Seminar
in Human Geography:
Cultural and Political Ecology
Geography 679 (02723)
Wednesdays 6:10-10:00 Clippinger
118
Professor
Brad Jokisch
Office Hours: Tuesday and Thursday
12:00-2:00 in Clippinger 113
jokisch@ohiou.edu 593-1143
The
Content:
Cultural/Political Ecology is a subfield within geography that examines
environmental transformation in extractive economies, primarily agricultural
systems in the “Third World”. Both cultural and political ecology are interdisciplinary,
drawing inspiration from and overlapping with anthropology, biology, and
development studies. Cultural ecology has its roots in anthropology, when
researchers investigated how adaptation to the environment gave rise to
particular cultural forms. Through the 1970s, cultural ecologists began
investigating agricultural intensification, the relative sustainability
of swidden systems, the logic of peasant systems, and environmental degradation.
By the 1980s the field of cultural ecology expanded as researchers began
investigating environmental transformation using perspectives from political
economy and social theory (gender in particular), giving rise to the term,
political ecology. Political ecology has become an eclectic subdiscipline
that uses a variety of approaches and scales to explain the causes and
consequences of environmental “problems”. This course explores cultural/political
ecology chronologically. We begin with an historical overview of the subdiscipline
before examining research in cultural ecology. We will spend the
latter half of the quarter reading works in political ecology.
Format:
Each week I will assign a
series of articles and chapters for the class to read. I will place the
readings on reserve at the library and one copy of each reading will be
in the envelope on my office door. Each week’s reading list will be distributed
in class, along with a few questions to consider as you read the work.
Graduate seminars should engage
their participants in high levels of discussion and reflection on the themes
and issues in question, based on a thorough reading of the literature.
This kind of discussion cannot take place unless all participants are prepared.
Preparation involves an understanding of each reading and evaluations of
the strengths and weaknesses of the propositions, claims, interpretations,
and evidence in it. Therefore, the seminar will be mostly discussion, but
I will lecture occasionally, especially to introduce a new set of readings
or topic.
Each week a student will be in charge
of presenting the readings for the week. This will entail a 10-15 minute
presentation which should lead us into the evening’s discussion. Also,
each week everyone is responsible for emailing me a brief reaction statement
to the readings. The email should discuss the most important points raised
by the week’s reading and include your brief commentary. The email should
be less than one page in length and must be sent to me by 3:00 p.m. each
Wednesday. The last class meeting will be a discussion of student papers.
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Assignments:
In addition to the weekly emails
and class participation, there are three writing assignments in the course:
an essay/exam, a paper proposal, and a substantial final paper. The essay/exam
will be a take-home project based on the work covered to that point in
class. I will provide the question(s), and you will have one week to answer
the essay. The paper proposal will be 3 pages that states the research
question, plan of the paper, and includes a preliminary bibliography. The
due date will be announced in class. Everyone will meet with me to discuss
the topic prior to preparing the proposal. Students are encouraged to pursue
their own interests in cultural/political ecology, but I must approve the
paper topic. The final paper should be approximately 15 pages of text and
include a title, bibliography, and graphs, charts, and/or maps as appropriate.
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|
Grading
|
Percentage of Final Grade
|
| Essay/Exam |
25%
|
| Paper Proposal |
10%
|
| Final Paper |
35%
|
| Participation |
30%
|
Text:
Liberation Ecologies: environment,
development, social movements 1996 Peet, Richard and Watts, Michael
(eds.), Routledge, London and New York.
Course
Schedule and Topics
This list is subject to change
based on progress in the course.
|
Jan.
6
|
Introduction
and Subdiscipline Overview |
|
Jan.
12
|
Environmental
Determinism and the Antecedents to Contemporary Thought on Nature-Society
Relations |
|
Jan.
18
|
Cultural
Historical Tradition (Sauer) and the rise of Cultural Ecology (Steward) |
|
Jan.
25
|
Systems
theory and Adaptation to the Environment |
|
Feb.
3
|
Agricultural
Intensification and Behavioralism |
|
Feb.
10
|
Structuralism
and Political Ecology |
|
Feb.
17
|
Political
Ecology Continued |
|
Feb.
24
|
Gender
and the Environment |
|
March
3
|
Development
and Cultural/Political Ecology approaches |
|
March
10
|
The Environment
as a Social Construction |
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