Newsletter – October 2021
PRESIDENT’S COLUMN
AAG Regions Connect & Geographies of Infrastructure
By Emily Yeh
The AAG Regions Connect events in October point the way to the future of AAG meetings—and also highlight the vital role of an equitable digital infrastructure for the US.
ANNUAL MEETING
Upcoming Deadlines for #AAG2022
The next important deadline for paper presenters at #AAG2022 is the October 19 deadline for abstract submission. Please note that registration rates will also increase in all categories after that day. Poster abstracts will be accepted until January 6, 2022. All abstracts can be edited until January 13, 2021. While virtual attendees may only present their work in virtual sessions, in-person registrants may present in either in-person or virtual sessions. As a reminder, the AAG accepts all submitted abstracts and organized sessions for presentation.
Learn more about registration and abstract submission.
Support Geographers – Volunteer to be Part of the AAG Jobs and Careers Center
The AAG seeks panelists, career mentors, workshop leaders and session organizers for careers and professional development activities at the 2022 AAG Annual Meeting in New York City. Individuals representing a broad range of employment sectors, organizations, academic and professional backgrounds, and racial/ethnic/gender perspectives are encouraged to apply. If interested in organizing or participating in a career or professional development event, please see the Call for Participation. For best consideration, please submit your information by November 4, 2021.
Get involved with the AAG Jobs and Careers Center.
Register Today for the 2022 AAG Annual Meeting
Mark your calendar for the AAG Annual Meeting in the Big Apple, February 25 – March 1, 2022. The hybrid meeting will take place both online and at the NY Hilton Midtown and the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel. We look forward to seeing you in New York City!
- Stay up to date on the annual meeting
- Register for the 2022 AAG Annual Meeting
- Decide which presentation type is right for you
- Submit your abstract
PUBLICATIONS
NEW The Professional Geographer Issue Alert: Articles with topics ranging from the more-than-human state to the use of blogs in human geography research
The most recent issue of The Professional Geographer has been published online (Volume 73, Issue 4) with 17 new research articles on current geographic research, including two papers from the 2020 Nystrom Award competition. Topics in this issue include urban food access; museums and memorywork; trends in the geographic discipline in the US; wicked concepts; the use of face masks for COVID-19; US Governors’ Twitter responses to COVID-19; social media use among local governments; the Battle of Hastings; Muslim spaces in China; and daylight saving in Australia. Locational areas of interest include Maricopa County, Arizona; Austin, Texas; Cuyahoga County, Ohio; and the Colombian Andes. Authors are from a variety of research institutions including Seoul National University Asia Center; Universitat Oberta de Catalunya; and Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt.
All AAG members have full online access to all issues of The Professional Geographer through the Members Only page. Each issue, the Editors choose one article to make freely available. In this issue you can read Engaged Convergence Research: An Exploratory Approach to Heat Resilience in Mobile Homes by Lora A. Phillips, Patricia Solís, Chuyuan Wang, Katsiaryna Varfalameyeva, & Janice Burnett for free for the next 3 months.
Questions about The Professional Geographer? Contact PG [at] aag [dot] org.
In addition to the most recently published journal, read the latest issue of the other AAG journals online:
• Annals of the American Association of Geographers
• The Professional Geographer
• GeoHumanities
• The AAG Review of Books
ASSOCIATION NEWS
2021 AAG Regional Meetings Get Underway
Several of the regional divisions of the AAG will host their annual meetings in-person and virtually during October and November. Six of the Regional Divisions are collaborating with AAG and the Applied Geography Conference for AAG Regions Connect: A Joint Climate-Forward Initiative happening Oct 14-16. For those who have not recently attended a regional division meeting, they provide an excellent way to connect with geographers in your area in a more intimate setting than the AAG Annual Meeting. The regional division meetings also promote a supportive environment for student presentations of geographic research. Students are encouraged to apply for the AAG Council Award for Outstanding Graduate Student and Undergraduate Student Paper at a Regional Meeting which awards students with travel funding to the AAG Annual Meeting.
Register for an AAG Regions Meeting.
Upcoming AAG Grants and Awards Deadlines – October 15 and November 1
Please consider submitting applications or nominations to four AAG grants and awards with approaching deadlines, three for students and one for career geographers. The AAG Marble-Boyle Undergraduate Achievement Awards aim to recognize excellence in academic performance by undergraduate students from the U.S. and Canada who are putting forth a strong effort to bridge geographic science and computer science. The biennial William L. Garrison Award for Best Dissertation in Computational Geography supports innovative research into the computational aspects of geographic science. The AAG Harold M. Rose Award for Anti-Racism in Research and Practice honors geographers who have served to advance the discipline through their research, and who have also had an impact on anti-racist practice. Lastly, the AAG Community College Travel Grants support outstanding students from community colleges, junior colleges, city colleges, or similar two-year educational institutions to attend the next AAG Annual Meeting. Community College Travel Grant applications are due November 1, 2021 while nominations and applications for the three awards are due October 15, 2021.
