Cultural Geography is one of the most vibrant areas of geographical research and encompasses a wide range of issues. In the 1930's, when the term was introduced from Germany to the United States, it was typically used to refer to the expression of culture in landscape - i.e. ways in which culturally diverse societies adapted to and modified the earth's surface. The term has now come to encompass all applications of the concept of culture to geographical themes - for example, the study of space, place and time in culture and the analysis of cultural elements such as artefacts, tools, techniques, attitudes, customs, languages and religious beliefs. Providing both a retrospective as well as a prospective take on modern cultural geography, this collection provides a range of diverse material. The volumes constitute both an historical resource, tracking the marking of the field, and a map of contemporary themes and obsessions.
A distinctive feature of the editorial selection is its emphasis on the multiplicity of theoretical and substantive concerns in cultural geography over and above the 'classical' interests in elite cultural practices and representational approaches to cultural politics. This enlargement of the compass of cultural geography emphasises its interfaces with science studies, cultural studies, post-colonial studies and environmental history. The collection is in four parts with new introductions to each volume. The first volume addresses the history and practices of contemporary cultural geography itself, from writing to exploration. The second focuses on the cultural politics of identity. The third examines the diversity of senses through which cultural worlds are inhabited. The fourth volume explores the materialities of cultural practice and approaches that admit the non-human into the company of cultural geography.