The SAGE Handbook of Historical Geography
- Mona Domosh - Dartmouth College
- Michael Heffernan - University of Nottingham
- Charles W. J. Withers - University of Edinburgh
Historical geography is an active, theoretically-informed and vibrant field of study within modern geography, with strong interdisciplinary connections with the humanities and the social sciences. The SAGE Handbook of Historical Geography provides an international and in-depth overview of the field with chapters that examine the history, present condition and future significance of historical geography in relation to recent developments and current research.
The Handbook is in two volumes, divided across nine parts. Volume One includes commentaries on the history and geography of historical geography, and reviews how historical geographers have considered the appropriation, management and representation of landscape, the changing geographies of property, land, money and financial capital, and the demographic, medical and political analysis of the world’s growing and mobile population.
Volume Two shows how historical geographers have made significant contributions to geopolitical debates about the relationships between nation-states and empires, to environmental challenges posed by human interaction with the natural world, to studies of the cultural, intellectual and political implications of modern science and technology, and to investigations of communicative action, artefacts, performances and representations. The final part reviews the methodological and ethical challenges of historical geography as a publicly engaged research practice.
Part 1: Histories and Geographies
Part 2: Land and Landscapes
Part 3: Property and Money
Part 4: Population and Mobility
Part 5: Territory and Geopolitics
Part 6: Environment and Nature
Part 7: Science and Technology
Part 8: Meaning and Communication
Part 9: Studies in Practice
In these two indispensable volumes, editors Domosh, Heffernan and Withers bring together 50 diverse and vital voices to engage deeply with historical geography’s past, present and future. The result of this remarkable collaboration is a guidebook to this distinctive field unlike any other. It is both an insightful, international overview and an exciting basis for informed engagement with today’s world. Historical geography is quintessentially an interdisciplinary endeavor: with its lively and well-researched contributions addressing resonant themes from landscape to dispossession, outer space to big data, the Handbook of Historical Geography will spark the geographical imaginations of a wide readership.
This is the book that historical geographers have long been waiting for. In fifty chapters organised into nine sections the authors provide an authoritative and engaging survey of the international field of historical geography. Taking a generous definition of the subject, the contributors take a fresh look at fundamental themes such as landscape, population, territory, industrialisation and environmental change, as well as addressing neglected topics of vital contemporary significance including geographies of money, slavery, war, dispossession and heritage practice. The chapters typically combine informed synopsis of research in a particular subject area (such as ‘disease’, ‘engineering’, ‘global cityscapes’, ‘state and territory’, ‘the Holocaust’, ‘speech’ or ‘conservation’) with arguments that are compelling, challenging and accessible. This book is testimony to the vitality and diversity of a field which has produced some of the finest writing in the discipline of geography. It will be a godsend to future generations of students and teachers
Unparalleled in its vision and ambition, the SAGE Handbook of Historical Geography is an inspiring testament to the intellectual strength and vibrancy of geographical research on the past. Essays by more than 50 contributors extend across a diverse range of subjects, times, places and contexts, demonstrating the intellectual scope and depth of historical geography. The Handbook’s historical geographies are conceptually and politically engaged, methodologically rigorous and creative, and empirically rich and resonant. From chapters focusing on slavery, famine, disease and climate change, to the historiography of historical geography and research in practice, the Handbook will make a vital and lasting contribution to understanding the past, making sense of the present and imagining possible futures.
