Limits of Freedom – Defining a Normative Background for Spatial Citizenship

Abstract

This paper deals with the application of geomedia that are in everyday use, quoting two highly political mapping examples. These publicly accessible digital maps addressing the current refugee situation, its reception and instrumentalization in Germany are used to provide a vivid example of a practical application of Spatial Citizenship. This paper presents the theoretical framework of Spatial Citizenship. After examining questions which arise from an analysis of the maps, this framework is discussed and extended, especially with regards to the social embeddedness of its basic principles of fundamental human rights and democratic negotiation. The discussion reveals the links between approaches from social geography and central aspects of citizenship education. Finally, the educational implications of this extension of the Spatial Citizenship approach are discussed while presenting a practical example.

Linking Sustainable Transport and Community Development: Transportation 2.0 in the Small Island of Tobago

“…Social geo-communication combines social media with geographic information systems, e.g. geo-media [32,33]. Software tools and smartphone apps for voluntary crowd-sourced mapping have been increased [34].…”

“…Community mapping indicates a link between map-creation and policymaking. The ability to produce, understand, critically think, reflect on submitted information can be therefore understood as a form of democratic and a kind of Spatial Citizenship [33].…”

Educational Resources, Geographical Information, Geomedia, and Learning

“…In early versions of the concept, both the conceptualization of citizenship as well as the radical constructivist aspect of the Spatial Citizenship approach were questioned, noting that the basic conception was easily misunderstood as fostering a very conservative aspect of administratively bounded citizenship, and even fostering nationalist tendencies. While Gryl and Jekel (2012) already based their original work on the idea of an actualized citizenship by Bennett et al (2009), further clarifications on useful concepts of citizenship have been provided by Bednarz and Bednarz (2015), Jekel et al (2015), as well as Gryl et al (2017). The latter contribution also discusses a possible normative background in some more detail.…”

“…Spatially Enabled Learner: Geomedia as an Integrated Education Platform Among others, Thielmann et al (2012) and Vogler et al (2012, 205) state that we live in a "spatially enabled society": Spatial representations are omnipresent and provide information layers for everyday information and decision-making. While the availability of mobile devices, the mobile web, social web applications, and globalization outcomes in general seem to support de-location in everyday understanding and action (Gryl et al 2017), the combination of these aspects with geolocational technologies leads to a "renaissance of place" (Schroll et al 2007, 26, transl. )…”

Spatial Citizenship and Service Learning – Breaking the Mould of Geography Teacher Education

“…The scientific development of Spatial Citizenship (Gryl & Jekel, 2012) has so far comprised three major fields of interest: (1) the theoretical and pedagogical foundation and configuration of a competence-based learning approach for Spatial Citizenship Education (SCE) that aims to enable people to critically use digital geomedia for political participation and for decision-making in spatial discourses in society (Jekel, Gryl, & Schulze, 2015;Jekel, Gryl, & Oberrauch, 2015); (2) in the context of the SPACIT project, a number of learning materials have been developed to support the integration of SCE within situated and cooperative learning environments in schools and, thus, to foster active teaching for geomedia-based communication and reflection in real-world contexts (SPACIT, 2014); (3) the actual implementation of SCE into learning environments in schools and teacher education, in the form of lesson plans and practice examples (see e.g. Gryl, Könen, & Pokraka, 2017;Pokraka et al, 2017). All the contributions cited provide details of how to integrate SCE into teaching and learning, in terms of critical cartography and emancipatory map production, the use of digital geomedia for participation in political discourse, and citizenship education in general.…”