Physical Geography Research Research Articles

A horizon scan for novel and impactful areas of physical geography research in 2023 and beyond

This editorial reports on a horizon scan exercise that was undertaken to identify new frontier topics, new or emerging themes/concepts, or new philosophical questions of relevance to physical geography. Researchers with broad geographical and disciplinary scope, all of whom were members of the journal's editorial board or editorial advisory board, were invited to join a horizon scan panel. The horizon scan Chair canvassed panel members for ideas, resulting in an initial 32 independently proposed topics. Similar topics were merged by the Chair, and panel members were then invited to vote on and score anonymously the remaining 28 topics, bearing in mind the perceived importance/relevance and novelty for the discipline. The final ranking and sifting phase produced a list of 12 topics, which were categorised as being either new study areas or new epistemological frameworks for physical geography. In this editorial, we outline these 12 topics, some of which have been inspired by developments outside of the discipline, but we identify how potentially fertile contributions could be added by physical geographers. We discuss how new studies of extreme event geographies, the impacts of compound stressors, cross-system pollution and toxicity, the geomorphological basis of zoonoses, ancient environmental DNA, the projection and visualisation of landscape futures, and planetary sciences can all benefit from additional physical geography perspectives. We then consider the ways in which physical geographers may engage further with new approaches in personalised and internet-of-things monitoring, artificial intelligence, innovative technologies for teaching physical geography, the study of human-climate impacts, and the raising of the profile of physical geography thinking alongside other knowledge forms. We encourage more physical geographers to apply their unique skillsets and ways of thinking to these topics. The journal will welcome new submissions, or proposals for special issues, that address these topics from physical geographers and their colleagues.

Effects of COVID-19 on First-Year Undergraduate Research in Physical Geography

Having confirmed that including research in first-year undergraduate teaching can actually help students understand the research process, link research with concepts, and improve both their academic and professional skills, we intended to evaluate how this experiential learning component fared during the COVID-19 challenge. For a first-year three-credit physical geography class, we have included a First Year Research Experience (FYRE) project for six iterations. A cluster analysis grouped students’ perceptions obtained from survey questions into five categories, from high to low. The results showed an overall improvement in perception of the FYRE during the pandemic, driven primarily by soft-skill development related to time management and self-motivation. Students were also able to better connect the research project with the theoretical content of the course. Components of the FYRE that suffered during the pandemic include engaging with course instructors and completing the oral presentation phase of the research. Soft-skill development continued through the second year of the pandemic, although students’ dissatisfaction with continued restrictions on in-person contact was evident.

Whither physical geography Redux: Revisiting the place of physical geography in the United States

The differentiation of human and physical geography is a fundamental distinction in Geography. This commentary examines the past, present, and possible future places of physical geography within Geography, focusing on the situation in the United States. Physical geography played a major role in the establishment of Geography as an academic discipline, but became marginalized soon thereafter. For the past 80 years, Geography in the United States has largely been a social science that has uneasily accommodated a natural-science component within it. Although somewhat healthy during the latter part of the 20th century, physical geography appears to be on the decline. In part, this situation reflects the social-science identity of Geography, a lack of adequate training of physical geographers in basic science and mathematics, as well as growing emphasis on research in geomorphology, climatology, and biogeography, the major subfields of physical geography, by cognate disciplines. The future of physical geography is in doubt: it could keep struggling to compete with better-trained scientists in cognate disciplines, evolve into a geospatial methods branch of the earth and environmental sciences, or pursue integrated research with human geographers to address Anthropocene concerns. Any of these paths forward has important implications for trying to sustain the process approach to inquiry that has underpinned research in physical geography since the 1950s. Regardless of how physical geography evolves, it needs to seriously address issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion. Doing so will only enhance whatever it becomes.

