Vol.58 No.6 (2006)
Contents
Special Issue
Progress of Human Geography in Asia: Editorial Note
KANASAKA Kiyonori, OKUNO Shii, OGATA Noboru, TAKAYAMA Masaki and IKUTA Masato(1)
Human Geograhy: Singapore Perspectives
SAVAGE, Victor R. (8)
Development of Human Geography in Taiwan in the Last Decade
Lan-Hung Nora Chiang and Sue-Ching Jou (25)
The Development and Prospects of Korean Human Geography
BAIK Seonhae (40)
Development of Geography in Vietnam: The Past, Present and Future
NGUYEN Cao Huan, NOMA Haruo, NGUYEN Duc Kha and TRAN Anh Tuan (56)
Meeting Reports
104th Meeting of Historical Geography (74)
105th Meeting of Historical Geography (76)
86th Meeting of Geographical Thought (77)
15th Meeting of Metropolitan Area Studies (81)
18th Meeting of Metropolitan Area Studies (83)
19th Meeting of Metropolitan Area Studies (87)
20th Meeting of Metropolitan Area Studies (89)
4th Meeting of Geographical Education (101)
5th Meeting of Geographical Education (105)
News (106)
Abstracts
Progress of Human Geography in Asia: Editorial Note
KANASAKA Kiyonori
OKUNO Shii
OGATA Noboru
TAKAYAMA Masaki
IKUTA Masato
Full Text（PDF，328KB）
Human Geography Singapore Perspectives
Victor R. Savage
(National University of Singapore )
Geography has been taught as a university subject for over 75 years and the Department of Geography at the National University of Singapore is the only fully fledged academic Geography Department in Singapore. Based on the last 15 years （1990―2005） this paper looks at the research contributions on human geography of mainly the Singaporean geographers in the Department. This article asserts that the Department has gone through a renaissance in the last 15 years reflecting a new influx of young geographers, the changing university system from a British to an American research-driven system, and the catalytic research impact of three faculty members in the Department: Lily Kong, Henry Yeung and Brenda Yeoh. The research output in human geography in the Department has been prodigious and reflects mainly contributions in three areas: Singapore as nation, city and urban ecosystem; diasporas, migration and gender issues; and varied operational aspects of globalization dealing with global cities, cosmopolitan populations, transnational corporations, and global-local dialogues.
Development of Human Geography in Taiwan in the Last Decade
Lan-Hung Nora Chiang
(Department of Geography, National Taiwan University)
Sue-Ching Jou
(Department of Geography, National Taiwan University)
Human geographers in Taiwan are distributed in five geography departments and various social science and education departments. In spite of the small population, their publications are well represented in five major geographical journals in Chinese and a few international journals in the English-speaking world. Apart from summarizing the growth of departments, this paper introduces the subfields and specialties represented by geographers in major universities, surveys the publications in the ten years between 1996 and 2005, and uses a bibliometric approach to analyze the progress made in human geography. The subject matters approach used by the Human Geographical Society of Japan has been used with regard to the above analysis.
Geographic research reflects social change in Taiwan, as well as follows paradigmatic waves in English-speaking countries, particularly Anglo-America from where most of Taiwanﾕs geographers obtained their degrees. Led by new paradigms in human geography, geographers tended to cooperate with other social scientists in the 1990ﾕs, thus resulting in disparate fields of interest among geographers, particularly in economic, urban, social and population geography. While empirical studies predominate, social relevance is demonstrated in all the new themes being studied. The future growth of human geography depends on further interdisciplinary cooperation, collaboration with international scholars, and the participation by young scholars, leading to a breakaway from traditional subjects of research and methodology.
