Humanistic Geography: How it blends with human geography through methodology

Abstract

Humanistic geography is a genre of geography born in late 1960s. A series of theories came out which criticize the knowledge system of logical positivism. The philosophical fundaments of humanistic geography are existentialism and phenomenology. Yi-fu Tuan, Edward Relph, Anne Buttimer, David Ley, Marvyn Samuels and Nicholas Entrikin are the leaders of humanistic geography. Yi-fu Tuan published the first article about humanistic geography, which was collected in Human Geography (1976). The focus of humanistic geography is on people and their condition. However, in different geographic traditions, humanistic geography is often criticized for its weak methodology. I argue humanistic philosophy, can provide a sound epistemologicalframework in which to organize and strengthen this methodology in human geography research. The topics of geographical knowledge, territory and place, crowding and privacy, livelihood and economics, and religion are briefly noted from the humanistic perspective. The basic approach to these topics is by way of human experience, knowledge, and awareness. The application of this approach is emerging in the Nepalese context, however for long time Nepalese geographers followed the Western Eurocentric view and appear to be content in following western notions and ignored understanding our own social and cultural aspects/landscapes that enrich our knowledge of geography. The researcher claims that there is a need to rethink our research practices towards better understanding of the world with austerity of philosophical and methodological consistency.

Humanistic geography in an indigenous community of Mexico: Santa Catarina Lachatao

“…Social memory is tightly interwound with everyday life and rituals and serves to preserve both the sense of history and cosmovision, a life project (Ríos, 2013;Johnson et al, 2015). In this way, the public space of the urban center functions as a meeting place for everyone and anyone (Tuan, 1977;Sapkota, 2017). The geographical location of the basketball court at the downtown center functions as the symbol of community growth before others in social encounters (Garcia, 2018).…”

“…The current research rests on humanistic geography, a small yet vibrant social science (Tuan, 1976(Tuan, , 1977(Tuan, , 1983(Tuan, , 2010Sapkota, 2017;Seamon and Larsen, 2020). The object of study is the spatial organization of the Santa Catarina Lachatao society and its interpersonal relations, specifically among the children of this indigenous community and its environment (Johnston et al, 2000;Low, 2022), connected to the land (Dudgeon and Bray, 2019) and Earth (Moreton-Robinson, 2017), in one of the least-accessible regions in southern Mesoamerica.…”

Türk Beşeri Coğrafyasında İhmal Edilmiş Bir Paradigma: Hümanist Coğrafya

“…O, "tüm bilginin deneyim dünyasından geldiğini ve o dünyadan bağımsız olamayacağını" ileri sürmüştür. Bilgi edinmeyi gerektiren bu bakış açısı, deneyimsel bir süreci içerdiğinden gözlemciden bağımsız olarak var olan hiçbir özün veya mutlaklığın olmadığını ve dünyanın gerçek değerini anlamanın tek yolunun onunla doğrudan yüzleşmek olduğunu ima etmektedir (Sapkota, 2017). Tuan (1971) ise çevresel, coğrafi ve yersel özelliklerin birleştirildiği dünyadaki insana vurgu yaptığı için fenomenolojik perspektifin coğrafi açıdan değerine ve potansiyeline vurgu yapmıştır.…”

The symbolic dimension of the city – the presence of a dragon in the urban space of Krakow

“…Humanistic geography takes an interest in the interpretation of landscape as a carrier and repository of symbolic meanings, rather than in establishing a quantitative correlation between people and place. The methodology is based on hermeneutics (the theory of interpretation and clarification of meanings (Sapkota 2017)). Therefore, the authors applied qualitative research methods, i.e.…”