Here is my application for the PhD position at KTH (Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan) in Stockholm. The position I applied for regarded one of four advertised from the Environmental Humanities Laboratory newly established there. You can read more about the Laboratory here:
http://www.kth.se/abe/om-skolan/organisation/inst/philhist/2.3231/ehl
Anyhow here is my application:
PhD Project
Proposal for the Environmental Humanities Laboratory at the Division of History
of Science, Technology and Environment, School of Architecture and the Built
Environment at KTH- Royal Institute of Technology
preliminary title:
The new green human geography
- how sustainable-development-thinking changed a discipline
Background
Lena Molin,
University Lecturer at Uppsala University, in charge of composing the national
Swedish course guidelines for primary level geography education proclaimed: “Hållbar utveckling självklart i geografin”
(Lärarnas Nyheter 2012). She confidently asserts that sustainable development thinking
and the discipline of geography are ‘obviously’
complementary. Also the Swedish Ministry of Education agrees with this notion for
geography in secondary education (Skolverket). Human Geography research in
Sweden pursues similar ambitions; in 2008 Högskolan
Dalarna introduced a research faculty entirely devoted to sustainable
development research. These examples represent a general trend of environmental
awareness within contemporary Swedish society and Swedish human geography.
However, nothing
is from the outset ‘obvious’, stating
aspects this way represents a rhetorical tool or a black box that is constructed over time, borrowing a Latourian
phrase. The intricate relation between the discipline of human geography and
environmental minded sustainable development thinking seems to constitute just
such a case. Therefore this study proposes to ‘open the black box’ of
environmental awareness within the discipline of human geography. The guiding
research question being:
-
How
did human geography develop and adapt to growing environmental awareness?
The history
of the discipline suggests that this recent trend is just one more change in a
long line of adaptation and developments of (human) geography.
Figure 1 displays the usage of the terms ‘sustainable
development’ and ‘sustainability’
in the corpus of all digitalized books by Google, indicating that before 1980
these environmental conscious concepts were virtually non-existent.
Figure 1: Google N-gram Viewer plot of the usage
of the terms between 1970–2008
In contrast
the first Swedish geographical society established itself in 1877,
suggesting a long time period where the discipline of human geography existed
without the concept of sustainable development and subsequent major
environmental awareness. Furthermore a (superficial) review of dissertations
from Gothenburg and Stockholm universities’ human geography department suggests
such a historic change within the discipline. Figure 2 shows the number of
doctoral dissertations related to issues of sustainability during two different
time periods, sustainability thinking from being virtually non-existent
(1970–75) becoming a significant part of research (2000–05).
Figure
2: Dissertations in Human Geography at
Gothenburg and Stockholm University
All this strengthens
the assumption that the relationship between human geography and concepts like
sustainable development is a historical contingent construction. Making it a
suitable example to explore how environmental awareness changes social
scientific knowledge production, as exemplified by the discipline of human
geography.
Theory and Method
This study
proposes an investigation into the development of the discipline of human
geography since the growing environmental awareness and sustainability thinking
of the early 1970s. In the style of early Sociology of Scientific Knowledge
(SSK) and Science and Technology Studies (STS) that often analyzed the birth of
disciplines or the spread of new scientific practices and technologies. Famous
examples being such studies as the inception of the discipline of geology
(Porter 1977), the development of the air-pump (Shapin& Schaffer 1985) or
the study of gravitational waves
(Collins 2004) to just name a few. However the majority of these studies
focus on natural science knowledge production. Studies investigating similar
effects of technology advance, social factors etc. upon the development and
knowledge production of social sciences are scarce.
Thereby this study would not only provide an elucidation of how growing environmental
awareness changed Swedish human geography but also address a knowledge gap
within SSK and STS, by investigating the development of a non-natural science
discipline.
Actor-Network
Theory (ANT) represents a suitable approach for this study serving as an
‘interpretive guide’. Offering a “repository
of terms” (Mol 2010:262) that allows for the description of a
multi-factorial influences for the stabilization of a particular network
(Latour 2007), in this case a discipline. Applying ANT here would be similar to
how Avango (2003) employed ANT, in investigating the rise, maintenance and
subsequent demise of Swedish coal mining interest on the Svalbard archipelago,
by not precluding or excluding different factors’ relative importance prior to
the actual study. The historical change of the discipline of geography is
unlikely to only depend on growing environmental awareness or other social
factors. Material and technological aspects are at least equally – and perhaps
even more – influential on the development of the discipline. One such
technological example that profoundly influenced the discipline of human
geography is the advance of GIS (Geographical Information System) technology. Even
environmental minded concepts such as the ecological footprint are impossible
without GIS technology, suggesting a complex causal relation between all these
different aspects. The features exhibited by GIS technology within human
geography appear to be of similar importance as Edward’s (2000:243) description
of computerized global climate model technology within climate science,
constituting the same data/model interdependence. Furthermore all the
traditional difficulties and problems of cartography (Livingstone 2003: 153-163)
are still existing in today’s GIS technology, if not being of more severe
character. Therefore the relative importance of social, material and
technological factors for the development of human geography is expected to emerge
in the study, as opposed to establishing it in advance.
Due to the
novel nature of the inquiry (from an STS point of view), it will take the form
of an exploratory approach. The starting point is to outline what the
discipline of human geography in Sweden entails by inventorying and compiling a
summary over all major research topics of human geography faculties in Sweden during
1950-2010. This summary will provide the empirical starting point for deriving further
specific research questions and case studies.
