Fusion or exclusion? Reflections on conceptual practices of landscape and place in human geography

Abstract

This article has its premise in two of the most cherished and complex concepts within human geography, namely landscape and place. They have been subject to both endless and some of the most significant discussions within the discipline. These concepts are also subject to some of the most confusing debates among human geographers – they clearly overlap and are frequently conflated. It is argued here that present conceptualizations and wider discourses of landscape and place are very similar within strands of the discipline. Furthermore, it is argued that it is particularly due to recent theorizations of (embodied) practice that landscape and place become conflated. Practice may then inform our understanding of present uses of both terms. An obvious, but ultimately populist, ahistorical and sidetracking conclusion to draw from the arguments presented in this article is that human geography can do away with one of the concepts. The article concludes by suggesting that the disciplinary practices of landscape and place can be seen rather as struggles over disciplinary vocabulary serving to hold certain academic communities together while keeping others apart.