Three 20th Century "Revolutions" in American Geography

During the 20th century, the evolution of American geography went through three major periods of change. The first period of change, which began in the 1920s and extended through the 1930s, initially consisted of a move away from environmental determinism toward "man-land" relations; then...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inUrban geography Vol. 23; no. 6; pp. 503 - 527
Main Authors Gauthier, Howard L., Taaffe, Edward J.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Silver Spring, MD Taylor & Francis Group 01.09.2002
Winston
Subjects
18th-20th centuries. National schools
areal differentiation
Bgi / Prodig
environmental determinism
geographic thought
Geography
Historical section
History
History of geographical sciences and discoveries
Land
man-land relations
Revolution
Social theory
Spatial analysis
twentieth century geography
U.S.A
Urban geography
Urban studies
United States of America
History of geography
Epistemology
Twentieth Century
Practice of geography
Spatial analysis
American school
Man-environment relations
Social theory
Research
Spatial differentiation
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Summary:During the 20th century, the evolution of American geography went through three major periods of change. The first period of change, which began in the 1920s and extended through the 1930s, initially consisted of a move away from environmental determinism toward "man-land" relations; then a move from man-land relations to an emphasis on regional study, or areal differentiation. The second change period, from the early 1950s to the late 1960s, saw a shift away from areal differentiation toward spatial analysis, involving quantitative methods and the application of theory. The third period began in the early 1970s and has extended beyond the l980s. The period was marked by a stress on social theory and a strong rejection of the work in spatial analysis. The three periods of change are compared in terms of six selected characteristics: (1) type of change; (2) pace of change; (3) intensity of debate accompanying change; (4) operational characteristics of change; (5) impact of change; and (6) disciplinary and societal context of change. An overview of the periods of change suggests three possible interpretations: monotonicity, periodicity, and continuity.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 23
ISSN:0272-3638
1938-2847
DOI:10.2747/0272-3638.23.6.503