One possible
case study and a practical analytical method might represent the full
application of digital humanities methods, which are crudely employed above. But
instead of using N-grams from Google’s corpus to analyze the frequency of
usage, one could create a new digital corpus from Swedish human geography publications
after the 1950s. Such a corpus should allow for text mining investigation of
different environmental conscious concepts like; sustainable development,
sustainability, ecological footprint etc. Analyzing their creation, how they
are applied and how they develop in usage throughout time. Furthermore such a
corpus would open up for other types of analysis as well, for example:
- Which sources are used by prominent
figures in the field to develop their ideas? Analyzing this by bibliometrically
mapping the usage of references (e.g. Hägerstrand founder of Time Geography)
- How are new GIS methods developed and
implemented into human geography? Analyzing sources of GIS data, references to
other works, transformation of methods etc.
- How do different local research
cultures influence the research style? Analyzing similar projects from different
faculties and comparing them. (e.g. Stockholm vs. Gothenburg)
Setting any
concrete demarcations towards scale of the project prior to the compilation of
what different faculties in Sweden are researching is problematic. Nevertheless
certain demarcations seem reasonable in keeping the study manageable. To only
focus on the development of human geography in Sweden from the 1950 onwards
(possibly until 2010) represents such a demarcation, consecutively
continuing Åquist’s (1994) history of Swedish human geography. Furthermore
this allows for the establishment of a baseline with low public environmental
awareness to which the changes compare. Also it is the actors themselves that
set the demarcations in ANT; the researcher should mostly “follow the actor” (Latour 1993: 19).
As of now all
these represent informed speculations, the compilation of the source material
will yield what types of inquiries are actually feasible. Nevertheless
conducting the research in this fashion allows for the description of broad
scale trends that in turn are exemplified in detailed practical applications.
Creating an extensive account and epistemological map over how the growing
environmental awareness influenced the production of scientific literature and
knowledge from the field of human geography.
Personal Note
My background
is within the field of human geography with both a bachelor and a master degree
in the subject. During my entire education environmental awareness and
especially the concept of sustainable development was omnipresent in every
aspect, almost presented as the raison d’être of the entire discipline. The
combination of informal discussions with classmates, the great uncertainties
experienced during GIS training and several other factors led me privately to
question the ‘obviousness’ of this presentation, while still acknowledging its importance.
As part of my
master’s education I attended an introductory course into the philosophy and
sociology of science, given by Mats Fridlund. Learning about the insights of
SSK, STS and philosophy of science let me to constantly draw parallels to my
own experience and discipline. However to my great disappointment the examples of
STS-studies investigating social sciences were few and far between. According
to the Kuhnian definition of science the social sciences are still in the phase
of pre-science, since they are lacking a unified paradigm. However I felt the
growing environmental awareness within human geography in fact was just this; a
paradigm shift within a social science discipline, although arguably not a
classical case of paradigm shift. Unfortunately I was unable to validate this
intuition due to the absence of similar examples from the social sciences.
Fueled by
curiosity I attended several more STS courses and ended up writing my master
thesis as a hybrid between STS and human geography, with Mats as my supervisor.
The more I learned about STS and SSK I started to think; but what about the
social sciences? Are they not subject to the same kind of materialism, peer
pressure, political agendas etc. that everyone within STS and SSK recognized within
the natural sciences. Through several formal and informal discussion with Mats
during a reading course on STS and geography, while working on a GIS project on
terrorism and technology and at the Oxford Summer School for Digital Humanities
slowly a idea for a doctoral project emerged. That I was to devote my doctoral
research to just such a project; to investigate the development of a social
science discipline from an STS perspective. Mats suggested his old ‘home department’
at KTH as a very suitable environment for such a study; this among other
reasons represents the rationale behind this application.
I too believe
that KTH would provide a beneficial environment for this type of study; with
its expertise in STS and history and its focus on environmental humanities. And
having similar research projects that extend the STS approach to other
non-natural sciences: like Adam Netzén’s inquiry into the scientific
perspective of Gunnar Myrdal. Therefore I believe this type of study proposed
here would very much benefit from the KTH environment. In order to advance both
STS and environmental humanities into understanding how environmental awareness
impacts a scientific discipline. On the STS side advancing the understanding
what factors influence social sciences, which at current seems to be a real
knowledge gap. And on the environmental humanities side furthering the
understanding how environmental awareness changes social scientific knowledge
production, exemplified by human geography.
Sincerely
René Brauer
References
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(2005) Sveagruvan – Svensk gruvhantering mellan industri, diplomati och
geovetenskap 1910-1934. Jernkontorets Berghistoriska Skriftserie
44
Collins, Harry (2004)
Gravity’s Shadow: The Search for
Gravitational Waves, Chicago, University of Chicago Press
Digital.Humanities@Oxford Summer
School 2012 http://digital.humanities.ox.ac.uk/dhoxss/2012/,
accessed on 2012-09-27
Edwards, Paul N. (2000) The World in a Machine:
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Göteborg Universitet,
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on 2012-09-23
Latour, Bruno
(1996) Aramis, or the love of
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Reassembling the Social: An Introduction
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accessed on 2012-09-23
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accessed on 2012-09-27
Figure 2
information compiled from:
www.humangeo.su.se/publikationer/avhandlingar/avhandlingar-for-doktorsgraden
www.humangeo.su.se/publikationer/avhandlingar/avhandlingar-for-doktorsexamen
www.keg.handels.gu.se/publikationer/avhandlingar/
accessed on 2012-09-19
