2017-2018 Academic Catalog 
    
    Mar 29, 2024  
2017-2018 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

Courses


 
  
  • GEOG 028 - Discover Worcester


    What is this city of Worcester? Discover it! In this class, we will explore and learn about Worcester using a variety of lenses: field trips, historical accounts and documents, contemporary statistical data, and scholarly analyses of broader US urban trends. We will visit cultural institutions such as the Art Museum, document social life via photography of streets and parks, and learn about the city from local experts. At the end of the course, you will be able to describe and critically assess Worcester in terms of US urban development, institutional and neighborhood resources, and your own experiences of its many landscapes. Fulfills the History Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: HP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered periodically

  
  • GEOG 052 - Global Change, Regional Challenges


    Applies a regional perspective to explore important questions related to our planet and its people including: What are the key challenges facing communities, environments and societies in different regions of the world today? Is the world becoming more culturally homogenous or more fragmented? Why is the global distribution of wealth so uneven and how might poorer regions “catch up” to wealthier regions? How does the physical and human context of a region influence its ability to benefit from globalization? What factors are driving regional conflicts and how might peaceful resolutions be achieved? Focuses on eight regions – Europe, Russia/Central Asia, Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, East Asia, and South/Southeast Asia. One or two significant issues will be focused on in each region such as gender equality, human rights, environmental sustainability, political change, economic development, public health, and/or human rights. Fulfills the Global Comparative Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 075 - Americans and the Environment


    This first-year intensive, run as a seminar, will immerse students in the study of how Americans have interacted with their environments, ending in the present and looking to the near future. It will focus on key themes, moments, and debates, with a particular emphasis on New England and the Worcester region. Local and regional field trips to key sites will complement the readings. It will encompass aspects of environmental history; the evolution of US environmental law, policy, and social movements; and the role of both the United States as a country, and individual Americans as citizens and consumers, in contemporary environmental politics and interactions

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: HP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Every other year

  
  • GEOG 080 - Reading the Forested Landscape


    This First Year Intensive course will introduce students to the field of forest ecology, the process of scientific inquiry, and New England’s forest ecosystems. Understanding how ecosystems function and change in response to human activities and normal Earth system fluctuations is among the most important contemporary topics. Beyond having inherent scientific value, such knowledge has become integral to national and international policies and practices of ecosystem management. This intensive course will focus on forest ecosystems, which are one of the most important ecosystem types on Earth, and will consider fundamental ideas regarding how forests function, how they change, and how they are studied. As a First Year Intensive, this course will employ dialogical teaching, collaborative learning, and will also support students’ transition to college and the development of foundational skills necessary to succeed.



    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: SP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: occasionally

  
  • GEOG 087 - Introduction to Environmental Information Science


    An introduction to fundamental concepts of environmental geographic information science, and a comprehensive survey of the technologies and institutions involved in producing and using geographic data. These include the global positioning system, aerial surveys and photogrammetry, topographic mapping, social surveys such as the U.S. Census, and satellite remote sensing. Overall, this class is a combined introductory class to Geographic Information Science (GISc), cartography and remote sensing. Fulfills the Science Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: SP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered Periodically

  
  • GEOG 090 - Native Americans, Land and Natural Resources


    There are several reasons for the establishment of this course.  First, there are the issues of Native American histories and geographies - subjects that most “Americans” (and others) are not particularly well versed in, and - subjects that are constantly revised and reinterpreted. These histories and geographies are important for understanding the roots of the American “nation” and for considering the morality of other acts of past and present colonialism in the world, i.e. Israeli settlement of Palestine; European colonial history in India, Africa and the Middle East; Chinese colonialism in Uyghur territory in central Asia and in Tibet; the US in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Hawaii (to name just a few).  Second, studying Native American practices and attitudes toward “nature” allow us to consider other ways of being in the world besides the Euro-American way.  The concepts of “development” and “progress” must be critically examined here. Finally, the questions of who is indigenous and how cultures persist - with or without assimilation - are significant for better understanding international and intercultural relations, particularly where conflicts over land and resources occur. The course is divided into 4 modules: Introduction to Indigenous Studies, Indigenous Geographies of Colonialism, Indigenous Geographies of Justice and Indigenous Geographies of Resistance and Resurgence. We will begin by establishing a framework for our study, using the theories of settler colonialism and decolonization, and then examine various histories and geographies of indigeneity in the Americas. Our goals in the course will be to learn as much as we can about indigenous histories and geographies such as extractive industry conflicts, and projects of socio-ecological restoration. We will also examine indigenous peoples’ land claims and survival struggles elsewhere in the Americas, and through collaborative learning explore contemporary indigenous geographies in other parts of the world. In addition to the readings, we will make use of a number of films, web sources, and field trips to educate ourselves.

     

     

     

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Varies

  
  • GEOG 101 - Food Justice and Food Movements


    In this course we will be examining the meaning of “food justice” and the multiple movements attempting to change the highly destructive existing industrial food system in the US and elsewhere.  At the same time, we will be working on the Real Food Challenge at Clark. The Real Food Challenge is a US student-led campaign to shift institutional purchasing toward food that is more humane, worker friendly, environmental sound, and advancing of local economies.  In signing the Challenge Clark University committed to having 20% “real food” by 2020. “Real food” consists of food that has certain certifications to qualify it as local, fair, humane, or ecologically sound. This class will incorporate the practical work that goes along with the commitment, working on the real food calculator and raising campus awareness of the Challenge, with learning the intricate world of the global productive system. This means looking through the lens of the Real Food Wheel to examine all of the different facets that make the food system. This means producers, earth, consumers, customers, and earth. The Real Food Wheel will act as the vehicle for explaining the social, cultural, ecological, moral, and economic impacts of the modern food system.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: VP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Annually

  
  • GEOG 102 - Weather and Climate


    Understanding controls of weather: insolation, evaporation, wind, and topography; the climates that result; and how they influence human activities. Students are also introduced to fundamentals of scientific inquiry and knowledge with exposure to observational methods, data analysis, and forecasting. Fulfills the Science Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: SP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 104 - Earth System Science


    This course introduces the structure and function of the earth system, with a focus on how the Earth system sustains life. Topics include (1) connections among terrestrial surface, oceans, and atmosphere and (2) how these connections create and sustain climates, biomes, and ecosystem services. Fulfills the Science Perspective requirement.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: SP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year.

  
  • GEOG 106 - Water and the City: A Socio-Hydrology of Worcester and its Environs


    The course offers a historical and contemporary exploration of the social relationships between our city-region and its water (as lifeline, right, cultural and ecological resource, economic engine, waste, and central to politics, regulation, management and future climate vulnerability and resilience). We draw widely from the academic literature on urban nature, urban development and change, planning, environmental justice, and climate and environmental history, as well as from popular literature and periodicals (newspapers, regional watershed-related blogs and websites, policy briefs). This scholarship is used to establish a foundational framework of urban socio-hydrology. We strongly integrate our academic work with field experiences in Worcester, the Blackstone River Valley and the Central New England region as a living laboratory, in order to witness key moments and features that have shaped regional history as well as current issues in water (and wastewater) management, conservation, and planning. We will undertake visits to sites such as the Clark campus rain garden and public parks and locations throughout Worcester, the Worcester Art Museum, Worcester Historical Museum, the Blackstone River and Canal Heritage State Park and the Millville Lock, regional watershed associations, the Broad Meadow Brook Wildlife Sanctuary, The Harvard Forest Fisher Museum and the City of Worcester Water Treatment Plant. These experiences of regional land use, watershed change and urban water management will be threaded through and complement our academic investigation of urban socio-hydrology.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: VP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 107 - Miracles of Asia: Economic Growth in Global Contexts


    Explores the reasons behind the rapid rise of Asian economies and their sudden crises. Discussions include the impacts of rapid industrialization on the standard of living, housing, role of the state, multinational corporations, urban problems and ethnic relations in east, southeast and south Asian countries. Examines the role of Japan and the United States in Asia’s industrialization, the impacts of colonialism in socio-economic-political transformation in the Asia-Pacific region, business-government relations in Newly Industrializing Economies, and the recent phenomenal growth of China and India. Fulfills the Global Comparison Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 110 - Introduction to Quantitative Methods


     

    GEOG110 is an introductory course in applied statistical analysis with emphasis on computer skills. Students gain proficiency in using spreadsheets to organize data and to perform the most common statistical procedures such as univariate analysis, hypothesis testing, estimation of means, regression, and association. Undergraduate students receive credit for a Formal Analysis perspective. Geography majors receive credit for a skills course. Environmental Science majors receive credit for a statistics course. Graduate students receive credit by registering for GEOG311. Prerequisites are high school math such as Algebra 2 and/or pre-calculus.

