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GEOGRAPHY SEMINAR - GEOG
607 The Politics of Scale Instructor:
Alexander B. Murphy Spring
2007 Mondays,
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This graduate seminar examines changing
understandings of the concept of scale in the geography literature – with a
particular goal of exploring why, in human geography, scale has come to be
understood not just as a matter of spatial resolution, but as a strategy and an
outcome of political and social processes.
We begin with a broad examination of the concept of scale, consider how
and why the concept became more central to geographical analysis in the latter
part of the twentieth century, and explore some of the recent debates over its
use.
The seminar is open to graduate students with an
interest in the role of scale in geographical research and in the history of
geographical ideas. Exploration will
proceed through common reading, discussion, and debate of several
article-length pieces during each session.
Students will also conduct independent research on a topic of interest
to them—showing how scale issues and concepts shape outcomes on the
ground. Time will be devoted during seminar
sessions to the presentation and discussion of developing student work.
Student contributions will be in both written and
oral form. There are four critical
components to student participation in the seminar: (1) digesting assigned readings and coming to
class prepared to discuss them, (2) periodically serving as a discussion leader
for readings during the term, (3) preparing a 15-20 page seminar paper on a
topic agreed to in the early part of the term, and (4) preparing material based
on their independent research for presentation and discussion by the class. Grades for the seminar will be on a pass/no
pass basis; acceptable performance in each of the categories of student
participation is necessary to receive a passing grade.
CLASS SCHEDULE
April 2
Introduction to the subject matter of the course.
Discussion of
readings and student research projects
April 9
Meyer, William B., Derek Gregory, B. L. Turner, and Patricia F. McDowell. “The Local-Global Continuum.” In Geography's Inner Worlds, R. Abler, M. Marcus, and J. Olson, eds., Rutgers Univ. Press, 1992, 255-79.
McMaster, Robert and Eric Sheppard. “Introduction: Scale and Geographic Inquiry.”
In
Agnew, J. “Representing
space: Space, scale and culture in social science.” In
Herod,
Andrew. “Scale: The Local and the Global.”
In Sarah L. Holloway, Stephen P. Rice
and Gill Valentine, eds., Key Concepts in
Geography,
Research/Writing Assignment
Brief review of possible paper topics
April 16
No Class – Week of AAG meeting
April 23
Smith, Neil. “Geography, Difference
and the Production of Scale,” in J. Donerty et al.,
eds., Postmodernism and the Social
Sciences, Macmillan, 1992
———.
“Homeless/global: scaling places.”
Mapping the
futures: local cultures. global change. J. Bird, B. Curtis, T. Putnam, G.
Robertson and L. Tickner (1992).:
87-119.
Swyngedouw, Erik. "Excluding the
Other: The Production of Scale and Scaled Politics." In Geographies of Economies, edited by Roger Lee and Jane
Wills, 167-76, 1997.
Paasi, Anssi.
"Place and Region: Looking through the Prism of Scale." Progress
in Human Geography 28, 4 (2004): 536-46.
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation and discussion of 250-word
abstracts of papers
April 30
Jonas, A. “The scale politics of spatiality.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 12, 3 (1994):
257–264.
Delaney, David, and Helga Leitner.
"The Political Construction of Scale." Political
Geography 16, no. 2 (1997): 93-97.
Swyngedouw, Erik. "Neither Global nor Local:
"Glocalization" and the Politics of
Scale." In Spaces of Globalization: Reasserting the
Power of the Local, edited by Kevin R. Cox (1997): 137-66.
Brenner, Neil. "Between Fixity and Motion: Accumulation, Territorial Organization and the Historical Geography of Spatial Scales." Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 16 (1998): 459-81.
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation and discussion of outlines for
papers
May 7
Cox, Kevin. "Spaces
of Dependence, Spaces of Engagement and the Politics of Scale, Or: Looking for Local Politics." Political Geography
17, no. 1 (1998): 1-23. [Plus discussants – especially Judd and Jones – and Cox’s response.]
Martin, Deborah G. "Transcending the
Fixity of Jurisdictional Scale." Political Geography 18, no. 1
(1999): 33-38.
Staeheli, L. A. "Globalization and the scales of
citizenship." Geography Research Forum 19 (1999): 60-77.
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation/discussion of 3-4 page introductions
of student papers
May 14
Cox, Kevin R. "Locality and Community:
Some Conceptual Issues." European Planning Studies 6, no. 1 (1998):
17-31.
Marston, Sallie A. "The social construction of scale." Progress in Human Geography 24, 2 (2000): 219-242. [Plus Neil Brenner's response and Marston's reply in vol. 25(4), 2001 of the same journal.]
Cidell, J. (2006). "The
place of individuals in the politics of scale." Area 38(2):
196-203.
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation/discussion of a
3-4 page segment of student papers situating the paper topic in the literature.
May 21
Swyngedouw, Erik. "Scaled
Geographies: Nature, Place, and the Politics of Scale." In Scale
and Geographic Inquiry: Nature, Society, Method, edited by Eric Shepard and
Robert B. McMaster.
Sayre, Nathan. "Ecological and
Geographical Scale: Parallels and Potential for Integration." Progress
in Human Geography 29, 3 (2005): 276-90.
McCarthy, James. "Scale,
Sovereignty, and Strategy in Environmental Governance." Antipode
(2005): 731-53.
Lebel, Louis,
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation/discussion of a
6-8 page segment of the papers of 5 students in the class.
May 28
No Class – Memorial Day
June 4
Smith, Neil. "Remaking
Scale: Competition and Cooperation in Prenational and
Postnational
Hooghe, Liesbet and
Gualini, Enrico. “Regionalization as ‘Experimental
Regionalism’: The Re-Scaling of Territorial Policy-Making in
Leitner, Helga.
“The politics of scale and networks of spatial connectivity:
Transnational inter-urban networks and the rescaling of political governance in
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation/discussion of a
6-8 page segment of the papers of 5 students in the class.
Make-up Class for Missed Class During AAG week
Collinge, Chris. “The difference between society and
space: nested scales and the returns of spatial fetishism.” Environment
& Planning D: Society & Space, 23, 2 (2005): 189-206.
Mansfield, Becky. "Beyond
Rescaling: Reintegrating the 'National' as a Dimension of Scalar
Relations." Progress in Human Geography 29, no. 4 (2005):
458-73.
Marston, Sallie A., John Paul
Jones III, and Keith Woodward. “Human geography without scale.” Transactions
of the
Research/Writing Assignment
Circulation/discussion of a 2-4 page
conclusion of the papers of students in the class