Physical Geography Education: The Postgraduate Research Trends in Turkey

The field of research in physical geography relates to subjects such as place-shaping, climatic events, soil formation, vegetation development, the water cycle, and the nature and use of natural resources including underground mining processes. In order for humans to survive and facilitate their daily lives, they must have sufficient knowledge about many physical events taking place on planet Earth. In physical geographical education, various scientific research projects are carried out to bring rigour to the subject and the teaching of related concepts. Such projects include postgraduate Thesis studies. In this research, an examination of the status and general trends for postgraduate Theses occur in relation to physical geography education in Turkey. The current study is a mixed methods design and an evaluation of the theses occur through a document review. The theses are retrieved from the database of the National Thesis Center of the Council of Higher Education Institution. A descriptive analysis and bibliometric study on the theses aims to reveal the progress in physical geography education. Results from the research show the most common type of graduate Thesis includes writing about the subject, university, year of admission, institute, writing language, sample, study group/sample size, method/research model, data collection tool, data analysis technique/analysis method, research subject and the subject of physical geography, and the level of instruction/target audience. In response to the less frequently covered topics and methods, suggestions are made for future research and investigation to occur at the level of postgraduate studies.

Physical geography contributes

Physical geography is a process, conducted by people, of integration and synthesis of ideas and observations to advance scientific understanding of Earth’s surface and atmosphere and to apply this knowledge to the greater good of the planet and its people. Therefore, physical geography matters; that is, physical geography makes a difference to people and contributes to environmental decision making at various scales. Based upon presentations and discussion at the 2019 AAG Annual Meeting (see editorial above in this issue), we provide here a historical perspective and distillation of how and why, in our opinions, physical geography matters. Although we provide several specific examples, these represent only a small portion of the large body of excellent and relevant physical geography research.

Major advances in studies of the physical geography and living environment of China during the past 70 years and future prospects

The natural environment provides material essentials for human survival and development. The characteristics, processes, regional differentiation and forcing mechanisms of the elements of the natural environment (e.g. geomorphology, climate, hydrology, soil, etc.) are the main objects of research in physical geography. China has a complex natural environment and huge regional differentiation and therefore it provides outstanding reserach opportunities in physical geography. This review summarizes the most important developments and the main contributions of research in the physical geography and human living environment in China during the past 70 years. The major topics addressed are the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau and the evolution of its cryosphere, the development of fluvial systems, the acidification of the vast arid region of the Asian interior, variations in the monsoon and westerly climate systems on multiple timescales, the development of lakes and wetlands, the watershed system model, soil erosion, past human-environment interactions, biogeography, and physical geographic zonality. After briefly introducing international research developments, we review the history of research in physical geography in China, focusing on the major achievements and major academic debates, and finally we summarize the status of current research and the future prospects. We propose that in the context of the national demand for the construction of an ecological civilization, we should make full use of the research findings of physical geography, and determine the patterns and mechanisms of natural environmental processes in order to continue to promote the continued contribution of physical geography to national development strategies, and to further contribute to the theory of physical geography from a global perspective.

Volunteered Geographic Videos in Physical Geography: Data Mining from YouTube

Volunteered geographic information and citizen science have advanced academic and public understanding of geographical and ecological processes. Videos hosted online represent a large data source that could potentially provide meaningful results for studies in physical geography—a concept we term volunteered geographic videos (VGV). Technological advances in image-capturing devices, computing, and image processing have resulted in increasingly sophisticated methods that treat imagery as raw data, such as resolving high-resolution topography with structure from motion or the calculation of surface flow velocity in rivers with particle image velocimetry. The ubiquitous nature of recording devices and citizens who share imagery online have resulted in a vast archive of potentially useful online videos. This article analyzes the potential for using YouTube videos for research in physical geography. We discuss the combination of suitability and availability that has made this possible and emphasize the distinction between moderately suitable imagery that can directly answer research questions and lower suitability imagery that can indirectly support a study. We present example case studies that address (1) initial considerations of using VGV, (2) topographic data extraction from a video taken after a landslide, and (3) data extraction from a video of a flash flood that could support a study of extreme floods and wood transport. Finally, we discuss both the benefits and complicating factors associated with VGV. The results indicate that VGV could be used to support certain studies in physical geography and that this large repository of raw data has been underutilized.

Conceptual pathways and institutional barriers for urban physical geography: A response to Ashmore and Dodson

Key Messages Growing urban physical geography research will focus the discipline on the places where most Canadians live and work, potentially raising the visibility of the discipline. Urban physical geography can look to urban ecology for conceptual models to help advance urban physical geography research. Funding institutions and undergraduate programs represent barriers for urban physical geography in Canada.

