Syllabus

(November 9, 2007)

GEOGRAPHY 330 (Old 362)

Cultural Geography

MWF 2:00 P.M. - 2:50 P.M.

(Lefrak Hall 2166)

I. Introduction - What I hope you will take away from this

course.

II. Course `Outline':

A. The physical world as it impinges on us.

B. The nature of cultural geography.

C. Languages.

D. Religions.

E. Folk geography, popular culture and ethnicity.

F. Politics, cities, the urban mosaic, and the industrial

world.

G. Agriculture.

H. Demography.

III. Course Requirements:

A. Two short papers. One dealing with a `physical' aspect

of the environment as it affects human culture (spend

all but the last paragraph describing the physical

environment, then briefly discuss its impact on the

culture(s) in or near it), the other dealing with ei-

ther a particular `culture' or a facet of culture as it

varies over the world. Each paper is to be a minimum of

5 full pages not counting cover pages, illustrations or

bibliography page. These papers will constitute 50% of

your class grade. They will be due Friday, March 14th.

Each paper must use at least four college-level refer-

ence sources (peer-reviewed books or journal articles -

to be discussed in class) which must be cited (with

page numbers) within the body of your paper as well as

listed in a bibliography at the back. Material from

encyclopedias is not acceptable.

1. All papers must have sufficiently good grammer and

spelling to be easily understood or they will not

be graded;

2 All Geography majors and minors and Environmental

Studies Majors receiving an A or A+ will be expec-

ted to resubmit a copy of their papers for review

by the Harper and Regional Writing Awards program;

3. All papers will be checked electronically for

plagiarism.

B. A final test covering the entire course. Students will

not be asked to identify any of the landscapes, buil-

dings, etc. shown as slides during the course. The

final will constitute the other half of the class

grade.

- The handwriting on tests must be legible and the

grammar and spelling sufficiently good to be

easily read or the question(s) will not be

considered answered which will lead to a loss of

points -

C. There is one recommended textbook. It, and the suggest-

ed readings, will be discussed in class. Some reading

beyond the textbook will be required to write the class

papers.

D. Both papers must be turned in and the final taken in

order to receive a passing grade. Because of the large

upward curve built into this class, letter grades will

be used to determine the class grade.

E. The final will be Monday, May 19th 1:30 - 3:30 P.M..

F. Plus and minus class grades will reflect maximum or

minimum efforts for a particular grade. What constitut-

es these will be explained in writing on your papers

when they are returned. For the final the upper and

lower ends of the numeric range will be a plus or mi-

nus. For instance, a 90% will be an A-, a 99% an A+. As

an example, an A- on both papers and an A on the final

will result in a class grade of A-. Please remember D

above. A C (2.0) is needed to pass the class.

G. Academic honesty is necessary for the process of learn-

ing to function properly and any lack of it will be

punished in this class. Plagiarism, falsifying cita-

tions and cheating on the final are three examples of

academic dishonesty.

IV. Office hours: 11:00 - 1:00 MW & 11:00 - 12:00 F

My office is room 2121 in Lefrak Hall, the phone number is

301-405-4112, my home phone number is 301-681-7934 which is

local to the school. Please feel free to call me at home.

V. Attendance at lectures is mandatory. More than five unexcus-

ed absences will result in the loss of one, whole, class

grade.

VI. Recommended Text: Blij, H.J. de, Alexander B. Murphy and

Erin H. Fouberg, 8th ed., (2006). Human

Geography: Culture, Society, and Space.

John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN: 0471679518

VII. Some suggested further reading:

Abler, Ronald F. (1973). "Monoculture or

Miniculture? The Impact of Communication

Media on Culture in Space," in David A.

Lanegran and Risa Palm (eds.), An Invi-

tation to Geography. McGraw-Hill.

Amedo, Douglas and Reginald G. Golledge

(1975). An Introduction to Scientific

Reasoning in Geography. John Wiley &

Sons.

Blaut, J.M. (1993). The Colonizer's

Model of the World. The Guilford Press.

Boal, Frederick W. and David N. Living-

stone, eds. (1989). The Behavorial En-

vironment. Routledge.

Drakakis-Smith, David, ed. (1990). Eco-

nomic Growth and Urbanization in Develo-

ping Areas. Routledge.

Featherstone, Mike, ed. (1990). Global

Culture: Nationalism, Globalization and

Modernity. Sage Publications.

Gioseffi, Daniela, ed. (1993). On Preju-

dice: A Global Perspective. Anchor

Books, Doubleday.

Mumford, Lewis (1961). The City in His-

tory. Harcourt, Brace & World.

Owen, Wilfred (1987). Transportation and

World Development. Johns Hopkins Univer-

sity Press.

Scott, Jamie and Paul Simpson-Housley,

eds. (1991). Sacred Places and Profane

Spaces: Essays in the Geographics of

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Green-

wood Press.

Sprout, Harold and Margaret Sprout

(1965). The Ecological Perspective on

Human Affairs. Princeton University

Press.

The university has a nationally recognized Honor Code admin-

istered by the Student Honor Council. The Student Honor Council

proposed and the University Senate approved an Honor Pledge. It

reads:

"I pledge on my honor that I have not given or received

any unauthorized assistance on this assignment/examina-

tion."

Unless you are specifically advised to the contrary, the

Pledge statement should be handwritten and signed on the front

cover of all papers, projects, or other academic assignments

submitted for evaluation in this course. Students who fail to

write and sign the Pledge will be asked to confer with the in-

structor. For more information see page 21 of the normal schedule

of classes.

If you have a documented disability and wish to discuss ways to

deal with it in this class please contact me as soon as possible.

Allen Eney, November 12, 2007