     

    Prerequisites:  

    Prerequisites are high school math such as Algebra 2 and/or pre-calculus.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: FA

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered at least once per year

  
  • GEOG 116 - Forest Ecology


    Understanding how ecosystems function and how they change in response to human activities and normal Earth system fluctuations are important themes in contemporary natural sciences. Beyond having inherent scientific value, such knowledge has become integral to national and international policies and practices of ecosystem management. This course provides a foundation in forest ecology by considering the function, structure, and composition of forest ecosystems. Topics include forest succession, long-term ecological variability, disturbance ecology, ecological resilience, and the influence of climate and environmental heterogeneity on forest patterns and dynamics.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 119 - The Arctic in the Anthropocene


    The Arctic is currently experiencing some of the most rapid and severe climate change on Earth. The most profound environmental changes that will occur in your lifetime are undoubtedly those resulting from climate warming in the Arctic: loss of Arctic sea ice, melting of glaciers/ice caps/ice sheets, thawing of carbon-rich permafrost, extinction of species, among numerous other impacts. However, what happens in the Arctic does not stay in the Arctic - these changes have far-reaching implications across the planet. For instance, loss of arctic snow and ice exacerbates global climate warming, thawing of arctic permafrost carbon contributes vast quantities of greenhouse gases to the global atmosphere, and the melting of land ice in the Arctic is the largest contributor to expected global sea level rise over the next century. Furthermore, climate warming in the Arctic has significant implications for native communities and subsistence hunting activities, fisheries, oil and gas exploration, and shipping routes. This course focuses on understanding the Arctic as a system, including land-atmosphere-ocean-ice-human interactions. Topics include arctic hydrology, climatology, biogeochemical cycling, permafrost, glacier/ice sheet dynamics, terrestrial and marine ecology, sea ice, physical oceanography, and human-environment interactions.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: SP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 126 - Living in the Material World: The Political Geography of Resource Development


    Focuses on consumption and production systems that determine the development, allocation and use of natural resources like water, minerals, trees and animals. Emphasizes approaches used by geographers to study natural resources (e.g., commodity chains, geopolitical analysis, ecological footprints). Case studies provide an opportunity to examine differences between societies (or economies) and between specific resource issues. Oil and gas in the Middle East and the Caspian, water in the western United States, Israel or India; gold in Tanzania, the United States and South Africa; and animal use in India, Great Britain and China are some examples of typical cases. Fulfills the Global Comparison Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 127 - Political Economy of Development


    Why do some people die from too much consumption yet others at the opposite corner of the world perish from poverty and starvation? Development theories try to answer fundamental questions like this. This course critically examines these development theories, including classical, neoclassical and Keynesian economies; modernization theory; dependency, Marxist and neo-Marxist and world systems theories; post-developmentalism; feminism and feminist critiques of development; and critical modernist theories. The course quickly takes students with an initial interest in development to a high level of critical understanding. Fulfills the Global Comparison perspective.

     

     

     

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 136 - Gender and Environment


    Explores how gender is reflected in the landscape, in our settlement and land-use patterns, in environmental history, and in our present ecological science and practice from the global to the local level. Combines lectures, readings, discussions, films and local field trips. Reviews feminist and other alternative explanations of the gendered nature of knowledge, access, use and control of space and resources in environments - past, present and possible. Regional focus on New England. Fulfills the Values Perspective.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: VP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 141 - Research Design and Methods in Geography


    Focuses on ways empirical social-science research is conducted. Students study problems, methodological strategies and analytical techniques characteristic of current social and geographical research. Includes defining a research problem, measurement, sampling, research design, analysis and writing the report. Fulfills the Formal Analysis requirement. A required skills course in the geography major, and strongly recommended for the GES major.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: FA

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 152 - Geographies of Globalization


    An introduction to the study of globalization and geographical variations in its impacts. Examines the issues of development, income disparity across regions and nations, the emergence of multinational corporations, the impacts of government policy and the role of information technologies in globalization.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall 2016

  
  • GEOG 157 - Psychogeography and Cultural Spaces


    Human are forever inscribing themselves in the landscape; whether it be particular architectural forms or certain crop formations, the result is a complex palimpsest that records social life. Cultural geographies have unpicked this record, studying how and why grandiose monuments signify social status and, conversely, why other groups have been resigned to a ghostly presence. And yet these complex and intriguing geographies too often become buried underneath daily routines and multimedia bombardment. Psychogeographers look to reignite our awareness and engagement with the human environment; as one of its founders stated, psychogeography is “the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals”. This course continues on in this tradition. It does not simply look to engage with questions of how to identify and examine cultural geographies, rather it enlists students in an attempt to interact with the shaping of landscapes; recognizing how daily routines make our world and how critical understandings of cultural geographies can help effect social change. After an introduction to the psychogeographical and cultural geography literatures, students will engage in their own urban explorations and interactions; navigating Worcester via Berlin, partaking in “urban drifting” and constructing their own “detourements”. The course will therefore provide a foundation in cultural geography and connect classroom to outside world through the practice of psychogeography. Fulfills the Values Perspective (VP) requirement.


     

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: VP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 0170 - Environment and Society


    Relationships between human societies and the natural environment are central to the discipline of geography. Geography 017 introduces students to these relationships and to the analysis of them, integrating perspectives from the natural and social sciences. We examine questions such as: how do environments shape societies; how do societies transform environments; are there environmental limits to economic growth; how does culture shape our relationships with our environments; and what sorts of human-environment relationships are sustainable and just? We examine these questions at many different geographic and temporal scales: from pre-history up to the present, from very local cases to the entire planet, and from pre-industrial or rural landscapes to suburban and urban ones. Cases and discussions will span the entire globe, but will include examples from the Americas, the United States, and New England in order to ground our discussions in the places we know best.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP (summer only)

    Anticipated Terms Offered: varies

  
  • GEOG 172 - City Planet: Urban Challenges in a Globalized World


    We now live on a City Planet: the majority of the world’s population are ‘urbanite’ and their numbers continue to grow. Yet this symbolic tipping point in human settlement comes with significant challenges. Most people within this urban majority live in ‘slums’, with many of the economic and cultural opportunities associated with cities in western thought being pure fantasy in the face of daily struggles for survival. Furthermore, given cities are the primary emitters of greenhouse gases, all urban dwellers are united, if not equally, in being responsible for climate change and its potential mediation. This course examines the emergence of a City Planet through: an examination of the ways in which geographers have understood cities and their relationships in an era of globalization; the tracing of global urban relations with respect to capital, labor, communications and culture; and the consideration to two of the major challenges currently faced: growing social inequalities and mounting sustainability requirements. A core course in Globalization, Cities and Development in the geography major. Fulfills the Global Comparative (GP) requirement.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 179 - Global and Local Environmental Justice


    Integrates ecology, culture and political economy from local to global scale through case studies. Starts from a view of people in environmental “hot spots,” following links to world economy and planetary ecosystems. Explores connections of international environmental, economic and social policy with everyday realities and possible futures of people from the Amazon rain forest to the streets of Worcester. Fulfills the Values Perspective (VP) requirement. Normally offered as lecture/discussion course.

     

    We will offer hands on field research to support local solutions to pollution along the Tatnuck Brook  and specifically Coes Pond, as well as a module on local/global food connections and three international case studies of local and global resistance to environmental damage and resource depletion by indigenous peoples, peasants and community organizations from forest and agrarian landscapes to urban neighborhoods.       

     

     

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: VP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 180 - The Earth Transformed by Human Action


    Traces the course of human modification and transformation of the earth since antiquity, but with particular emphasis on the last 300 years. The major causes and consequences of these changes are explored from global climate change to the sustainability of life.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered periodically

  
  • GEOG 190 - Introduction to Geographic Information Science


    This course introduces Geographic Information Science (GIS) as a powerful mapping and analytical tool. Topics include GISc data structure, map projections, and fundamental GISc techniques for spatial analysis. Laboratory exercises concentrate on applying concepts presented in lectures and incorporate two widely used GISc software packages - IDRISI (created by Clarklabs) and ArcGIS (created by ESRI). These exercises include examples of GISc applications in environmental modeling, socio-demographic change and site suitability analyses. Although the course is computer-intensive, no programming background is required. A formal-analysis course. Counts as skills course or core course in mapping sciences/spatial analysis in geography major.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: FA

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every semester

  
  • GEOG 205 - Introduction to Hydrology


    Overview of what governs the hydrological cycle’s major components of precipitation, evapotranspiration, soil moisture, surface water, and groundwater.  Core principles of physical hydrology will be introduced including rainfall-runoff processes, surface and subsurface storage and flows, and land-atmosphere exchange.  Students will also learn about human influences on the water cycle, and consider management of water resources at field to watershed scales.  Upon completion of this course, students will:

    • Understand the essential elements of hydrological processes and how these govern the distribution of water in the earth system.
    • Be able to solve the surface water balance and analyze its controls in different environments.
    • Have the basic skills needed to explore water resource issues, such as quantitative understanding of the likelihood of extreme rainfall and flooding events, flow directions and rates in surface and ground waters, or land use/land cover effects on hydrological processes.
    • Have new appreciation for fundamental tools and terms used in the field of hydrology including mass balance, steady-state, flux-gradient relations, continuity, dimensional analysis, and probability.