Editors’ Introduction

Editors’ Introduction Hilda E. Kurtz and Deepak R. Mishra In Volume 57, Issue 1 of the Southeastern Geographer, we are pleased to offer readers a special issue on “Black Geographies in and of the United States South” guest edited by Adam Bledsoe, LaToya Eaves and Brian Williams, with a commentary by Katherine McKittrick. The special issue showcases conceptually innovative research grounded in a Black Geographies perspective on the racialized production of physical, political and imagined space(s). This issue goes to press two days after a deeply divisive American Presidential election has made it much harder to deny the racism and xenophobia that have threaded through the fabric of the United States for centuries. The Southeastern Geographer has a long record of engagement with race, racism and xenophobia through scholarship on urban segregration, Jim Crow policies, contestation over Confederate memorials, struggle over the Confederate battle flag, regional tourism, immigration and many other empirics. Review of the 55 year archive of the journal through Project MUSE (ProjectMUSE.com) suggests that the Southeastern Geographer may have a higher proportion of work wrestling with race and racism than any other geography journal publishing today. (A thematic resource list of these papers can be accessed from sedaag.org). Conceptual and analytical approaches to race and racism in geography have changed significantly over the years, growing more critical, theoretical and supple over time; these developments are readily on view in the pages of this journal. Against this scholarly backdrop, the Black Geographies scholarship offered in this issue of Southeastern Geographer pushes the critical edge further ahead. Our hope is that these papers stimulate ever more nuanced and critical engagement with some of the most pressing issues of our time. Canadian geographer Katherine McKittrick (Queen’s University) and the late Clyde Woods (UC Santa Barbara) outlined the conceptual apparatus of Black Geographies in an edited volume published in the aftermath of the 2005 superstorm Hurricane Katrina. The lens of Black Geographies counters the ways in which predominantly white-authored scholarship tends to render black spaces and spatial practices as somehow deficient, and guides more open-ended inquiry into Black constructions of spaces that recognize complex spatial survival and resistance strategies in changing conditions of racial bias. The papers in this issue of Southeastern Geographer each contend with historical/ geographic conditions in and of the American South. We leave it to the guest editors to introduce each paper in relation to the aims and intentions of the special issue, but wish to underscore two key themes emerging from this project. First, as [End Page 4] recent turbulent and tragic events in cities across the United States clearly demonstrate, racism is a national, not a regional problem. At the same time, Southern states figure complexly in broader understandings of racialization. The textured array of research showcased here complicates the role of southern histories and geographies in relation to broader narratives of Black Geographies. Second, critical perspectives on race and racialization are vital to the ongoing enrichment of academic geography. The guest editors offer the journal’s readership the stimulating opportunity to envision how critical research agendas centered on a Black sense of place might push the proverbial envelope of critical race research in geography. It has been a great pleasure to work with the editors and authors whose work makes this an especially memorable issue of the journal. We hope that readers will find the work gathered here to informative and invigorating, as have we. Lastly, during our tenure as co-editors, we aim to balance annual special issues between research in human geography and research in physical geography. To that end, we have a special issue focused on submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) in the southeastern coastal zone in the works for next year. As always, we invite proposals for cross-cutting special issue topics. [End Page 5] Hilda E. Kurtz University of Georgia Deepak R. Mishra University of Georgia Copyright © 2017 Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers

Pacifi c Mega-Ecotone of Northern Eurasia as Evolutionary Model of Continental Biosphere

The problem of studying the structural and functional organization of geoecosystems of islands and coastal continental lands in different morphotectonic and macroclimatic sectors of the Pacifi c megaecotone of Northern Eurasia is expounded. This mega-ecotone is considered as a global model of modern development of the continental biosphere. Some ecological-phytocenotic effects of oro-climatic interactions on the mega-ecotone are described. The theoretical and methodological aspects of evolutionary landscape science as a novel trend of complex physical geography research are considered. The research object here must be the landscape-forming processes and events in the tectonically and climatically active contact zone between the ocean and the continent.