See all grants and awards deadlines.
Selection Committee Members Sought: AAG Learning Series for Graduate Students
The AAG is seeking AAG members (faculty, professionals, and graduate students) to help with the selection process for workshop proposals that will support graduate students and early career geographers. If you are selected as a member on one of the Selection Committees, you will be paid upon completion of the workshop selection (sometime in the Summer of 2022). If you are interested in submitting a selection committee member application or want more information, go to bit.ly/aag-committee-apply.
Submit your application to be a selection committee member on or before Friday, October 15, 2021. The program is supported by AAG staff Julaiti Nilupaer and Coline Dony and you can reach them with any questions at research-during-covid [at] aag [dot] org.
AAG Welcomes Fall Interns
The AAG is excited to welcome two new interns coming aboard our staff for the Fall of 2021! Joining us this semester are Julianna Davis, a senior at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa pursuing a B.A. in Political Science along with a minor in Geography and Environment; Zachary Jarjoura, a senior at University of Maryland, College Park, pursuing a B.S. in geographical sciences with a minor in sustainability studies; and Sreya Juras, a recent graduate from The Ohio State University where she received a BS in International Development while minoring in Environmental Science and Spanish.
Become a GeoAdvocate for Geography Awareness Week November 14-20
This year, AAG celebrates Geography Awareness Week with the theme The Future Is Here: Geographers Pursue the Path Forward. Highlighting the many ways that geographers are anticipating and shaping a better future in their work, the week will also celebrate the contributions of early-career geographers and students of geography. Help us share information about geography as a GeoWeek GeoAdvocate. You’ll receive access to information resources that can help you promote the week in your department or organization. Sign up to be a GeoAdvocate.
You can also send us information about a GeoWeek event for inclusion in our map. Add your event here.
Image: 2016 Rio Olympics mural by Eduardo Kobra
POLICY CORNER
House Science Subcommittee Holds Hearing on Social Media Data Research
The following update comes from our colleagues at the Consortium of Social Science Associations (COSSA)
On September 28, the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight within the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology (SST) held a hearing on social media platforms, data, and research focused on misinformation spread. Witnesses at the hearing included Professor and Interim Dean at Khoury College of Computer Sciences at Northeastern University Dr. Alan Mislove; Ph.D. Candidate and Co-Director of Cybersecurity for Democracy at New York University Laura Edelson; and Professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Department of Sociology Dr. Kevin Leicht.
Subcommittee Chair Bill Foster (D-IL), Ranking Member Jay Obernolte (R-CA), and Full Committee Chair Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) all expressed great concern about the role of social media algorithms in spreading misinformation and shared support for increasing access for researchers to study social media platforms. Specifically, Facebook was singled out by witnesses as a prime example of a “black box” social media platform that hinders research being conducted on their platform, hides algorithmic practices, and uses moderation tools on extremist content in an inconsistent manner. Members questioned the witnesses on a wide variety of topics including data sharing tools such as Facebook’s CrowdTangle and Twitter’s Firehose API, ethical practices that other social media platforms have used, the accessibility of data for researchers on social media, ethical issues with social media platform business models, and the potential for legislative action regarding social media data. Witness testimonies and a recording of the hearing are available on the SST Committee website.
In the News:
- Last month, the White House announced the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST). This group represents the most diverse PCAST in U.S. history and includes AAG 2021 Honorary Geographer, Kathy Sullivan.
- An American Statistical Association (ASA) task force recently released its final report on 2020 Census Quality Indicators.
MEMBER NEWS
October Member Updates
The latest news about AAG Members.
Dr. Brady Foust, former chair of the Geography Department at University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire and fifty-year member of AAG, and his wife Jeanne Foust, who recently retired from a 30-year career at Esri, are donating $1 million to establish the Brady Foust Geospatial Analysis and Technology Double Major Scholarship. The scholarship will initially provide $10,000 a year to two students who enter the university in 2022-23 and two more to students entering in 2023-24, with the hopes of providing four more scholarships a year. Read more.
Christopher Fowler, associate professor of geography and director of the Peter R. Gould Center for Geography Education and Outreach at Penn State’s, has been appointed to the Pennsylvania Redistricting Advisory Council, the only geographer in the state to receive such an appointment. Fowler spoke last month in AAG’s Redistricting Series, serving on the Pennsylvania panel organized by Lee Hachadoorian, assistant professor of instruction at Temple University’s Department of Geography and Urban Studies. (Listen to the recording of that session here.)
RESOURCES AND OPPORTUNITIES
GISCI Announces December 2021 Exam Period
The next testing window for the GISCI Geospatial Core Technical Knowledge Exam® as a part of the GISP Certification has been scheduled and will once again be administered by PSI Online through their worldwide testing facilities in a computer-based testing (CBT) format. The exam will be held December 4 – 11, 2021. The Exam will be administered by PSI Online, a worldwide exam delivery company with over 70 years of experience in providing computer-based testing (CBT) facilities across the US, Canada, and around the world.
