Geographic Thought II: Contemporary Indian Geography, the Major Traditions, Dualisms, Paradigm Shifts and Perspectives from Positivism to Postmodernism
2. The major geographic traditions and the dualisms
William Pattison's essay "The Four Traditions of Geography" (1964) argued that beneath its apparent disunity geography has four enduring traditions, which are exactly the four the document names. The spatial (location) tradition — spatial analysis — studies distance, location, pattern and movement, and runs from Ptolemy's mapping to central place theory and GIS. The area-studies (regional) tradition describes the character of places, from Strabo to Hartshorne. The man–land (man–environment) tradition studies human relations with the physical environment, from determinism and possibilism to cultural ecology and hazards research. The earth-science tradition studies the physical Earth — landforms, climate, soils — the root of physical geography.
| Dualism | The two sides | Where it came from |
|---|---|---|
| Physical versus human | The natural environment against human activity and society | Widened as each branch specialised; bridged by man–environment and hazards research |
| Regional versus systematic | Study of places as wholes against study of one phenomenon across places | Varenius's special and general geography; Ritter against Humboldt |
| Qualitative versus quantitative | Interpretation and description against measurement and statistics | The quantitative revolution of the 1950s–60s and the humanist reaction |
| Idiographic (the document's "ideographic") versus nomothetic | Understanding the unique case against seeking general laws | Terms from the philosopher Wilhelm Windelband (1894); in geography, the Hartshorne–Schaefer debate |
3. The paradigm shift, positivism and behaviouralism
Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962) described science as periods of normal science within an accepted paradigm, interrupted when accumulating anomalies produce a crisis and a scientific revolution installs a new paradigm. Geographers — notably Haggett and Chorley in Models in Geography (1967) — read their own history this way: exploration and description, environmental determinism, the regional paradigm, the quantitative revolution and spatial science, and then the behavioural, radical, humanistic and postmodern turns. Critics such as R.J. Johnston observed that geography's "paradigms" coexist and compete rather than succeed one another cleanly, so the Kuhnian model fits only loosely.
Positivism, from Auguste Comte and the logical positivists of the Vienna Circle, holds that valid knowledge comes from observable facts tested by the scientific method — hypotheses, measurement, statistics and general laws. It was the philosophy of spatial science: William Bunge's Theoretical Geography (1962), Peter Haggett's Locational Analysis in Human Geography (1965) and David Harvey's Explanation in Geography (1969), which set out the logic of scientific explanation for the discipline. Behaviouralism reacted against spatial science's "economic man", who has perfect information and maximises profit. Following W. Kirk's distinction between the phenomenal and the behavioural environment, it studied how people perceive and decide: Julian Wolpert (1964) showed that Swedish farmers were satisficers rather than optimisers; Kevin Lynch's The Image of the City (1960) found five elements in people's mental images of cities — paths, edges, districts, nodes and landmarks; Peter Gould and Rodney White's Mental Maps (1974) mapped residential preferences; and Pred's behavioural matrix applied the approach to industrial location.
4. Humanism, structuralism, feminism and postmodernism
Humanistic geography rejected both the positivist search for laws and behaviouralism's treatment of people as information processors. Drawing on phenomenology, existentialism and idealism, it studies meaning, values and the lived experience of place. Yi-Fu Tuan wrote Topophilia (1974), on the affective bond between people and place, and Space and Place (1977); Edward Relph's Place and Placelessness (1976) criticised the loss of authentic places; Anne Buttimer wrote on the "lifeworld"; and David Ley and Leonard Guelke developed idealist and interpretive approaches. Structuralism in geography looks beneath observable patterns for the deep structures that generate them; its dominant form was Marxist (radical) geography. The journal Antipode was founded in 1969; William Bunge led the Detroit Geographical Expedition; and David Harvey's Social Justice and the City (1973) moved from positivism to a Marxist analysis of urban inequality as a product of capital accumulation. Anthony Giddens's structuration theory later offered a bridge between structure and human agency.
Feminist geography exposed the absence of women from geographical research and the gendering of space. Janice Monk and Susan Hanson's "On Not Excluding Half of the Human in Human Geography" (1982) and the Women and Geography Study Group's Geography and Gender (1984) opened the field; Gillian Rose's Feminism and Geography (1993) criticised the masculinist bias of geographical knowledge; and Doreen Massey's Space, Place and Gender (1994) developed a relational, "progressive" sense of place. Postmodernism is suspicious of grand theories — Jean-François Lyotard's "incredulity towards metanarratives" — and emphasises difference, representation and the local. Edward Soja's Postmodern Geographies (1989) called for a reassertion of space in critical social theory, drawing on Los Angeles; Michael Dear and the "Los Angeles school" followed; and David Harvey's The Condition of Postmodernity (1989) explained postmodern culture itself through the time–space compression of flexible capitalism. Together these perspectives form the "cultural turn" of the 1990s.
| Perspective | Core idea | Landmark works |
|---|---|---|
| Positivism | Laws from observable facts, tested by hypothesis and measurement | Bunge 1962; Haggett 1965; Harvey 1969 |
| Behaviouralism | Perception and decision-making under imperfect information | Lynch 1960; Wolpert 1964; Gould and White 1974 |
| Humanism | Meaning, values and the lived experience of place | Tuan 1974, 1977; Relph 1976; Buttimer |
| Structuralism (Marxist) | Deep economic and social structures generate spatial patterns | Antipode 1969; Harvey 1973 |
| Feminism | Gender relations shape and are shaped by space | Monk and Hanson 1982; Rose 1993; Massey 1994 |
| Postmodernism | Suspicion of metanarratives; difference and representation | Soja 1989; Dear; Harvey 1989 (a critique) |
Key takeaways
- Indian cartography: Survey of India (1767), the Great Trigonometrical Survey (1802, Lambton and Everest), NATMO (1956, S.P. Chatterjee); thematic work by Spate, R.L. Singh, Shafi and Mitra; methodological advances in regional planning (Prakasa Rao, Misra) and political economy (Moonis Raza).
