The Dictionary of Human Geography (26 page)

Read The Dictionary of Human Geography Online

Authors: Michael Watts

BOOK: The Dictionary of Human Geography
5.11Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
class interval
A key element in the design of a quantitative map that partitions the range of data values into discrete categories, each assigned a unique symbol. Common on chor opLeth maps, class intervals are also used for maps of linear and point phenomena and embedded in maps on which isoLines divide the data into categories or layers. Typically, a map key links the class intervals to their respective symbols, which may vary in size, greytone value or colour. Because different class intervals can yield radically different depictions of the same data, viewers (NEW PARAGRAPH) should be wary of ill informed, careless or biased map authors (Evans, 1977; Monmonier, (NEW PARAGRAPH) . mm (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Monmonier (1993). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
classification and regionalization
Procedures most of them quantitative for grouping indi viduals into categories. Classification involves splitting a population into mutually exclusive categories on pre determined criteria, either deductively (using a previously determined set of classes, such as town size groups) or inductively (finding the best set of classes, on predetermined criteria, for the data set being analysed: cf. deduction; induction). Some procedures start with the entire population and divide it; others start with individuals and group them into classes. Most proceed hierarchically, generating classes that nest within each other at various scales. The goal is to produce classes whose members are more like other members of their class than they are members of other classes: classes are internally homogeneous and externally heterogeneous. A range of classifica tion algorithms is available in standard statis tical packages. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Regionalization (cf. region; regionaL geog raphy) is a special case of classification in which the individuals classified are spatially defined units (usually areas) and the resulting classes (regions) must form contiguous spatial units. Because of this constraint, regions may not be as internally homogeneous as would be classes generated for the same set of areas but without the insistence on contiguity. These latter form regional types, areal units grouped without a contiguity constraint, so that similar areas may be spatially discontinuous (e.g. areas with Mediterranean climates). (NEW PARAGRAPH) Recent work has argued that classifications should not impose firm boundaries, and sug gested instead the use of fuzzy sets to indicate the probability that an individual belongs to any particular class. (See also districting aLgorithm; geodemographics; modifiaBLe areaL unit proBLem; redistricting.) rj (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Johnston (2005c); Heckman, King and Tracy (2005); Openshaw and Openshaw (1997). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
climate
Conventionally understood to com prise the meteorological elements rainfall, wind, temperature, insolation, humidity and so on which characterize the general atmos phere over a zone of the Earth's surface for a period of time. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (2003) thus identifies climate, in its Glossary of terms, as ?average weather? or ?more rigorously as the statistical description of the mean and variabil ity of relevant quantities over a period of time ranging from months to thousands or millions of years'. To this, the IPCC glossary adds that the World Meteorological Organization speci fies 30 years as the ?classical? temporal period for determining average conditions. The crisp clarity of this definition, however, masks the concept?s contested historical lineage. During the period of the European enlightenment, for example, Diderot and d?Alembert?s cele brated Encyclop?die identified as one of its def initions of climate a region with characteristic seasons, soils and cultural mores (Feldman, 1990). The Victorian geologist Samuel Haughton (1880, p. 74) similarly typified cli mate as the ?complex effect of external relations of heat and moisture upon the life of plants and animals?, including the human species. Given these associations, it is not surprising that the study of climate has routinely embraced matters of social, moral and political concern. (NEW PARAGRAPH) human geography's engagements with cli mate have thus been manifold. Among the most conspicuous have been a noticeable inclination amongst its advocates to reduce environmental determinism to climatic determinism; the incorporation of climatic conditions into studies of the perception of environmental hazard and risk; discussion about the role of human agents in inducing climate change and global warming; medical geography's earlier interest in the role of climate correlated pathologies; and imperial debates about human capacities to adapt to different climatic regimes. Each of these domains has witnessed controversy. Amongst early twentieth century environmental deter minists, for example, climate was often called upon to justify various