    Prerequisites include GEOG104 Earth System Science or GEOG102 Weather and Climate.  Students lacking this background may request special permission to enroll.  A background in one or more of the following courses would also be helpful: physics (PHYS110/111), calculus (MATH 120/121), or statistics (GEOG110).  Three of the lab sessions will require extended hours.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 102 - Weather and Climate  or GEOG 104 - Earth System Science 

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall

  
  • GEOG 216 - Field Methods for Environmental Science


    The collection and analysis of field data is central to research and other work in the environmental sciences. In this field-based course students learn key methods used in environmental science, especially forest ecology. Students also work with the scientific method and learn to formulate and test hypotheses. Most class meetings involve field trips to nearby forest ecosystems to collect field data.  Occasional class meetings are in the classroom to discuss methodological approaches. 

    Prerequisites: The successful completion of or concurrent enrollment in GEOG 116 or consent of the instructor is a prerequisite for GEOG 216.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: SP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 220 - Property and the Global Environment


    Property relations are among the most powerful and pervasive institutions in human societies. Fundamental rules governing and legitimating who can do what, and where, shape and reveal interactions between human societies and physical environments. This course explores these dynamics with a particular focus on their implications for environmental politics and regulation. It addresses debates over common property; the benefits and dangers of privatization of environmental goods and services; distinctions between formal and informal property rights; the development of zoning and other regulation of private property; and contemporary debates over novel forms of property rights in nature (e.g., intellectual property rights, tradeable pollution permits, etc.), as well as relationships among trade, property rights, and environmental quality. At least 6 credits of prior coursework in geography or another relevant discipline (e.g., political science, economics, history, or ID) or permission of the instructor subsequent to discussion regarding the student’s level of preparation is required.

  
  • GEOG 222 - Why Global Warming Matters


    Climate change (a.k.a. “global warming”) is the single greatest problem facing the planet today. Or is it? In this course students will peel away the rhetoric surrounding global climate change, so that they may be able to understand why this issue matters not only to international policy makers but also to individuals and their daily lives. Topics for exploration will focus on the causes and consequences of climate change and justification (and options) for action. The breadth of areas the climate-change issue intersects - including but not limited to ecology, politics, economy, ethics - suggests that global warming is a crucial integrating theme for the discipline of geography and, more importantly, the intellectual foundation of a well-rounded student. Students will engage in quantitative and qualitative analysis.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Periodically

  
  • GEOG 224 - Economy and Environment


    Environmental problems are largely the result of economic developments and human settlement patterns. This course involves the examination of different types of economies, various institutional forms and constraints, and cultural features that have environmental implications. Of particular importance are the types of futures that people envision, and the sorts of economic features that must be developed to achieve desirable (or sustainable) futures. Ecological modernization, political and social ecologies, voluntary simplicity, industrial ecology, community-based entrepreneurial economies, “other than capitalist” economies, and other discourses/practices will be examined for their economic and environmental implications. We will also consider global production networks and fair trade, third party certification, and corporate social responsibility. A practical project will be undertaken by each student. Food production and consumption will be a principal focus of the course.
     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 225 - Environmental Politics


     

    This course examines the development of environmental governance, with a primary focus on the United States.  It explores how we conceive of the environment, multiple approaches to environmental governance and protection, and the many dimensions of environmental politics.  It reviews both the history of environmental movements and regulation, and contemporary issues and debates in environmental governance, with particular attention to issues of scale, justice, institutional forms, and the effects of social movements. Each iteration of the course will focus on a specific example, after building a common historical and analytical foundation (e.g., climate change, genetically modified organisms, pollution control, conservation of biodiversity, etc.).

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 232 - Landscape Ecology


    Considers the relationships between spatial patterns in landscape structure (physical, biological and cultural) and ecological processes. Role of ecosystem pattern in mass and energy transfers, disturbance regimes, species’ persistence, applications of remote sensing and GIS for landscape characterization and modeling are examined. GEOG 116 - Forest Ecology  and   strongly recommended.

    Prerequisites: No prerequisites, but GEOG 116 Forest Ecology and GEOG 190 Introduction to Geographic Information Science strongly recommended.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 237 - Feminism, Nature and Culture


    The purpose of this course is to expose students to major currents of contemporary social theory that have developed around “nature” and “woman” or nature and gender. We will explore a number of important contemporary topics including: biotechnology and “life,” food and identity, the body/science/fashion, human and nonhuman animal relations, and the manner in which conceptualizations of nature and of women (or gender roles) mutually constitute and reinforce one another. Our principal goals are to analyze and critique the normative idea of what is “nature” or what is “natural” as it pertains to gender, environmental processes, other life forms, and human social and economic existence in general. Because feminists have been instrumental in leading much of this analysis and critique, we lean heavily on feminist theories. We will explore these ideas through science fiction, magical realism, cartoons, movies, other fiction, social histories and biographies. By the end of the semester, students should be adept at decoding representations of nature and gender in the popular media as well as in academic scholarship. Students should also have a reasonable understanding of the development of and debates surrounding biotechnology and gender, identity and gender, and ecofeminist thought.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 238 - Animal Geographies


    Animals play a prominent role in human life. They sustain us, entertain us and provide companionship and solace. Most of the “animal planet” is comprised of humans and their domestic animals. Only a small percentage of the mass of animals are actually wild. Emerging work in cognitive ethology and ecology is providing new knowledge on animals’ skills and minds. Political movements are fighting for new rights for domesticated animals. How should our relations with other species be determined and assessed? How do these relations differ through cultures and spaces? Where do non-human animals belong?  Open to upper-level undergraduates.

    Formally GEOG 105 The Keeping of Animals

    Prerequisites: GEOG 017   or GEOG 126  or  GEOG 136  or  GEOG 179  

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: GP

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 245 - Remote Sensing of the Cryosphere


    The Earth’s cryosphere (frozen planet) plays a critical role in shaping the world in which we live. The great ice sheets of the past shaped the surface of the continents; changes in snow cover and sea ice extent are amplifying global warming; rapid thinning of glaciers and ice sheets is accelerating global sea level rise; and abrupt snow melt is one of the primary causes of catastrophic flooding. Understanding how and why the cryosphere experiences such rapid changes is of ever increasing societal importance. Changes in the cryosphere occur on massive scales and in hostile environments, making them highly suited for analysis using remote sensing.

    In this class students will learn about the physical characteristics of the cryosphere’s four main components; glaciers, sea ice, snow and permafrost and the role that each component plays in modulating the Earth’s climate system. Students will build upon previous remote sensing knowledge and learn about visible, Lidar, radar and microwave satellite sensors and apply this knowledge to measure changes in cryosphere characteristics (e.g. area, volume, mass, reflectance, melt, and velocity). Students will be required to complete a self-directed and novel group research project that they will present to the class the end of the term. The course will also focus on student skill development with several frequent collaborative projects conducting remote sensing analysis using Matlab.





    Prerequisites: GEOG 293 or equivalent background, some programming knowledge (such as C, Python, R, Matlab) is beneficial but not required.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Spring

  
  • GEOG 246 - Geospatial Analysis with R


    Free and open source R is increasingly used for geospatial analyses. R and its ecosystem of supporting software also facilitate the creation, presentation, and reproducibility of analyses. R is therefore very close to being a one-stop shop for the modern GIScientist. This course will provide students with the skills they need to use R as a GIS. There will be additional emphases on programming, presentation, and reproducibility, which will entail learning to develop R libraries, development of presentations and reports using Rmarkdown, and using version control with github. Students will learn and apply R skills by working on a specific research problem.  Open to upper level undergraduate and graduate students.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 190 - Introduction to GIS

    Anticipated Terms Offered: annually

  
  • GEOG 247 - Intermediate Quantitative Methods in Geography


    Continues development begun in GEOG 110  of computer-based methods in geographical analysis. Focuses on bivariate and multivariate regression, discriminant analysis, factor analysis, log-linear models and analysis of spatial and temporal data. Includes lab work with PCs, spreadsheets and SPSS-X statistical software package. Prerequisite: GEOG 110 . Meets skill requirement for geography majors and graduate students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 248 - Social Justice and the City


    Cities today face unprecedented challenges. Migration, rapid urbanization, growing inequality, authoritarian governments, racial tensions, terrorism, climate change, and the list goes on. This course examines the concept of social justice in light of contemporary philosophical debates and explores its various relations to the city and urban development, using a geographical perspective. After engaging various dialogues on social justice, the course turns its attention to the ‘urban question’. It asks what is distinctive about the issue of social justice in an urban context and whether we need a more geographically-informed viewpoint from with to deploy our positions on social justice. In the final section of the course, various urban issues and problems are explored using developed understandings of social justice.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: VP, DI

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 252 - Urban Design Research Lab


    At present, over half the world’s population live in cities. Yet we have no stable idea of what makes a good city. As society changes, so does what it is we demand of our cities. We therefore must understand the city as constantly in a state of becoming. As a consequence we require a critical understanding of what types of processes cause the city to change over time. This course seeks to unite this realization with the concerns of urban practice. Throughout the 20th century, urban geographers examined the ways in which urban planners, architects and urban designers shaped the city. Conversely, early urban planners such as Ebenezer Howard and Patrick Geddes were deeply concerned with geographical problems. In this course we bring an understanding of contemporary urban problems to the study of urban design and practice. The course requires students to select a topical concern and research what geographers and urbanists have concluded about it. With this understanding, students must collectively draw upon social and urban theory to develop an urban design scheme to respond to the topical issue. Throughout the course students will work in groups to develop a design scheme.

