Abstract
This paper explores the concept of “geosophy” and its theoretical and practical implications for new directions in the geohumanities. Geosophy, the subjective, philosophical, and creative understanding and practice of geography, was introduced by John Kirtland Wright in his 1946 presidential address to the American Association of Geographers to develop a humanistic counterpoint to the predominantly empirical discipline. Wright stressed the importance of perception, visualization, narrative, metaphor, cognition, and other non-scientific factors in constructing geographical knowledge. These subjective processes of narrative orientation and mind-mapping, claims the cultural geographer Yi Fu Tuan, integrate physical and human geography into a meaningful symbiotic whole and transform space into place. Years of teaching World Geography at the undergraduate level have convinced me of what Jared Diamond calls, the “Power of Place.” I have seen students inspired and empowered by their growing understanding and field experience of the earth and its systems. Basic geographic concepts - materiality; flux; geologic “deep” time; scale and perspective; landscape; the human-physical nexus; cartography and wayfinding; regionalism; geopolitics; and interconnection, etc. – are explored and mined for insights to both ground and liberate a new geographic literacy and imagination in the classroom and everyday life. Conversely, geographic illiteracy, abetted by the removal of geography from most school curricula and the prevalence of GPS and other conveniences, has impoverished our understanding of and interaction with the world. Through a practical exploration of multicultural approaches to geography, this paper considers the literary, artistic, civic, and pedagogical possibilities of geosophy and the geohumanities.
Presenters
Michael KilburnProfessor, Politics and International Studies, Endicott College, Massachusetts, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
2025 Special Focus—Oceanic Journeys: Multicultural Approaches in the Humanities
KEYWORDS
Geography, Geosophy, Geohumanities, Space, Place, Yi-Fu-Tuan, Narrative, Mapping, Fieldwork