racial ideologies that attributed excellence to the temperate zones and explained the historical trajectory of civil ization in the vocabulary of climatic circum stance (Livingstone, 1994: see also race). Controversy has also attended proposals over the steps that need to be taken to curb the influence that human society has had in climate change and over the degree to which the Earth's planetary atmosphere can be understood as a self regulating system: this has immediate political implications, since individual states have been reluctant to bear the political consequences of prioritizing environmental restraint over economic growth (Fleming, 1998). Amongst early medical geographers, debates about climate revolved around whether disease should be understood in miasmic ecological terms or in the language of the new germ theory (Rupke, 2000: see also medical geography). Debate raged too amongst colonists over whether human accli matization was possible and, if so, under what conditions it could be effected. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Other human dimensions of climatic dis course and practice have also recently been the subject of geographical investigation. The realization that climate has often been con ceived of in moral categories has established it as a significant component in a range of moral geographies. Thus historians of sci ence, for example, have demonstrated how the study of meteorological conditions was rooted in a suite of discourses about the pre diction of ominous social and political hap penings (Jankovic, 2000). The ways in which climate was used to pathologize whole zones of the globe by resorting to it as the explanation for debility as well as parasitic fecundity have also been exposed (Naraindas, 1996). At the same time, enquiries within historical geog raphy have revealed how climate was cultur ally constructed to serve various, often racial, interests among philosophers, geographers, medical practitioners, travel writers and artists (Livingstone, 2002a). These pronouncements contributed directly to the production of the idea of tropicality by castigating the tropical world as medically and morally degraded, and by providing a naturalistic justification for various labour practices in the colonial world and immigration policies in the West. Read in this register, climate has persistently surfaced as a cultural category that has been deployed as a hermeneutic resource to advance moral, political and social interests. (NEW PARAGRAPH) The practices of meteorological instrumen tation have also raised significant geographical questions. Weather conditions are derived from a variety of instrumental devices, such as anemometers, hygroscopes, thermoscopes, barometers and pluviometers (see scientific instrumentation). At centres of calculation, such as the Meteorological Office, the aggre gate mensural yield of widespread meteoro logical networks is assembled as affiliated observation stations return standardized records to weather information centres. As Anderson (2005a, p. 290) puts it: ?Philosophically, the science of meteorology was global; in practice, global science developed in distinctively differ ent political and geographical landscapes, and contemporaries insisted on the importance of the differences.' The inherently geographical nature of this process of knowledge produc tion as information moves from specific sites into general circulation has been the subject of interrogation by both historians and geograph ers, who have examined this scientific impulse to escape the bounds of the local (Jankovic, 2000; Naylor, 2006). The significance of mis sionaries in the gathering of climatological data has also attracted scrutiny, as their records provide information on the weather history of locations in which they worked (Endfield and Nash, 2002). Such work has drawn attention to issues congregating around the standardization of measurement practices, the social geography of who can be trusted to deliver reliable climatic information, the regu lation and management of distant observers, and the cultural politics of shifting boundary lines between amateur and professional. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Matters of climate are thus profoundly implicated in a range of discourses. The racial politics of climatic determinists, the apocalyp tic tincture of certain strands of climatic proph ecy, the economic geography of weather related insurance, and the social constitution of climatological knowledge are just a few of the ways in which climate is clearly disclosed as a cultural construct. dnl (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Jankovic (2000); Livingstone (2002a). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
clusters
