No sense of place: Geoscientisation and the epistemic erasure of geography

Abstract

AbstractThis article explores the question of geoscientisation and its consequences for the discipline of geography. By geoscientisation, I am referring to the ways in which geography, under conditions of top‐down managerial neoliberalisation, has been subject to a range of administrative (re)locations in colleges and faculties of science and engineering and to forced mergers with programmes and departments in the physical sciences, most notably geology, earth sciences and environmental sciences/studies. It argues for a greater understanding of the forms of epistemic erasure and other negative consequences that geoscientisation engenders, especially for critical human geographers who find themselves in such administrative arrangements.