    Prerequisites:

    One of the following is required:
    GEOG 020 American Cities: Changing Spaces, Community Places
    GEOG157 Psychogeography and Cultural Spaces
    GEOG172 City Planet: Urban Challenges in a Globalized World
    GEOG 241 Suburbia: Culture, Politics, Place

    GEOG 258 Utopian Visions, Urban Realities
    GEOG 248 Social Justice and the City

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 257 - Internet Geography: Socioeconomic Impacts of Information Technologies


    Spring 2018 Course Description:
    In the span of a few decades, the Internet has become a driver of global change and has connected people and places to an unprecedented degree. However, to what extent does the Internet transform or supersede the structures, configurations, and arrangements that make up our world? How does the Internet interact with, and produce, geographies at various scales? In light of the rapidly changing environment influenced by the information revolution and the Internet itself, the answers to these questions are not universal, or even immediately apparent. Therefore, it is necessary to develop an explanatory framework that places the Internet into a broader historical, social and political-economic context. By adopting a geographical perspective, this course prepares students to challenge abstract notions of the Internet as a placeless informational cloud, by analyzing its grounded causes, consequences, and impacts at various scales. This course will cover a range of topics related to the history, technology, politics, regulation, and practices of the Internet and associated communication technologies. The course is centered on weekly readings and group discussions.

    Prior Semesters Description:
    Examines how the Internet has changed our society, economy, culture and geography. Explores the myths and the realities of the impacts derived from technological changes. Issues for discussions include an examination of ‘the death of distance’, social polarization and the ‘digital divide’ at the national and international scales, as well as the changing practices and modes of everyday social interactions. Explores how consumption and our conceptualization of leisure is changing as a result of the widespread use of the Internet.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: no

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 258 - Utopian Visions, Urban Realities: Planning Cities for the 21st Century


    Although utopia literally means “no place” and utopias do not exist in any concrete sense, utopian thinking exerts a powerful hold on our imagination and continues to inspire a lot of approaches to urban policy, design and planning today. This course explores this thinking and will attempt to come to grips with various ideas about what utopias should be, how they have animated our thinking about city form and function, and how they have achieved certain material expressions in the twentieth-century urban context. It will also examine the contradictions and unintended consequences of utopian thinking in planning. Amongst other things, the course will grapple with questions of order versus disorder in the city, heterogeneity versus homogeneity, openness versus closure, and individual freedom versus collective necessity. It will draw upon geographical sources as well as a diverse array of other materials.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 260 - GIS & Land Change Models


    Students learn how to use and to interpret GIS-based computer models that simulate land change, especially those models in Idrisi.  Students learn fundamental concepts such as calibration, validation, extrapolation, uncertainty and sensitivity analysis.  Most applications focus on policies for Smart Growth of suburbanization and policies to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD). The work is linked to on-going research at Clark University, thus topics vary somewhat from year to year.  The course culminates in presentations of student projects. 

    Prerequisites: GEOG 190   or GEOG 390  or instructor permission

    Anticipated Terms Offered: offered every spring

  
  • GEOG 261 - Decision Methods for Environmental Management and Policy


    Information on environmental-impact assessments needs to be systematically organized and analyzed to be useful in the decision-making process. This course provides a survey of methods that are currently used to aid environmental decision makers (who include policy makers, environmental managers and affected populations). Covers techniques such as: decision analysis, benefit/cost analysis, multicriteria evaluation, multiobjective analysis, multiattribute utility theory, the analytical hierarchy process, and spatial-analytical methods using geographical information systems. These methods will be evaluated with respect to their theoretical foundations, systems formulation and appropriate application. A critical evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of these methods will also be discussed.

    Prerequisites: Advanced undergraduates only; instructor permission required for registration

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 263 - The Climate System and Global Environmental Change


    In order to understand and predict the Earth’s current and future climate, it is imperative to know the forces that can drive both natural and anthropogenic climate change. This course will utilize an Earth Systems approach towards climate science, meaning rather than simply cataloging the Earth’s history of climate change, we will focus on understanding the climate system’s response to both external and internal drivers. We will examine the interactions between atmosphere, ice, ocean, land surface, and vegetation, allowing us to touch on the fields of geology, ecology, paleobotany, glaciology, oceanography, meteorology, biogeochemistry, climate modeling, atmospheric chemistry, and hydrology, among others. The goal of the course is to provide the scientific background that is necessary for understanding global environmental change-related issues as well as providing a basis for addressing the critical social and policy questions that cascade from these issues.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 274 - Africa’s Development in Global Context


    Explores, in detail, the economic geographies of Sub-Saharan Africa; both their historical development and their contemporary manifestations in commodity chains, business practices, production systems, gender and environmental relations, entrepreneurial and innovative behavior, and rural and urban livelihood strategies. Emphasis is placed on examining how African economies relate to the rest of the world, how globalization is influencing the prospects for growth, autonomy, and sustainability in Africa, and how Africans actually produce, innovate, succeed, and struggle in their business activities. Confronts stereotypes about “backward” economic practices in Africa and encourages students to view Africans as capable agents of economic change not simply as passive victims of global or historical inequalities.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 279 - GIS & Map Comparison


    GIS & Map Comparison investigates quantitative methods that are commonly used and abused for map comparison, especially in remote sensing and land change science. We examine the advantages, disadvantages, interpretations, and misconceptions of metrics such as Omission Error, Commission Error, Kappa, Figure of Merit, Relative Operating Characteristic, Total Operating Characteristic, Mean Absolute Deviation, and Root Mean Square Error. Students learn a philosophy of map comparison that focuses on components of deviation between maps.  Students learn how to use the computer language R. Course projects frequently become scientific literature. The prequeisite is GEOG 190/390 Introduction to GIS, but it is recommended that students enroll also in GEOG 296  or GEOG 397  Advanced Raster GIS simultaneously or before this course.

    Prerequisites: Prerequisite is GEOG 190  or GEOG 390  or instructor permission.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: FA

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Every spring

  
  • GEOG 280 - Urban Ecology: Cities as Ecosystems


    Explores ecology and the social and physical geography of cities as systems built and inhabited by people, and constantly changed by social, biological and physical processes. This class of ecosystem is often neglected except in studies of pollution, yet it is home to many of the world’s people and to a surprising number of plant and animal species as well. Readings, lectures, discussion and written work combine landscape and systems ecology with physical and urban geography and environmental justice to broaden our understanding of city environments, both present and possible. In addition to the 3 hour block for class, weekly field classes in Worcester and project workshop time requires attendance at a second weekly 3 hour session. Four day field trip to Boston/Providence or New York City is required: Sept. 15-18 (alt. dates: Sept. 22-25); a $100 fee is charged to students at time of registration to cover administrative and transportation costs. In addition, students should bring $20 for a subway pass and enough to cover meals. Book costs for the course are minimal. Registration is by Permission only (email: drocheleau@clarku.edu)

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 282 - Advanced Remote Sensing


    Application of remote sensor systems in earth science and other disciplines; interpretation of multispectral scanner, RADAR and thermal imagery, classification, postclassification analysis, special transformations, multitemporal data analysis for change detection, the study of spectral characteristics of vegetation, soils, water, minerals and other materials. The specific objectives of the course are to acquaint the student with the physical principles underlying remote sensing systems and the primary remote-sensing data-collection systems; introduce the student to methods of interpreting and analyzing remotely sensed data; provide some insight concerning the applications of remote sensing in various discipline areas; and provide hands-on experience in digital image processing using software packages available in the computer lab.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 283 - Terrestrial Ecosystems and Global Change


    Explores ecosystem responses to global environmental changes and how they feedback on the earth system. Students will learn about biophysical controls on energy, water, and carbon cycles, and how biogeography, vegetation physiology, and local to global climates influence surface-atmosphere exchanges, which then feedback on biogeography and climate. The course introduces the theory, remote sensing, and computational modeling of biophysical, biogeochemical, and ecosystem dynamical processes active in shaping the terrestrial biosphere. Students will be exposed to methods of land surface and ecosystem process modeling through computer tutorials with numerical simulation, and will train some basics of writing computer code. Can fulfill the Geography or Earth System Science Capstone.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 286 - Special Topics


    Devoted to a specific topic unique for each semester and instructor. Permission from instructor is required for registration.

