow EUI geographer, Godson Obia, described him as “a stellar academic and a great person,” remarking on how much he gave to his students and department. He will also be greatly missed by his family. He predeceased his siblings – two brothers and a sister – and also leaves behind Pam, his loving wife of 44 years, their three children, Jennifer, Carl and Frank, and four grandchildren.

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Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education: A Featured Theme at AAG 2016

Call for Participation
AAG Annual Meeting
San Francisco, California
March 29 – April 2, 2016

For its 2016 Annual Meeting in San Francisco, the AAG is welcoming abstracts and organized session proposals on the theme of Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education.

Context: This is a challenging time to be engaged in scholarship in higher education. Shrinking state budgets and rising tuition raise concerns about the affordability—and importance–of college. Graduate education is facing serious criticism and evaluation; is the academy preparing students valued by society or merely reproducing itself? Skepticism by some members of Congress about the value of social and behavioral sciences threaten research funding at the same time universities are placing increased importance on grantsmanship for promotion and tenure. A cornerstone of education, tenure, is under attack. Fundamental notions of shared governance and academic freedom are under reconsideration. Increasingly our status as individual scholars and collective departments is measured and benchmarked by external organizations using criteria we may not even be aware of—or value.

This plays out in different ways for the discipline of geography. Eight actions emerge as key to healthy geography departments: teach, promote, build, innovate, nurture, manage, reflect, and envision. Departments must have a clear (and shared) vision of what and who they are and be prepared to work to build toward that vision. This may require innovation, a euphemism for change, something that is never easy. Departments need leaders who manage effectively and who are willing to nurture their colleagues, enabling them to succeed across different stages of their careers. Healthy geography departments care about recruiting and retaining students and majors through compelling teaching that enriches the lives of the students they touch. Strong departments build through fund raising, nurturing alumni, and entrepreneurship. Finally, healthy departments take the time to reflect, to assess, plan, and refocus as needed, together.

Sessions: To reflect on these ideas, the AAG invites sessions focused on the notion of building the discipline broadly through the development of healthy departments. A second pathway to disciplinary health is through strong research-based teaching and institutional action. Especially appropriate would be papers and sessions focused on topics such as:

  • Impactful geographical research
  • Entrepreneurship and alumnae development strategies
  • Innovations in undergraduate and graduate education
  • Research in geographic and spatial thinking
  • Innovations in K-12 education
  • Internationalization of geography education

For each of the activities below, we seek a diverse group of individuals representing a range of experiences with these topics. If interested, please follow the specified procedures.

RESEARCH PAPERS

AAG staff will be organizing several paper sessions on research topics related to this theme. To present in one of these sessions:

  • Register for the conference at aag.org/annualmeeting/register
  • During abstract submission select “paper” as the abstract type
  • After entering your abstract, select Higher Education as the Primary Topic
  • In the space for “Special Request” add a note that the abstract submitted is intended for the “Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education” theme
  • When you receive confirmation of a successful abstract submission, please then forward this confirmation to: geoeducation [at] aag [dot] org.

The abstract deadline is October 29, 2015.

ILLUSTRATED PAPER SESSIONS

AAG staff will also be organizing practice-oriented illustrated paper sessions intended to disseminate information about effective approaches to geography education in the context of this theme. An illustrated paper is a short oral summary of problem, data, method, and findings presented in poster format, followed by a one-on-one or small group discussion with interested listeners. Each presenter will post illustrations and other relevant materials on a poster board supplied by the AAG. All oral summaries will be given at the beginning of each session before participants disperse to the poster boards around the room. To present in one of these sessions:

  • Register for the conference at aag.org/annualmeeting/register
  • During abstract submission select “paper” as the abstract type
  • After entering your abstract, select Higher Education as the Primary Topic
  • In the space for “Special Request” add a note that the abstract submitted is intended for the “Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education” theme
  • When you receive confirmation of a successful abstract submission, please then forward this confirmation to: geoeducation [at] aag [dot] org.

The abstract deadline is October 29, 2015.

ORGANIZED SESSIONS

To submit an organized session to this theme please forward your session confirmation email to geoeducation [at] aag [dot] org by October 29, 2015. 

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AAG Staff
AAG Staff