A Geogaphy Podcast by YSJ Staff!

We are pleased to share Beyond Colouring-In, a new podcast produced by members of the YSJU Geography team that aims to provide students with an accessible introduction to key geographical concepts and research methods.

Each episode features an informal conversation about a specific research concept or theme, and comes accompanied by a list of readings to help you further your understanding. Episodes can be listened to in any order, and we hope to continually add new episodes on a regular(-ish) basis. Details of current episodes and their suggested readings are provided below. You can also follow the YSJ Geography twitter account for podcast updates. Listen/subscribe via Anchor FM, Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Please do let us know what you think, and be sure to comment/review the podcast if you enjoy what we are doing! Also feel free to suggest concepts/methods for us to discuss in the future!

A full list of the podcast episodes can be found below, organised by the topic discussed (concepts or methods) and including the associated reading lists (updated as often as possible!). 

Concepts

Ecological Justice – LINK TO EPISODE

Ecosystem Services – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1: Lekan discusses the work of Robert Constanza and others from 1997 – ‘The value of the world’s ecosystem services and natural capital’, published in Nature – that demonstrates an early, influential effort to quantify environmental benefits in terms of monetary value. Link here: https://www.nature.com/articles/387253a0
• Key Reading #2: Sharachchandra Lele et al’s 2013 review of the concept published in Conservation and Society (‘Ecosystem Services: Origins, Contributions, Pitfalls, and alternatives’) incorporates a summary of some of the key ways that the concept of ES has been taken up in response to the challenges of environmental management and conservation, as well as reflecting on the weaknesses of the approach, and how these might be addressed. Open access and available here: https://www.jstor.org/stable/26393131?seq=1
• Further Reading: Mark Everard’s textbook, Ecosystem Services: Key Issues, a second edition published in 2022, provides an accessible introduction and overview of the concept of ecosystem services (and associated ideas) via a range of case studies and suggested further reading. A previous is available via Google Books: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Ecosystem_Services/r9dSEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0
• Further Reading: Kurt Jax et al’s 2013 paper in Ecological Economics (‘Ecosystem services and ethics’) reflect on the ethical assumptions of potential issues arising from the application of the ES concept, and consider the importance of context for assessing the worth of the approach, as well as considering how improved clarity around the processes of evaluating the environment might address some of these concerns. Link here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800913002073

Geodiversity – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1: The 2022 article “Conserving Nature’s Stage…” by John Gordon, Joe and Jonathan Larwood offers a useful account of the relationships between geo- and biodiversity, and the importance of preserving the varied surfaces of the earth upon which species flourish. Published in the Park Stewardship Forum and available online here as an open-access text: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8fp8v4wk
• Key Reading #2: Joe’s 2017 paper in Global Ecology and Biogeography, co-authored with several others and drawing on his PhD research, entitled “Modelling native and alien vascular plant species richness” specifically examines the question of scale, as discussed in the episode, and its importance when assessing the relevance of ‘geodiversity’. Published open access and available here: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/geb.12574
• Further Reading: Joe and fellow researcher Franziska Schrodt wrote a really accessible article for the online news site The Conversation in 2019 that introduces the concept and importance of geodiversity for a non-specialist audience interested in conservation. Available online here: https://theconversation.com/our-new-research-is-tracing-the-development-of-the-worlds-vital-non-living-nature-125664
• Further Reading: Joe recommends Murray Gray’s 2013 book Geodiversity: Valuing and conserving abiotic nature as an excellent general reference text on the concept. A preview is available via google books here: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Geodiversity/LSB8AAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0  

Phenomenology – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1: The 2007 article “Leaving nothing but ripples on the water: performing ecotourism natures” by Gordon Waitt and Lauren Cook is mentioned by Pauline in discussion as a useful applied example of how scholarship on outdoor human activities might incorporate and consider bodily experiences. Published in the Social & Cultural Geography and available online here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14649360701529782
• Key Reading #2: Pauline’s 2017 paper in cultural geographies, flagged in the episode, sees her apply the insights of Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology to the subject of small-boat sailing and the experience of ‘being in nature’. “The embodied spatialities of being in nature” is available online here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1474474017732978
• Further Reading: Geographer Eden Kincaid has developed a range of resources explaining and discussing key concepts and debates in geography as part of a series of collated twitter threads (see the website: ‘wtf is…geography!?’). Being as they work on phenomenology in their own research, the thread on this subject is a great way into the concept. Available online here: https://twitter.com/WTFisGeography/status/1572962871042273280?s=20&t=XW5MYaGWLJjfcgl8tkvsDQ
• Further Reading:  The article by Drik van Eck and Roos Pijpers from 2017, ‘Encounters in place ballet’, published in Area, is one that Pauline has found works well when teaching students about phenomenological ideas and how they might be applied by geographers to understand spatial experience (in this case, the experience of parks by older people). Link here: https://rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/area.12311