    SPRING 2018

    SEC. 3 - ALVAREZ LEON: CRITICAL GIS - The objective of this course is for students to develop mapping and spatial analysis skills in conjunction with the theoretical tools necessary to use such skills in a rigorous, critical practice. In an environment characterized by the proliferation of digital datasets and new spatial media, there is pressing need for technically-informed critical inquiry -a foundation of responsible data production and consumption. This course provides a theoretical perspective that incorporates insights form fields such as Critical GIS, Information Studies and Science and Technology Studies.  The structure of the course is divided in two types of weekly sessions: (1) seminar sessions, where the class will discuss and workshop through key readings, concepts, and examples of the Critical GIS curriculum, and (2) laboratory sessions, where the class will focus on the learning and practice of spatial analysis and mapping tools. The technical component of the course centers on becoming familiar and comfortable with the use of the R software as a means for spatial analysis and mapping. Through weekly reading, discussion, and group exercises, the students will refine their critical grasp of the technical tools they acquire. In this process, they will develop a GIS practice that is both technically competent and sensitive to the broader social, political, and epistemological implications of geospatial tools and technologies. This course is aimed at upper level undergraduates, as well as graduate students. It meets twice weekly, and assumes no prior knowledge of R, spatial analysis, or critical GIS.; SEC. 5 - SANGERMANO: HABITAT MODELING (MODULE B) - This course introduces niche-based habitat suitability modeling and evaluation through lectures and hand-on exercises.

    FALL 2017

    SEC. 1 - ROY CHOWDHURY: LAND AND ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE. Permission required. SEC. 3 - SPHAR: ECONOMY, PLACE, AND POLITICS IN THE 21st CENTURY. Permission is not required - In this course we will focus on the deeply intertwined nature of economies and politics through a geographical lens, emphasizing the rootedness of both economies and politics in particular places. Even though this rootedness often seems to have lost importance with the onset of economic globalization, throughout the semester we will explore how it is in fact as important as ever. By critically analyzing the changing nature of this three-way relationship between place, politics, and economy we will better understand how economic globalization shapes and remakes our economies, our politics, our lives, and our cities. We will also explore how citizen-led projects, such as participatory budgeting in Porto Alegre, Brazil, are fostering new visions for radical democracy by rethinking this three-way relationship. Through this course students will engage with pressing issues in economic and urban geography, and be able to apply this knowledge through case study analyses of key global cities. They will learn how current debates in economic globalization shape city, state, and national politics, and be able to explain how places, policies, and economies are co-constituted through these processes.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: no

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall and Spring

  
  • GEOG 289 - Development Policy


    A research seminar for students with some background in development studies. After an introduction on policy and policy-making institutions, the seminar critically examines recent tendencies in development policy, particularly the policies advocated by the World Bank, IMF and WTO. The course also looks at alternative development.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 293 - Introduction to Remote Sensing


    This course is designed to introduce the students to the principles and analytical methods of satellite remote sensing as applied to environmental systems (e.g., land-cover classification, vegetation monitoring, etc.). Lectures will cover principles of remote sensing, sensor types, as well as the processing and analysis of multispectral satellite images (e.g. Landsat and SPOT). A series of hands-on lab exercises will complement students’ understanding of lecture material and also helps students to become familiar with image processing functions of the IDRISI image analysis software. Particular emphasis will be placed on final group project that brings a real world perspective to the learning process.

    Prerequisites: Vector GIS or Introduction to GIS, and must register for Lab.  Introduction to GISc and Introduction to Quantitative Methods desirable. 

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year.

  
  • GEOG 296 - Advanced Raster GIS


    This course builds on Introduction to GIS by delving deeper into raster GIS. Topics include time-series analysis, uncertainty assessment, multi-objective decision making, land-change modeling, and spatial statistics. Concepts in lectures are illustrated using the Idrisi software. Final project is required. This is a prerequisite for the fifth year Masters program in GIS and is a requirement for the GISDE masters program.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 190 /GEOG 390 /IDCE 310 - Intro to Geographic Information Systems  or permission of instructor.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every spring

  
  • GEOG 297 - Honors


    Students receive variable credit for advanced research & readings in the honors program.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: ES

  
  • GEOG 298 - Internship


    Academic experience taking place in the field with an opportunity to earn credit.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: ES

  
  • GEOG 299 - Directed Study


    Undergraduates, typically juniors & seniors, construct an independent study course on a topic approved & directed by a facutly member. Offered for variable credit.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: ES

  
  • GEOG 304 - Cartography and Map Design (0.5 credit)


    This course studies the elements of cartography with emphasis on the map as a basic form of communication.  It explores contemporary design concepts and various graphic techniques.  The course covers the key principles of cartography to enable students to use GIS software for the creation of communicative, compelling, visually pleasing maps that highlight spatial relationships among time-space phenomena.  This course requires intensive use of GIS softward and will require the completion of a final project portfolio. Students should have knowledge of IDRISI Tiaga/TerrSet and ArcGIS. Open to doctoral and masters students, advanced undergrads may ask to enroll with permission.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 190   Introduction to Geographic Information Science or IDCE 310  Introduction to GIS is required

    Anticipated Terms Offered: every other year

  
  • GEOG 305 - Introduction to Hydrology


    Overview of what governs the hydrological cycle’s major components of precipitation, evapotranspiration, soil moisture, surface water, and groundwater. Core principles of physical hydrology will be introduced including rainfall-runoff processes, surface and subsurface storage and flows, and land-atmosphere exchange. Students will also learn about human influences on the water cycle, and consider management of water resources at field to watershed scales. Upon completion of this course, students will:

    • Understand the essential elements of hydrological processes and how these govern the distribution of water in the earth system.
    • Be able to solve the surface water balance and analyze its controls in different environments.
    • Have the basic skills needed to explore water resource issues, such as quantitative understanding of the likelihood of extreme rainfall and flooding events, flow directions and rates in surface and ground waters, or land use/land cover effects on hydrological processes.
    • Have new appreciation for fundamental tools and terms used in the field of hydrology including mass balance, steady-state, flux-gradient relations, continuity, dimensional analysis, and probability. 

    The course assumes an introductory background in earth and environmental sciences.  A background in one or more of the following courses will also be helpful: physics (PHYS110/111), calculus (MATH 120/121), or statistics (GEOG110).  Three of the lab sessions will require extended hours. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Prerequisites:  

     

     

    Corequisites:  

     

     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall

  
  • GEOG 309 - Historical Foundations and Trends in Forest Ecology


    Understanding the ecology of forest ecosystems is central to understanding and addressing many contemporary environmental issues. In this doctoral and masters student seminar, we will read the primary literature, which provides the foundation for contemporary ecological understanding, as well as recent primary literature, which illustrates recent trends in forest ecology research.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: varied

  
  • GEOG 310 - Qualitative Research Methods, Skills and Applications


    Examines the purpose, scope and procedures of qualitative research, especially as applied to human geography. Emphasis is on epistemologies underlying various approaches to qualitative research. Readings will draw on a variety of work in the social sciences, especially anthropology, geography, sociology and women’s studies. We examine a range of qualitative methods, including interviews, participant and nonparticipant observation, ethnography, action research and discourse analysis. Through case-study readings, we examine how scholars employ these methods in different research contexts, with particular attention to the ethical and practical considerations of doing so. The course will engage theoretical debates relevant to qualitative research by addressing questions such as: How does qualitative research challenge the practice of social “science” and the search for “universal truths”? How do we represent the world or multiple understandings and perspectives of it? What are the implications of using qualitative data for the researcher, the research product and the “researched”? How do we interpret qualitative data and present it to scholarly audiences? Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 311 - Introduction to Quantitative Methods


     

    GEOG311 is an introductory course in applied statistical analysis with emphasis on computer skills. Students gain proficiency in using spreadsheets to organize data and to perform the most common statistical procedures such as univariate analysis, hypothesis testing, estimation of means, regression, and association. Undergraduate students receive credit for a Formal Analysis perspective. Geography majors receive credit for a skills course. Environmental Science majors receive credit for a statistics course. Doctoral and masters students receive credit by registering for GEOG311. Prerequisites are high school math such as Algebra 2 and/or pre-calculus.

     

    Prerequisites:  

    Prerequisites are high school math such as Algebra 2 and/or pre-calculus.

