Human Geography
Human geography is an interdisciplinary, inclusive, and exciting field: just about every aspect of human activity can be analyzed and understood from a spatial perspective! Human geographers study topics as diverse as immigration, food, children, sustainability, water, social movements, urban gentrification, racism, health, poverty, conflict, and many others. They do so using a variety of methods, including GIS, qualitative and quantitative approaches.
Human geography faculty members at SDSU teach a wide range of courses and are involved in a number of research projects that highlight the ways in which human societies create and transform their social and physical environments. Many of us specialize in urban geography and are fascinated by the diversity of urban experiences. We are also concerned with spatial inequality within cities and its consequences on low-income people, racial and ethnic minorities, women, children and the elderly.
Social and cultural geographers study how different people relate to places such as neighborhoods, public spaces, and homes and how that impacts their identity, everyday life, and wellbeing. They also explore how people organize and actively struggle to define, claim, and transform places.
Human geography relates to global studies and many of our human geography faculty members are also area specialists, focusing their attention and their research on a specific region such as Latin America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and California.
Specialities
We study the places and spaces of children and young people’s lives, emphasizing their agency in their families and communities. We also focus on child rights and youth activism.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 102: People, Places, and Environments
- GEOG 348: Environment and Development
- GEOG 354: Geography of Cities
- GEOG 554: World Cities: Comparative Approaches to Urbanization
Geographers at SDSU conduct research on a variety of urban issues from a wide range of theoretical and methodological perspectives. Some use GIS and quantitative spatial analytical methods to study the spatial organization of cities and solve problems associated with transportation, housing, and crime. Others employ mixed and qualitative methods to study how different people experience cities paying attention to the right to inhabit urban spaces and the ability to access resources and shape one’s environment.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 354: Geography of Cities
- GEOG 454: Sustainable Cities
- GEOG 554: World Cities: Comparative Approaches to Urbanization
- GEOG 740: Seminar in Human Geography
Everybody has to eat; the procurement and consumption of food are some of the most mundane and basic activities of humankind. At the same time, these practices are deeply influenced by economic, political, social, and cultural forces that operate at various geographic scales. Food provides a wonderful window to explore how the everyday is shaped by global food regimes, political ideology, consumption cultures, environmental resources and climate change. Of particular interest to geographers are questions related to the spatial distribution of food production and consumption, the organization of local and alternative food systems, and the relationship between foodways and place.
SDSU faculty specializing in this area have conducted research on alternative food spaces, food and gentrification, ethnic food economies, and the social significance of food in the lives of immigrants, including young people.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 340: Geography of Food
- GEOG 440: Food Justice
- GEOG 590: Community-Based Geographic Research (a project-based class that involves students in field research on topics as varied as food deserts, young people’s food routines, ethnic food businesses, and more recently the creation of a “good food district.”)
Human geographers at SDSU are interested in understanding how people maintain livelihoods under changing economic and political circumstances. This requires that we pay attention to employment and income earning activities as well as social reproduction – the everyday activities that take place outside of work, but are essential in supporting the life and wellbeing of individuals and communities and include the provision of food, shelter, clothing, and care. We study these issues in a variety of places, including southern California and Ecuador. We are particularly interested in informal and precarious work.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 102: People, Places, and Environments
- GEOG 348: Environment and Development
- GEOG 353: Economic Geography
- GEOG 554: World Cities: Comparative Approaches to Urbanization
Explores spatial questions about material production, cultural meaning, and bodily affects and perceptions in relation to all forms of media, including film, TV, social media, video-games, radio, music, and theater.
Faculty doing research in this area:
In 2015, according to the United Nations, there were 244 million people in the world living outside of their country of birth, including almost 20 million refugees. As human geographers, many of us are interested in understanding this movement of people across international borders. We focus on a variety of issues related to migration and mobility, including the political, economic, social, and environmental reasons why people migrate from one place to another, the consequences of migration on places of origin, the transnational networks that connect migrants to their communities, and the multifaceted experiences of migrants and their families as they settle in new places.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 348: Environment and Development
- GEOG 554: World Cities: Comparative Approaches to Urbanization
- GEOG 740: Seminar in Human Geography
Political ecology is a field of human geography that explores the connections between environment and society from a critical perspective, emphasizing the power relations and political-economic factors underlying them.
SDSU Faculty working within this field are interested in a wide range of issues including the privatization of public resources like water, access to green space and urban natures, children’s relationship to nature, governance of natural resources, and the political ecology of urban agriculture and local food systems.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 348: Environment and Development
- GEOG 454: Sustainable Cities
- GEOG 496: Selected Studies in Geography
- GEOG 554: World Cities: Comparative Approaches to Urbanization
- GEOG 770: Seminar in Environmental Conservation
Geographers at SDSU conduct research on key topics in political geography. Many of us are inspired by political-economic perspectives that emphasize the intimate relationships between the state and the economy and their impacts on many geographic phenomena. Yet, we do so critically, with consideration of culture, affect, and difference. We have conducted research on state restructuring, including the withdrawal of the welfare state and its neoliberalization, and how it impacts the everyday lives of people in particular places. Our work also draws attention to the importance of space and place in enabling and sustaining collective action, affecting social change, and organizing resistance. It expands the definition of the political to include actors and activities that are typically not viewed as such.
Faculty doing research in this area:
Courses offered in this area:
- GEOG 324: Latin America
- GEOG 348: Environment and Development
- GEOG 554: World Cities: Comparative Approaches to Urbanization
- GEOG 740: Seminar in Human Geography