A concept usually associated with the work of Michael Porter, from Harvard Business School's Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness. Porter defines clusters as ?... geographic concentrations of intercon nected companies, specialized suppliers, firms in related industries, and associated institu tions (for example universities, standards agencies, and trade associations) in particular fields that compete but also cooperate' (Porter, 1998c, pp. 197 8). According to Porter's work, within a cluster: (1) informa tion flows increase between related and sup porting industries; (2) market awareness of firms improves thanks to the concentration in the cluster of demanding clients; (3) peer pres sure/competition drives innovation as rivals seek to out compete one another; and (4) local ?factor conditions', such as the availability of skilled labour in a particular area, are exploited to make firms globally competitive. These four forces form part of Porter's ?diamond model' for successful clusters. In addition, as Porter also points out, the social foundations of a cluster are vital because success is reliant on ? . . . social glue that binds clusters together, contributing to the value creation process. Many of the competitive advantages of clusters depend on the free flow of information, the discovery of value adding exchanges or transactions, the willingness to align agendas and to work across organiza tions, the strong motivation for improvement. Relationships, networks, and a sense of com mon interest undergird these circumstances? (Porter, 1998c, p. 225). (NEW PARAGRAPH) The concept of the cluster mirrors in many ways ideas contained in a wider set ofliteratures. Dating back to Marshall?s (1890) work on industriaL districts and, more recently, through studies of what have been called Learn ing regions and innovative milieux (Asheim, 1996; Malmberg and Maskell, 2002), emphasis has been placed on the importance of geograph ically distinctive arrangements of firms in one industry for knowledge production and circula tion. This has become especially important in light of recent debates about the knowLedge economy and the need for cities and regions to be globally competitive centres of iNNOvation. It is Porter?s cluster concept that has gained most traction in policy circles, with regional author ities throughout the world employing Porter and his followers to develop a cluster strategy for their local industries. Many are, however, critical of this approach. For geographers, the main concern with the cluster concept has been its apparent geographical fuzziness and the way in which the boundaries of a cluster are never defi ned in existing work. In addition, the way in which iconic spaces such as Silicon Valley are used to produce ?elastic? theoretical models that can be turned into fashionable development concepts has also caused concern, particularly because of the questionable levels of success of such models (see Martin and Sunley, 2003). jrf (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Martin and Sunley (2003); Porter (1998b). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
co-evolution
In biology and ecoLogy, co evolution refers to the reciprocal changes that occur between populations of species as they interact. In one sense all evolution is co evolution, as all species are considered to affect and be affected by changes to other species and their environments. In more spe cific terms, co evolution is understood to apply to those interactions where there has been mutual, symbiotic or parasitic changes that have affected both parties that are tem porally and spatially proximate. In human geography and the social sciences, the term (NEW PARAGRAPH) has been used loosely to understand the com plex relationships between, for example, tech nology and place (Graham, 1998), economy and environment (Costanza, 2003) and humans and companion species (Haraway, (NEW PARAGRAPH) . The shared aim is to avoid reduction ism and determinism, and point to the rela tional character of change. sjh (NEW PARAGRAPH)
co-fabrication
An orientation towards research and intervention emphasizing the ontological and political requirement of ?work ing together? (Whatmore, 2003). Derived from the work of the philosopher Isabelle Stengers (1997), the implications and prac tices involved in co fabrication have best been exemplified in science and technology studies and actor network theory, where the production of reality is demonstrated to be something other than a zero sum game. Rejecting discourses of either pure human invention or discovery of already existing real ity, co fabrication enacts a relational under standing of ontoLogy, suggesting that the more activity there is from a researcher, the more if they are to be successful activity there is from the researched (Latour, 1999c). This maxim applies as much to human microbe assembLages in the laboratory as it does to studies of, or with, social groups. In terms of the latter, co fabrication leads to something akin to action research, though with the added implication that all participants in the research process are treated less as informants and more as colleagues (Stengers, (NEW PARAGRAPH) . For social science, this requires a change of stance, away from distanced, expert critique and towards the crafting of co operative ventures. sjh (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Whatmore (2003). (NEW PARAGRAPH)

Other books

Midnight Captive by Elle Kennedy
Wicked Paradise by Erin Richards
Epilogue by Anne Roiphe
The Wells Bequest by Polly Shulman
The Fireman's Secret by Jessica Keller
Death by Denim by Linda Gerber
Last Puzzle & Testament by Hall, Parnell
The Tylenol Mafia by Scott Bartz
El pozo de las tinieblas by Douglas Niles
Angel of Death by Jack Higgins