     

     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered at least once per year

  
  • GEOG 314 - Research Proposal Writing in Geography


    Covers major topics in empirical social science research design, including problem definition, research strategies, sampling, data-collection and data analysis methods, and budgeting. Docotral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 317 - Research


    This is a variable unit graduate course for students engaged in research at the PhD level.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Every Semester

  
  • GEOG 318 - Explanation in Geography


    This seminar explores the main types of explanation in geography and other social sciences, including positivist, existentialist, realist, Marxist, feminist and postmodernist approaches. The seminar focuses on tensions between structural and nonstructural explanation and the integration of theory with empirical facts. Meets first-year core course requirement for geography doctoral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 321 - Ecologies of Resistance and Transformation: Alternatives to Development


    This graduate seminar course explores the creation of alternative ecologies at the community and regional scale and their relation to global environmental change and economic and cultural globalization trends. The class examines works of social, ecological and cultural theories in light of several case studies including: Mondrogon in Spain; Chiapas and Oaxaca in Mexico: urban collectives in Denmark, Mexico and the U.S.; Science Shops for environmental design in India’s Naramada Valley and other sites: alternative farming in Amish and Mennonite communities in the US; permaculture farmers in Australia and the UK; Forest Peoples’ communities in the Amazon and Mekong River Basins; international organizations such as Via Campesina; and the parallel efforts of Eco-Villages and Transition Towns. We will draw upon theories of Ecosystems, Networks, Complexity, Community, Autonomy, and the Commons, as well as theories of Justice, Identity, Difference and Solidarity. These theoretical readings will inform our understanding of cases studies and vice versa, as we seek to imagine Other Possible Worlds. We will use films, readings and discussions to critically engage with existing literature and examples and to create and question our own alternative visions of possible futures. Open to Geography doctoral students, Geography MS GIS and ICDE masters students and possibly undergraduates with special permission.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 323 - Forest Ecology and Management Seminar


    Forests are among the most important ecosystems on Earth. The interacting effects of climate change, increased settlement in forests, and other forces has led to difficult questions regarding what is actually driving change in forest ecosystems and what management strategies are most appropriate. In this context, the seminar examines current primary literature dealing with forest ecology and management and focuses on conducting research in forest ecosystems and deriving appropriate management recommendations from that research. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 324 - Economy and Environment


    Environmental problems are largely the result of economic developments and human settlement patterns. This course involves the examination of different types of economies, various institutional forms and constraints, and cultural features that have environmental implications. Of particular importance are the types of futures that people envision, and the sorts of economic features that must be developed to achieve desirable (or sustainable) futures. Ecological modernization, political and social ecologies, voluntary simplicity, industrial ecology, community-based entrepreneurial economies, “other than capitalist” economies, and other discourses/practices will be examined for their economic and environmental implications. We will also consider global production networks and fair trade, third party certification, and corporate social responsibility. A practical project will be undertaken by each student. Food production and consumption will be a principal focus of the course. Open to doctoral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 329 - Critical Theory: Space, Society and Change


    Nearly 75 years ago Max Horkheimer, echoing Marx, defined critical theory as distinguished by its attempt to critique and change society. It is therefore not simply a tool for understanding, but also a method for overcoming injustice, domination and oppression. Over the past 50 years, geographers have found inspiration in this transformative mode of theorizing in research fields as diverse as housing, resource management, race relations and climatology. But in what state do we find critical theory today? For some geographers, critical theory has transformed into a pluralist venture that is symbolized by a politics of disagreement and a modest normativity. However, others fervently disagree with this project, arguing that we now face unprecedented challenges that cannot be dealt with by this brand of modest theory or, paradoxically, those more assertive types of theory which preceded it. Simply, it is thought that previous critical theory is unable to produce change in an era of reflexive cynicism, sophism and post-political politics. The seminar follows these debates by tracing the ways in which geographers have historically engaged with critical theory and evaluating where this engagement stands today. In order to achieve the latter, the seminar will examine a range of contemporary critical social theory, including an exploration of Slavoj Zizek’s claim that we need a new theory of everything(!), Alain Badiou’s interpretation of politics as event and Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe’s arguments about critical theory’s kernel concern. Open to doctoral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 330 - Introduction to Species Distribution Modeling


    An Introduction to species distribution modeling methods and applications.  Species distribution models (SDM), are increasingly used to evaluate the impacts of global change on biodiversity, to assess protection status, and for protected areas planning. The course starts with an introduction to ecological niche modeling, and continues with topics of data gathering, pre-processing, modeling (including statistical and machine learning algorithms), and validation. Topics will be covered through a combination of lectures, discussion of assigned readings and hands-on exercises.


     

    Prerequisites: IDCE 310   GEOG 190  ID 190  Introduction to GIS

    Anticipated Terms Offered: annually

  
  • GEOG 332 - Landscape Ecology


    Considers the relationships between spatial patterns in landscape structure (physical, biological and cultural) and ecological processes. Role of ecosystem pattern in mass and energy transfers, disturbance regimes, species’ persistence, applications of remote sensing and GIS for landscape characterization and modeling are examined. GEOG 116  Forest Ecology strongly recommended. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 333 - Terrestrial Ecosystems and Global Change


    Explores ecosystem responses to global environmental changes and how they feedback on the earth system. Students will learn about biophysical controls on energy, water, and carbon cycles, and how biogeography, vegetation physiology, and local to global climates influence surface-atmosphere exchanges, which then feedback on biogeography and climate. The course introduces the theory, remote sensing, and computational modeling of biophysical, biogeochemical, and ecosystem dynamical processes active in shaping the terrestrial biosphere. Students will be exposed to methods of land surface and ecosystem process modeling through computer tutorials with numerical simulation, and will train some basics of writing computer code. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 336 - Wildlife Conservation GIS Research Seminar


    The course will follow a workshop-seminar and laboratory format in collaboration with research staff at Clark Labs and the Wildlife Conservation Society based in New York City. Students will work in small groups (i.e., no larger than three) for the semester on collaborative conservation projects in Rwanda, Guatemala, Cambodia, and other countries. Students will apply GIS and remote sensing skills to achieve explicit conservation goals related to land change assessment, hydrologic modeling, and ecosystem services valuation/modeling. Work will be performed in close collaboration with Wildlife Conservation Society research staff. Project results will be presented by student teams at the end of the semester to Wildlife Conservation Society staff. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: varied

  
  • GEOG 337 - Feminism, Nature and Culture


    The purpose of this course is to expose students to major currents of contemporary social theory that have developed around “nature” and “woman” or nature and gender. We will explore a number of important contemporary topics including: biotechnology and “life,” food and identity, the body/science/fashion, human and nonhuman animal relations, and the manner in which conceptualizations of nature and of women (or gender roles) mutually constitute and reinforce one another. Our principal goals are to analyze and critique the normative idea of what is “nature” or what is “natural” as it pertains to gender, environmental processes, other life forms, and human social and economic existence in general. Because feminists have been instrumental in leading much of this analysis and critique, we lean heavily on feminist theories. We will explore these ideas through science fiction, magical realism, cartoons, movies, other fiction, social histories and biographies. By the end of the semester, students should be adept at decoding representations of nature and gender in the popular media as well as in academic scholarship. Students should also have a reasonable understanding of the development of and debates surrounding biotechnology and gender, identity and gender, and ecofeminist thought. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 338 - Current Research in Geography


    This course will expose students to cutting-edge research across the range of geography and cognate disciplines, primarily via close engagement with a series of visiting speakers and their works. It will complement the other required courses for first year doctoral students in the department, Geography 368 (The Development of Western Geographic Thought) and Geography 318 (Explanation in Geography): where they provide historical and conceptual approaches to the development and content of the discipline, Geography 328 will have students engage with specific, grounded, and current examples of geographic research and the ongoing development of the discipline, with particular attention to full coverage of its breadth. The course, run in conjunction with the department’s colloquium series, will include required attendance at each of the lectures by speakers in the series; readings of selected articles or other works by visiting scholars prior to their visits; and class sessions with visiting scholars to discuss the works read, the lecture, and current research in the visitors’ areas of expertise. Students will write papers critically analyzing the talks and papers in terms of both content and presentation, and situating them within both the discipline and interdisciplinary fields of inquiry.
    The course is required for first-year doctoral students in geography, and open to masters students and senior undergraduate geography majors with permission of the instructor.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: offered every year fall and spring semesters

  
  • GEOG 343 - Human Dimensions of Global Change


    Global environmental changes involve worldwide transformations of land, oceans and atmosphere, driven by human activities interwoven with natural processes. Its human dimensions involve the complex causes and consequences of people’s individual and collective actions.  This advanced seminar investigates the human dimensions of global environmental change, examining its socioeconomic, political and environmental causes and consequences.  We will explore urgent, complex social, environmental and management problems, such as changes in tropical forests, grasslands and urbanizing areas; climate change and global food security; emerging infectious diseases; social institutions, collective action and international environmental regimes; spatial methods in global land change research; global land grabs; climate adaption and mitigation; environmental equity and justice, and others. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: every other fall

  
  • GEOG 345 - Remote Sensing of the Cryosphere


    The Earth’s cryosphere (frozen planet) plays a critical role in shaping the world in which we live. The great ice sheets of the past shaped the surface of the continents; changes in snow cover and sea ice extent is amplifying global warming; rapid thinning of glaciers and ice sheets is accelerating global sea level rise; and abrupt snow melt is one of the primary causes of catastrophic flooding. Understanding how and why the cryosphere experiences such rapid changes is of ever increasing societal importance. Changes in the cryosphere occur on massive scales and in hostile environments, making them highly suited for analysis using remote sensing.

