Writing orderly geographies of distant places: the regional survey movement and Latin America

Naylor, S. and Jones, G.A. (1997) Writing orderly geographies of distant places: the regional survey movement and Latin America. Ecumene, 4(3), pp. 273-299. (doi: 10.1177/147447409700400302)

Abstract

<br>Surveys of the boundaries, rivers and railways of Argentina have during the past century extended a network of measurements around and over the country, covering it with a finer and larger mesh of surveyed lines and affording a general knowledge of the principal geographical features.</br> <br>This paper is concerned with both a specific 'mapping' technique as well as with a particular evolutionary moment in the social sciences at the turn of the twentieth century. In it we concentrate upon the use of the 'regional survey or 'transect' which, in different forms, had become a mainstream technique in geography by the early 1900s, largely through the work of the Scottish geographer, sociologist and biologist Patrick Geddes, and is widely accredited with an important role in the evolution of geography as an academic discipline.</br> <br>The paper is also concerned with the complex imbrications of knowledge and power, focusing especially on the encounter between new ways of 'seeing' space and place and the decolonized areas of Argentina and Paraguay. We draw upon the writings of a number of influential sociologists, geographers and biologists, notably, William S. Barclay, Colonel George Church and Bailey Willis, and the less well known Victor Branford and Marcel Hardy. Specifically, we concentrate upon a survey by Barclay published in the Geographical journal, and unpublished surveys by Victor Branford and Marcel Hardy. This emphasis is important, as the significance of these encounters between British explorer-academics and Latin America has been largely ignored in the histories of the geographical discipline generally and in the historiographies of the Regional Survey Movement more specifically.</br>

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: Ecumene is continued by Cultural Geographies (ISSN 1474-4740)
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Naylor, Professor Simon
• Authors: Naylor, S., and Jones, G.A.
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Geographical and Earth Sciences
• Journal Name: Ecumene
• Publisher: Sage Publications
• ISSN: 0967-4608