Key words: social change, paradigm shifts, bibliometric approach, research landscape, pluralism, social relevance
The Development and Prospects of Korean Human Geography
BAIK Seonhae
(Department of Digital City Seoul Development Institute)
Korean modern geography started when the Korean Geographical Society was established in 1945. The 60-year history is by no means long, but Korean geography has seen dramatic growth in both quality and quantity. Owing to the growth of Korean geography, Korea came to hold the International Geographical Congress （IGC） in 2000, which has been said to be one of the most successful congresses in IGC history. Korean modern geography can be divided into five periods: from inception through the 1960s, the 1970s, the 1980s, the 1990s, and after the year 2000. Each period shows distinct characteristics, and especially great progress has been made since 2000. Korean human geography has been trying to analyze the actual circumstances and problems of the land and search for solutions in keeping with Korean society, which has experienced wide spatial changes and problems related to urbanization, industrialization, rapid economic growth, and recent cultural developments. It has made broad contributions to society both academically and socially because research outcomes have extended beyond academic theory to policy making and participation.
This study aims to outline the development of Korean human geography by periods, to examine recent research trends, and finally to raise some future prospects. For these purposes, articles published in the Journal of the Korean Geographical Society, Ph. D. dissertations in geography from Korean universities, and articles on the development process of Korean geography are reviewed.
Key words: Korean Human Geography, the Korean Geographical Society, rapid growth, contributions to society
Development of Geography in Vietnam: The Past, Present and Future
NGUYEN Cao Huan
(Faculty of Geography, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, Vietnam)
NOMA Haruo
(Faculty of Letters, Kansai University, Japan)
NGUYEN Duc Kha
(Faculty of Geography, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, Vietnam)
TRAN Anh Tuan
(Faculty of Geography, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, Vietnam)
The objectives of this paper are to review the history of the Vietnam geography from pre-modern geographical knowledge and identification to the present situation of Vietnam geography with special reference to the change of its field, method, technique, academic institution, and university level education.
As pre-modern Vietnam geography was strongly influenced by Chinese regional geography. Useful geographical knowledge was accumulated to contribute national land problems and local administration system, and furthermore, the relevant maps were also made. But the style of regional geography was not exceeded a traditional Chinese form.
In the period of French domination, conventional fourclassification method were generally used: physical setting, economy, historical / political geography, and statistics. As for academic researches, toponymy and historical geography initiated by H. Maspero in Paleographical Indo-China Institute were noticed. In the field of physical geography, Karst geomorphology and cave study were progressed by the archaeologist or the geologist. As for applied geography, the location study of industrial crop, irrigation systems, appropriate place for meteorological observing stations, and hill stations or beach resorts for French people were studied.
In 1930s, the influence of the French human geography became remarkable. C. Robequain and P. Gourou played an active role in the regional geography of northern part Vietnam, or land use research. Although the Gourou’s “Les Peasans du Delta Tonkinis” （1936） were the immortal achievements with exhaustive use of aerial-photos or detailed topographical maps, however, unfortunately it had been forgotten for a long time after World War II in the Vietnam geography.
As for modern geography, the period of 1954 to 1975 became a epoch. It is under the overwhelming influence of the Soviet geography which makes the Moscow University the peak, and geology and topography took the lead. Many of the first generation was occupied by students studied in Communist bloc countries. Unification of north-south Vietnam was attained in 1975, and specific studies in Mekong Delta or the central part were conducted.
Economic opening policy “doi moi” started in 1986, new academic trends of Anglo-Saxon geography has been introduced gradually, however, the pace was not so speedy. In the mean while, remote sensing or the technique of GIS raised the status of geography from a national development point.
The major stream of geography in university is leaded by Hanoi University, Hanoi University of Education, Ho Chi Minh City University. They are characteristic respectively: the first is physical geography, geology, geomorphology, landscape ecology, and land management; the latter two are economic geography, human geography. Both have the special new trend in the tourism or applied studies using GIS, remote sensing, etc., and application.
The Association of Vietnam Geographers was established in 1988 initiated by Hanoi University. Five-interval academic meeting is held, but there are no periodicals until now. Otherwise, a researcher in Institute of Geography, Vietnam National Academy of Science and Technology plays an important role in the field of natural resources, environment and natural disasters.
Human geography is beginning to have power in the basis of the name of “Integrated Geography” in Vietnam in recent years. It covers man-made landscape, small- and meso-scale community studies, and urban or rural geography. On the other hand, the geography made much of physical environment, planning and policy making, and socio-economic geography of theSoviet geography style is also important.
Key words: Vietnam geography, Pierre Gourou, Tonkin delta, French geography, Soviet geography, GIS