Space & Place – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1: Doreen Massey’s famous essay/chapter ‘ A Global Sense of Place’, first published in Marxism Today in 1991, and later included in her book Space, Place and Gender. In this classic piece, Massey argues for an ‘extroverted’ or outward-looking understanding of places as ‘meeting places’, is impossible to understand or explain in their particularity and character without following their connections with other places and times. Link: http://www.aughty.org/pdf/global_sense_place.pdf
• Key Reading #2: Tim Cresswell’s excellent introductory account of the concept of place and some of the key writings by geographers on this subject provides an excellent overview of much of what was discussed in the episode. Link: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Place/sdzhBQAAQBAJ?hl=en 
• Further Reading: Yi Fu Tuan’s highly influential, humanist and phenomenological account of space and place that, in particular, foregrounds place as something to be known, and attached to, through the senses. Link: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Space_and_Place/Ln2fQgAACAAJ?hl=en
• Further Reading: Stuart Elden’s short article from the mid-2000’s provides a neat overview of Henri Levefebvre’s ideas around The Production of Space, and in particular his arguments about the political nature of space and its construction under capitalism (available via ResearchGate). Link: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Stuart-Elden-2/publication/304885956_There_is_a_Politics_of_Space_because_Space_is_Political_Henri_Lefebvre_and_the_Production_of_Space/links/5a9ed3130f7e9badd99e7766/There-is-a-Politics-of-Space-because-Space-is-Political-Henri-Lefebvre-and-the-Production-of-Space.pdf

Sustainability – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1: Jacobus Du Pisani offers a neat overview of the historical roots of the idea of sustainability in his 2006 article – ‘Sustainable development: historical roots of the concept’ – published in Environmental Sciences, including reflections on the ways in which notions of living ‘sustainably’ have permeated discussions of human-environmental relations for several centuries. Link here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15693430600688831  
• Key Reading #2: Although over 10 years old, Jenny Pickerill and Larch Maxey’s review of ‘Geographies of Sustainability’ (published in 2009 in Geography Compass) provides a useful way into thinking spatially about this concept, and some of the ways in which geographers have sought to critically engage with and apply it. Link here: https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1749-8198.2009.00237.x
• Further Reading: John Robinson’s 2004 article in Ecological Economics (‘Squaring the circle? Some thoughts on the idea of sustainable development’) offers a critical perspective on the idea of ‘sustainable development’, and its circulation, since the term first came to prominence in the late 1980s. The article elaborates some of the critiques of the term discussed in the podcast episode, as well as how these might be addressed. Link here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800904000175
• Further Reading: Margaret Robertson’s textbook Sustainability Principles and Practice has recently been released in its 3^rd edition (2021). A useful resource for students that offers a way into the cross-disciplinary concerns of sustainability, its challenges, practices and key debates, complemented with discussion questions, further reading, and key examples. A preview is available via Google Books here: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Sustainability_Principles_and_Practice/WuMUEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0

Methods

Archives / The Archive – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1:The chapters in the SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Geography by Hayden Lorimer (‘Chapter 14 – Caught in the Nick of Time: Archives and Fieldwork’) is a brilliant and insightful reflection on the challenge of archive-working. Link:  https://methods.sagepub.com/book/the-sage-handbook-of-qualitative-geography-srm/i1471.xml
• Key Reading #2: The recent (2022) piece by Case Watkins and Judith Carney in the journal Antipode, entitled ‘Amplifying the Archive: Methodological Plurality and Geographies of the Black Atlantic’, features in our discussion. It’s a great example of how combining different kinds of sources offers a route to addressing the absences inherent in the ‘imperial archive’. Link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/anti.12838
• Further Reading:Su flags Francesca Moore’s ‘Tales from the archive: methodological and ethical issues in historical geography research’, published in 2010 in Area, as a useful elaboration of some of the key ethical questions that working in archives, particularly when exploring more sensitive topics or histories, can raise. Link: https://rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1475-4762.2009.00923.x
• Further Reading: Sarah Mills’ review of archival research in Geography, published in Geography Compass in 2013 (‘Cultural–Historical Geographies of the Archive: Fragments, Objects and Ghosts’), especially concerns the often partial or fragmented character of historical records, the utilisation of artefacts as archival sources, and the various means by which history is ‘haunted’ by the stories of those excluded from the narrative of the day. Link: https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/gec3.12071

Field Observation – LINK TO EPISODE

• Key Reading #1: The chapters in the Key Methods in Geography textbook by Eric Laurier (‘Chapter 11 – Participant & Non-Participant Observation’) and Shelly Rayback (‘Chapter 20 – Making Observations and Measurements in the Field’) provide an excellent and accessible introduction to the various ways in which geographers of all stripes might deploy observational methods. Link: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Key_Methods_in_Geography/-WaZBQAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0
• Key Reading #2: The chapter by Bruce Rhodes & David Wilson (‘Chapter 3 – Observing our World’) in the textbook Research Methods in Geography: A Critical Introduction, provides a detailed account of field observation, as well as some of the underlying assumptions / ideas that inform its practice, and the changing ways in which observation has been deployed in recent decades, to different ends. Link: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Research_Methods_in_Geography/gGU0wV9bUQgC?hl=en&gbpv=0
• Further Reading: Alan Marvell & David Simm’s article describing the use of fieldwork observations during a student trip to Barcelona demonstrates the variety of ways in which being able to witness geographical processes can enhance our understandings of key concepts and ideas, and the very making of landscapes and places themselves. Link: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00167487.2016.12093996
• Further Reading: John Berger’s essay ‘Drawn to that Moment’ elaborates the idea of drawings as records of one’s perception of the world, rather than as the world itself. Always worth a read and suggests why sketching/drawing might offer an enhancement to observation. Link: https://www.spokesmanbooks.com/Spokesman/PDF/90Berger.pdf