More information about the GISP Exam.
Propose a Session for New Meeting: Frontiers in Hydrology
The Frontiers in Hydrology Meeting is a new meeting created by the greater water community and co-sponsored by AGU and CUAHSI (Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc.). #FIHM22 aims to develop actionable solutions to some of the largest water problems facing our world today, incorporating topics such as managing scarce resources, learning from observations, understanding complex systems, and supporting environmental justice and equity. The meeting’s theme is the “Future of Water.” #FIHM22 will be 19-24 June 2022 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and online everywhere. We invite you to propose a session to help to shape this multidisciplinary meeting and encourage proposals that will:
- Work well for audience interactions, including shorter talks, audience engagement, and time for questions and answers.
- Provide access to all presentations and posters online (through pre-recordings, uploads, or live recordings)
- Expand open discussion and engagement times.
We encourage session proposals with diverse groups of conveners and session chairs who can work together to broaden participation. Session proposals can also be collaborative with other groups within AGU and CUAHSI and we encourage proposals that are a collaboration with other professional organizations. By proposing a session, you will be helping to shape this transformative meeting.
National Council on Public History Award Deadlines
NCPH awards recognize excellence in the diverse ways public historians apply their skills to the world around us. The purpose of the award program is to promote professionalism and best practices among public historians and to raise awareness about their activities. Submissions for the Book Award and Kelley Award are due November 1; all other awards (the Outstanding Public History Project Award, New Professional Award, Excellence in Consulting, and Student Awards) are due December 1. Help us acknowledge extraordinary work by nominating yourself or a colleague. A full list of awards and submission details at http://ncph.org/about/awards/.
Upcoming Deadlines and Events from the Kauffman Foundation
Have you ever wanted to share your research with experts and decision-makers in a way that grabs their limited attention? Participate in the Plain Language: Executive Summaries Workshop. This free, virtual event will share strategies for:
- Defining the target audience(s) for scholarly research.
- Leveraging smart information design to create useable and persuasive documents.
- Applying sentence-level edits to improve the readability of your work.
The virtual workshop will be held at 2 p.m. CST on November 9. Register
Thanks to a sponsorship from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, the AAG is pleased to announce two annual awards for promising research studying geography and entrepreneurship: one for best paper and one for best student paper.
The purpose of Best Paper Awards in Geography & Entrepreneurship program is to identify innovative research in business, applied or community geography that is relevant to questions related to entrepreneurs and their firms as well as to practitioners and policymakers. Two awardees will receive a check for $1,500, complimentary meeting registration, and a complimentary ticket to the AAG Awards Luncheon. The runner up for each award will receive complimentary registration and a complimentary ticket to the AAG Awards Luncheon. Submit your applications by November 5, 2021 for consideration.
News from the National Science Foundation
The Human-Environment and Geographical Sciences (HEGS) program at the National Science Foundation has announced several staff changes and has revised the program’s synopsis to better articulate its objectives. Learn more.
IN MEMORIAM
Bobby Wilson, a widely recognized leader in anti-racist scholarship and Emeritus Professor of Geography at the University of Alabama, passed away on August 25th, 2021. Wilson’s career was spent teaching in Alabama, first at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and then at the University of Alabama (in Tuscaloosa), where he was devoted to exploring the links between the civil rights movement, industrialization, and the exploitation of black labor. Wilson was recognized by the AAG with a Presidential Achievement Award in 2012, and both a Rose Award for Anti-Racism Research and Practice and the AAG Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015. More.
Sanford H. Bederman, 89, of Johns Creek, Georgia, died on 19 August 2021 from complications of cancer. An Honorary Life Member of the Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers, and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, Bederman taught at Georgia State University for 34 years. Bederman was primarily interested in geographies of Africa and also served in the U.S. Army in Germany during the 1950s. More.
Anthony O. Gabriel, professor of geography at Central Washington University, died Tuesday, September 14, 2021, after a valiant 14-month battle with cancer. He was 56. A geography professor for 20 years at Central Washington University, Gabriel also taught at Western Washington University and the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh. A mentor to many, he supervised over 30 Masters of Science students as well as new faculty. More.
GEOGRAPHERS IN THE NEWS
- Marshall Shepherd on why the geography of Louisiana made Hurricane Ida worse
- Colorado Sun notes AAG’s Redistricting Series in its overview of state redistricting issues
- ‘The Geography’ Is both a video game and a ~vibe~ generator
EVENTS CALENDAR
- October 14-16, 2021: AAG Regions Connect: A Joint Climate-Forward Initiative
- October 20-23, 2021 – Race, Ethnicity and Place 10th Bi-annual Conference (REP X) and MAD Regional Division Meeting
- October 21-22, 2021 – 2021 AAAS Science, Technology and Human Rights Conference
- October 29-30, 2021 – Middle States Regional Division Meeting
- November 21-22, 2021 – Southeast Regional Division Meeting