    In this class students will learn about the physical characteristics of the cryosphere’s four main components; glaciers, sea ice, snow and permafrost and the role that each component plays in modulating the Earth’s climate system. Students will build upon previous remote sensing knowledge and learn about visible, Lidar, radar and microwave satellite sensors and apply this knowledge to measure changes in cryosphere characteristics (e.g. area, volume, mass, reflectance, melt, and velocity). Students will be required to complete a self-directed and novel group research project that they will present to the class the end of the term. The course will also focus on student skill development with several frequent collaborative projects conducting remote sensing analysis using Matlab. Open to doctoral and masters students.


     

    Prerequisites: GEOG 383 Introduction to Remote Sensing or equivalent background; some programming knowledge such as C, Python, R, Matlab, is beneficial but not required

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Spring

  
  • GEOG 346 - Geospatial Analysis with R


    Free and open source R is increasingly used for geospatial analyses. R and its ecosystem of supporting software also facilitate the creation, presentation, and reproducibility of analyses. R is therefore very close to being a one-stop shop for the modern GIScientist. This course will provide students with the skills they need to use R as a GIS. There will be additional emphases on programming, presentation, and reproducibility, which will entail learning to develop R libraries, development of presentations and reports using Rmarkdown, and using version control with github. Students will learn and apply R skills by working on a specific research problem.   Open to upper level undergraduates and graduate students.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 190-Introduction to GIS

    Anticipated Terms Offered: annually

  
  • GEOG 347 - Intermediate Quantitative Methods in Geography


    Continues development begun in GEOG 110  of computer-based methods in geographical analysis. Focuses on bivariate and multivariate regression, discriminant analysis, factor analysis, log-linear models and analysis of spatial and temporal data. Includes lab work with PCs, spreadsheets and SPSS-X statistical software package. Meets skill requirement for senior undergraduate geography majors and doctoral students and masters students.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 110 .

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 348 - Social Justice and the City


    Cities today face unprecedented challenges. Migration, rapid urbanization, growing inequality, authoritarian governments, racial tensions, terrorism, climate change, and the list goes on. This course examines the concept of social justice in light of contemporary philosophical debates and explores its various relations to the city and urban development, using a geographical perspective. After engaging various dialogues on social justice, the course turns its attention to the ‘urban question’. It asks what is distinctive about the issue of social justice in an urban context and whether we need a more geographically-informed viewpoint from with to deploy our positions on social justice. In the final section of the course, various urban issues and problems are explored using developed understandings of social justice. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 349 - Advanced Topics in Spatial Analysis


    Explores spatial statistics and spatial decision models. The spatial statistics part of the course focuses on point, block and global estimation, fitting variogram models, kriging and spatial simulation. The prescriptive modeling part will focus on location/allocation-based decisions models including private- and public-sector facility location problems and land-allocation models. The topics covered are closely linked to the underlying spatial analytic methodologies used in, and often illuminated by examples developed with, Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The spatial statistics module in the IDRISI GIS will be used. The class is run on the “Socratic” method with some high-tech twists. Students are assigned a topic per week to prepare material and lead discussion. Pass/fail. Grading is based on class participation.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 351 - Seminar in Critical Resource/Food Geographies


    This course examines major questions in two important areas of critical geography: natural resources and food studies. Each topic will take one-half of the semester. We will first examine questions of nature and culture, and the role of the state and biopolitics, which are of concern for scholars of both topics. We will then turn to political economic theory on commodity chains or value chains, and power relations along those chains. We will address questions such as the “resource curse” and ethical consumption. Questions of sovereignty, territoriality, and investment relations will also be examined, as well as, questions of state and quasi-state governance. The resource component will emphasize water, minerals and oil/gas. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 352 - GIS & Land Change Science


    Students work collaboratively to create new GIS-based methods to measure and to explain land change over time and its environmental consequences.  The work is linked to research at Clark University, thus topics vary from year to year.  Some products of previous years are vidoes available at www.clarku.edu/~rpontius. Students must take initiative and be creative because the course will address issues for which standard methods of analysis do not yet exist.  A goal of the seminar is to create and to communicate the methods for the professional community beyond Clark University. Students will make regular oral presntations in class to report on progress.  Students become qualified to make presentations at professional conferences such as the Association of American Geographers annual meeting.  A prerequisite is Introduction to GIS or equivalent competency in GIS.  This course is designed for doctoral and masters students, but senior undergraduates and other qualified students can enroll with special permission. rpontius@clarku.edu

    Prerequisites: GEOG 190   or GEOG 390  or permission from Professor Pontius (rpontius@clarku.edu).

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every fall

  
  • GEOG 356 - Utopian Visions, Urban Realities: Planning Cities for the 21st Century


    Although utopia literally means “no place” and utopias do not exist in any concrete sense, utopian thinking exerts a powerful hold on our imagination and continues to inspire a lot of approaches to urban policy, design and planning today. This course explores this thinking and will attempt to come to grips with various ideas about what utopias should be, how they have animated our thinking about city form and function, and how they have achieved certain material expressions in the twentieth-century urban context. It will also examine the contradictions and unintended consequences of utopian thinking in planning. Amongst other things, the course will grapple with questions of order versus disorder in the city, heterogeneity versus homogeneity, openness versus closure, and individual freedom versus collective necessity. It will draw upon geographical sources as well as a diverse array of other materials. Open to doctoral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 357 - Internet Geography: Socioeconomic Impacts of Information Technologies


    Spring 2018 Course Description:
    In the span of a few decades, the Internet has become a driver of global change and has connected people and places to an unprecedented degree. However, to what extent does the Internet transform or supersede the structures, configurations, and arrangements that make up our world? How does the Internet interact with, and produce, geographies at various scales? In light of the rapidly changing environment influenced by the information revolution and the Internet itself, the answers to these questions are not universal, or even immediately apparent. Therefore, it is necessary to develop an explanatory framework that places the Internet into a broader historical, social and political-economic context. By adopting a geographical perspective, this course prepares students to challenge abstract notions of the Internet as a placeless informational cloud, by analyzing its grounded causes, consequences, and impacts at various scales. This course will cover a range of topics related to the history, technology, politics, regulation, and practices of the Internet and associated communication technologies. The course is centered on weekly readings and group discussions.

     

    Prior Semesters Course Description:
    Examines how the Internet has changed our society, economy, culture and geography. Explores the myths and the realities of the impacts derived from technological changes. Issues for discussions include an examination of ‘the death of distance’, social polarization and the ‘digital divide’ at the national and international scales, as well as the changing practices and modes of everyday social interactions. Explores how consumption and our conceptualization of leisure is changing as a result of the widespread use of the Internet.

    Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) Designation: no

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 360 - GIS & Land Change Models


    Students learn how to use and to interpret GIS-based computer models that simulate land change, especially those models in Idrisi. Students learn funadmental concepts such as calibration, validation, extrapolation, uncertainty and sensitivity analysis. Most applications focus on policies for Smart Growth of suburbanization and policies to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD).  The work is linked to on-going research at Clark University, thus topics vary somewht from year to year. The course culiminates in presentations of student projects. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Prerequisites: GEOG 390   or instructor permission

    Anticipated Terms Offered: offered every spring

  
  • GEOG 361 - Decision Methods for Environmental Management and Policy


    Information on environmental-impact assessments needs to be systematically organized and analyzed to be useful in the decision-making process. This course provides a survey of methods that are currently used to aid environmental decision makers (who include policy makers, environmental managers and affected populations). Covers techniques such as: decision analysis, benefit/cost analysis, multicriteria evaluation, multiobjective analysis, multiattribute utility theory, the analytical hierarchy process, and spatial-analytical methods using geographical information systems. These methods will be evaluated with respect to their theoretical foundations, systems formulation and appropriate application. A critical evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of these methods will also be discussed. Open to doctoral and masters students. Advanced undergraduates require instuctor permission to register.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year/

  
  • GEOG 362 - Seminar on Globalization


    Examines contemporary literature on globalization from various disciplinary perspectives. Both theoretical and empirical literature from Economics, Geography, Sociology, Political Science and Anthropology on various aspects of globalization, including governance, interdependence, labor relations and ‘networks’ will be analyzed. Explores the possibilities of developing a geographic paradigm to better understand the relationship between the global and the local. Open to doctoral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 363 - The Climate System and Global Environmental Change


    In order to understand and predict the Earth’s current and future climate, it is imperative to know the forces that can drive both natural and anthropogenic climate change. This course will utilize an Earth Systems approach towards climate science, meaning rather than simply cataloging the Earth’s history of climate change, we will focus on understanding the climate system’s response to both external and internal drivers. We will examine the interactions between atmosphere, ice, ocean, land surface, and vegetation, allowing us to touch on the fields of geology, ecology, paleobotany, glaciology, oceanography, meteorology, biogeochemistry, climate modeling, atmospheric chemistry, and hydrology, among others. The goal of the course is to provide the scientific background that is necessary for understanding global environmental change-related issues as well as providing a basis for addressing the critical social and policy questions that cascade from these issues. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 366 - Topics in Urban Geography


     

    Topics in Urban Geography engages a substantive theme within urban geography and cognate disciplines, focusing first on theorizations of the theme, then substantive empirical investigations of it.  Over the course of the semester, doctoral students will read a range of scholarly texts and will place them in two regards: first, in the broader historical and conceptual sweep of urban geographical scholarship; and second, in critical engagement with the goals, methods, and contributions of the specific work in the subfield.  Since the particular topic in a given semester will vary, doctoral students can take the course more than once for credit, as long as the subtitle is different from a previously taken course. Open for doctoral and masters students. Open to doctoral students, others by permission only.