- Pattison (1964): spatial, area-studies, man–land and earth-science traditions — the four the document lists.
- Dualisms: physical–human, regional–systematic (Varenius), qualitative–quantitative, idiographic (the document's "ideographic")–nomothetic (Windelband; Hartshorne against Schaefer).
- Kuhn (1962): normal science, anomaly, crisis, revolution; positivism powered spatial science (Bunge, Haggett, Harvey 1969); behaviouralism studied perception (Lynch's five elements, Wolpert's satisficers).
- Humanism (Tuan, Relph, Buttimer), Marxist structuralism (Antipode, Harvey 1973), feminism (Monk and Hanson, Rose, Massey) and postmodernism (Soja 1989, Harvey's time–space compression) make up the later perspectives.
Practice questions (12)
Attempt each one before opening the answer. Every explanation names the tempting wrong option as well as the right one, because that is where marks are lost.
"The Four Traditions of Geography" — spatial, area studies, man–land and earth science — were identified in 1964 by:
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Answer: C — William Pattison
Pattison's 1964 essay argued that geography's unity lies in four long-standing traditions — exactly the four the NET syllabus lists. Kuhn wrote on scientific revolutions, and Haggett on locational analysis.In Thomas Kuhn's account of scientific change, a new paradigm is established when:
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Answer: D — Accumulating anomalies cause a crisis that ends in a scientific revolution
Kuhn (1962) argued that normal science works within a paradigm until anomalies it cannot explain accumulate into a crisis, which a revolutionary new paradigm resolves. Geographers applied the idea to the quantitative revolution.The syllabus lists the dualism "ideographic versus nomothetic". The correct philosophical term paired with nomothetic, meaning concerned with unique cases, is:
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Answer: A — Idiographic
Windelband's pair is nomothetic (law-seeking) and idiographic (from idios, particular — understanding the unique). "Ideographic" is a misprint; iconography is Gottmann's term for binding symbols, and chorography is regional description.Topophilia (1974), a study of the affective bond between people and place, is a landmark of humanistic geography written by:
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Answer: C — Yi-Fu Tuan
Tuan's Topophilia and Space and Place (1977) are central to humanistic geography. Soja wrote Postmodern Geographies, Bunge Theoretical Geography, and Lynch The Image of the City.Kevin Lynch's The Image of the City (1960), a founding text of behavioural geography, identified five elements of mental images of the city. They are:
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Answer: A — Paths, edges, districts, nodes and landmarks
Lynch asked residents of Boston, Jersey City and Los Angeles to sketch and describe their cities and found that legible images are built from paths, edges, districts, nodes and landmarks. The other lists belong to central place theory, urban land-use models and social area analysis.David Harvey's Social Justice and the City (1973) is significant because it:
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Answer: B — Marked his move from positivism to a Marxist analysis of urban inequality
Harvey's 1969 Explanation in Geography was the positivist manifesto; four years later Social Justice and the City turned to Marxism, founding radical urban geography. Topophilia is Tuan's, and areal differentiation Hartshorne's.Postmodern Geographies: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory (1989), drawing heavily on Los Angeles, was written by:
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Answer: D — Edward Soja
Soja's book is a founding text of postmodern geography and of the "Los Angeles school". Massey wrote Space, Place and Gender, Relph Place and Placelessness, and Wolpert studied satisficing farmers.Which of the following are landmark works of positivist spatial science? Select all that apply.
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Answer: B — David Harvey, Explanation in Geography (1969); C — William Bunge, Theoretical Geography (1962); D — Peter Haggett, Locational Analysis in Human Geography (1965)
Bunge, Haggett and the early Harvey built the law-seeking spatial science of the quantitative revolution. Relph's book is a humanistic critique of placelessness, part of the reaction against positivism.The National Atlas and Thematic Mapping Organisation (NATMO) was established in 1956 under the leadership of:
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Answer: B — S.P. Chatterjee
Shiba Prasad Chatterjee founded NATMO in Calcutta and directed the National Atlas of India. R.L. Singh led the Varanasi school, Moonis Raza the JNU regional development centre, and Everest the Great Trigonometrical Survey in the nineteenth century.Assertion (A): Behavioural geography rejected the "economic man" assumption of spatial science. Reason (R): Real decision-makers act on imperfect information and on their perceptions of the environment, and they satisfice rather than optimise. Choose the correct option.
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Answer: A — Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A
Both are true and R explains A: evidence of bounded rationality — Wolpert's farmers, Kirk's behavioural environment, mental maps — is exactly why behaviouralists replaced the omniscient optimiser with perceiving, satisficing people.Feminism and Geography: The Limits of Geographical Knowledge (1993), a critique of the masculinist bias of the discipline, was written by:
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Answer: D — Gillian Rose
Gillian Rose's 1993 book is a landmark of feminist geography. Monk (with Hanson, 1982) had earlier called for including women in human geography; Buttimer is a humanist, and Semple a determinist of the early twentieth century.The Great Trigonometrical Survey of India, which measured the meridional arc and later the height of Mount Everest, was begun in 1802 by:
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Answer: C — William Lambton
William Lambton started the survey in 1802 from Madras; George Everest succeeded him in 1823 and extended the arc northward. Andrew Waugh announced the height of Peak XV in 1856, and James Rennell had earlier mapped Bengal.