    In the topics seminar subtitled “Urban Politics,” we will consider fundamental contemporary scholarship and debates around urban politics and urban geography.  We will interrogate the intersections of urban geography and political geography, focusing on themes related to: citizenship, place identity, state theory, and urban governance.  Our overall goal is to understand the ways that scholars, particularly within or in dialogue with urban geography, conceptualize “politics” and citizen-state-subjectivity relations.

     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall - every other year

  
  • GEOG 367 - Governing Development: Institutions, Networks, Space, Place


    This course investigates the theoretical potential and pitfalls of conceptualizing development as a field of networks of actors and institutions, and it poses the challenge of geography in understanding these networks.  More specifically, this course engages with various literatures to analyze how networks can be theorized and visualized in relation to actors such as the state, private entities, civil society and beyond. The first two thirds of the course will involve general readings on preset topics; while the last third of the course will be targeted towards the specific regional and topical interests of the student participants (each week one student will select and discuss readings of their choice).  Readings and discussions incorporate the global north as well as the global south. Questions asked include: By what mechanisms do networks and institutions operate? How do networks and institutions vary regionally (what are the structural similarities and differences)? What is the interaction between multilevel forms of governance, networked states and local institutions? What is the interaction among institutions, networks, livelihoods and resources? Open to doctoral students, but masters students may request permission to enroll.

     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Every Year

  
  • GEOG 368 - The Development of Western Geographic Thought


    Examines principal orientations, themes and debates within emergent professional geography communities in the 19th and 20th centuries and the professional structure of the field in research, educational and applied contexts. Required for, and open only to, first year geography doctoral students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 369 - Relational Political-Economic Geographies


    Relationality - the notion that the world is constituted and transformed by contingent, dynamic, and embedded relationships between people, places, objects, and structures - has emerged as a key concept in human geography. This course interrogates critically the idea of relationality and assesses its significance and possibilities for contemporary thinking in economic and development geography. Participants will read, critique, discuss, and debate a variety of theories about and sub-disciplinary perspectives on relational thinking - from economic sociology, organizational studies, critical realism, phenomenology, actor-network theory, Marxism, feminism, urban-economic geography, and development studies - and evaluate how these works might inform our understandings of contemporary political-economic issues. For doctoral students only.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: annually

  
  • GEOG 370 - Development’s Geographies: Debates and Interventions


    James Ferguson once referred to development as anthropology’s “evil twin,” and geography also has had an at best ambivalent relationship with development. This course first explores the place of international development in the social sciences to then focus on its place within geography and anthropology. We consider how particular authors have engaged the notion of development, and focus our discussion as much on efforts at conceptual reformulation as critique. The course then considers to what extent it is useful to speak of development geography as an intellectual enterprise - again considering usefulness in terms of both theoretical and practical engagement. Through the notion of “geographies of intervention” the course explores the literatures on livelihoods, NGOs and social movement/organizations. For doctoral students only.


     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 373 - Seminar in Urban Geography


    In this seminar we will consider fundamental geographical aspects of urban theory. Our goal is to undestand the ways that scholars have approached the study of cities, and to compare and contrast the epistemological assumptions underlying different approaches to “the urban.” We will critically evaluate major theoretical perspectives in light of their contribution to contemporary research. Open to doctoral students but masters students may request permission.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 375 - Technology and Sustainability: Perspectives from the Global South


    Examines the nature of technologies and their relationships to socioeconomic and environmental change in the developing world. Readings and discussions will address and critique theories on technology change, the role of technologies in development, and their real-world implications (good and bad) for developing regions. Theoretical literature will be linked to empirical case studies of agricultural, energy, financing, information-communication, and/or manufacturing technologies in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and South/Southeast Asia. The key objective of the course is to deepen and complicate students’ understandings of the ways in which technologies are developed, diffused, and absorbed and about how these processes influence communities and economies in the Global South. Open to doctoral students, but masters students may request permission to enroll.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 377 - Africa’s Development in Global Context


    Explores, in detail, the economic geographies of Sub-Saharan Africa; both their historical development and their contemporary manifestations in commodity chains, business practices, production systems, gender and environmental relations, entrepreneurial and innovative behavior, and rural and urban livelihood strategies. Emphasis is placed on examining how African economies relate to the rest of the world, how globalization is influencing the prospects for growth, autonomy, and sustainability in Africa, and how Africans actually produce, innovate, succeed, and struggle in their business activities. Confronts stereotypes about “backward” economic practices in Africa and encourages students to view Africans as capable agents of economic change not simply as passive victims of global or historical inequalities. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every other year

  
  • GEOG 378 - Emerging Issues in Climate Change Science


    This seminar examines emerging issues surrounding global climate change and Earth System Science.  Climate Change Science is inherently interdisciplinary and processes within this field involve significant interactions between land, atmosphere, ocean, ice, and humans.  Specific topics discussed in this seminar include abrupt climate change, biogeochemical cycling, biocomplexity, oscillatory climate phenomena, trace gas exchange, glacier/ice sheet dynamics, sea ice variability, sea level rise, paleoclimate, extreme weather events, and human-induced environmental change.  Readings will be focused on the most recent climate literature, including the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment reports.  This seminar not only introduces students to recent, cutting-edge research, but given the sometimes controversial nature of these issues also gives students insight into the process of critically evaluating Climate Change Science studies. Open to doctoral students, but masters students may request permission to enroll.

     

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 379 - GIS & Map Comparison


    GIS & Map Comparison investigates quantitative methods that are commonly used and abused for map comparison, especially in remote sensing and land change science.  We examine the advantages, disadvantages, interpretations, and misconceptions of the most common metrics such as Omissions Error, Commission Error, Kappa, Figure of Merit, Relative Operating Characteristic, Total Operating Characteristic, Mean Absolute Deviation, and Root Mean Square Error. Students learn a philosophy of map comparison that focuses on components of deviation between maps.  Students learn how to use the computer language R. Course projects frequently become scientific lterature. The prerequisite is GEOG 190/GEOG 390 Introduction to GIS, but it is recommended that students enroll also in GEOG 296  or GEOG 397  Advanced Raster GIS simultaneously or before this course. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Prerequisites: The prerequisite is GEOG 190  or GEOG 390  Introduction to Geographic information Science (GIS) or instructor premission.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Every spring

  
  • GEOG 380 - Urban Ecology: Cities as Ecosystems


    Explores ecology and the social and physical geography of cities as systems built, inhabited and managed by people. This class of ecosystem is often neglected except in studies of pollution, yet it is home to many of the world’s people and to a surprising number of plant and animal species as well. Readings, lectures, discussion and written work combine landscape and systems ecology with physical and urban geography and environmental justice to broaden our understanding of city environments, both present and possible. Four day field trip to Boston/Providence or New York City is required: Sept. 15-18 (alt. dates: Sept. 22-25); a $100 fee is charged to students at time of registration to cover administrative and transportation costs. In addition, students should bring $20 for a subway pass and enough to cover meals. Book costs for the course are minimal. Registration is by permission for both doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

  
  • GEOG 382 - Advanced Remote Sensing


    Application of remote sensor systems in earth science and other disciplines; interpretation of multispectral scanner, RADAR and thermal imagery, classification, postclassification analysis, special transformations, multitemporal data analysis for change detection, the study of spectral characteristics of vegetation, soils, water, minerals and other materials. The specific objectives of the course are to acquaint the student with the physical principles underlying remote sensing systems and the primary remote-sensing data-collection systems; introduce the student to methods of interpreting and analyzing remotely sensed data; provide some insight concerning the applications of remote sensing in various discipline areas; and provide hands-on experience in digital image processing using software packages available in the computer lab. Open to doctoral and masters students.

    Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered every year

 

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