Going with the flow? Using participatory action research in physical geography

This paper critically appraises the idea and practice of ‘participation’ in scientific environmental research, arguing for the wider uptake by physical geographers of a more radical participatory approach. It proposes participatory action research (PAR), which offers an alternative mode of science, involving collaboration and co-production of research from question definition through to outcomes. We begin with a critical view of public participation in environmental research and policy-making to date. We argue that much rhetoric and practice of participation is shallow, focusing simply on including relevant publics and stakeholders, or having an underlying agenda of building trust in science or policy-making. Both orientations diverge drastically from the radical traditions in which participatory research and planning originate. In the rest of the paper, we illustrate an alternative process of knowledge co-production, reporting on a PAR project on farm slurry pollution conducted with a UK Rivers Trust. We evaluate the knowledge co-produced, the responses of participants and the scientific process. Suggesting that we reframe co-production as the circulation of expertise, we argue that PAR can enrich the learning, knowledge and skills of all those involved and lead to innovation and positive environmental outcomes. A number of structural and institutional barriers to deep participatory processes need to be addressed.

An argument for ethical physical geography research on Indigenous landscapes in Canada

AbstractIn Canadian physical geography, the ethical implications of research occurring in Indigenous spaces and places have historically been overlooked. Physical geographers, particularly those working in northern Canada, are beginning to recognize that our research takes place in a sensitive social space and the knowledge we pursue has ethical and moral implications. The Canadian Geographer recently published a special issue (56:2) that documents the many challenges and opportunities of community‐based participatory research involving Indigenous peoples in Canada. Throughout that issue, the 2010 Tri‐Council Policy Statement, Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans (TCPS2), was referenced as important in directing a shift towards ethical interactions with Indigenous peoples in research. Drawing on material from the special issue and the TCPS2, this article gives an overview of the authors' experiences in attempting to execute an ethically sound physical geography study in traditional Dene territory in northern Saskatchewan. The viewpoint concludes with thoughts on what bridges and barriers exist when attempting physical geography research that is sensitive to the ethical responsibilities of working in Indigenous spaces. From our perspective, physical geographers can strengthen the ethical defensibility and overall quality of their research by enhancing involvement with indigenous communities that are potentially impacted by their research findings.

Analysis of Spatial Structure and Dynamics of Tom Valley Landscapes based on GIS, Digital Elevation Model and Remote Sensing

The Tom river valley is characterized by the composite landscape structure, which is conditioned by its location in a zone of transition from Altay Mountain Region to the Western-Siberian Platform. The landscape systems of the valley have high speed of the natural transformations. Besides a lot of landscape systems have undergone serious anthropogenic modification during XX- XXI centuries. The Purpose of this work is the analysis of the spatial structure of Tom valley landscapes and their natural and anthropogenic changes from the end of XIX century. The Object of research is the Tom river valley within the limits of Tomsk Region. The Subject of research is the internal-valley differentiation of landscape systems, their modern state, natural dynamics and anthropogenic modification for last 100 years. There are used both the traditional methods of the research in physical geography (including the field expedition methods) and the newest methods of GIS-mapping and complex spatial analysis based on remote sensing data and digital elevation models. In the research there is used software: ArcGIS 10 (ESRI Inc.), ERDAS Imagine (ERDAS Inc.). The results are next: big geodatabase and GIS “Tom river valley” (including the set of digital landscape and other thematic maps with the scale 1:10 000 – 1:25 000), digital elevation model (DEM) of valley in TIN and GRID formats, morphometric indexes of landscape systems (based on DEM), main trends of landscape dynamics in the different parts of the valley.

Confluences of human and physical geography research on the outdoors: an introduction to the special section on ‘Exploring the outdoors’

This special section of Area demonstrates the multiple ways that geographers engage with the outdoors. Human and physical geographers have pursued different paths of academic research on the outdoors, ranging from ‘objective’ empirical epistemologies to understandings of outdoor spaces as socially constructed. The special section highlights that more‐than‐representational accounts and more‐than‐scientific encounters have the potential to bridge human and physical geographies and lead to new understandings of the outdoors. In this editorial overview we argue for the outdoors as a site of boundary crossing between human and physical, and between ‘academic’ and ‘explorer’, geographies.

An Introduction to the Physical Geography of the Qiangtang Plateau: A Frontier for Future Geoscience Research on the Tibetan Plateau

The Qiangtang Plateau, an area of 5.97 × 105 km2, is located in a remote area of the Tibetan Plateau. It is the highest and largest flat area in Tibet, with an average elevation over 5000 m, but relief of only a few hundred meters. The Qiangtang Plateau has great potential for physical geography research. It is very cold and dry, with strong prevailing westerly winds. It has an extensive inland water system with the greatest number of plateau glaciers in the world, and the largest lake area in Tibet. Many rivers on the plateau are sourced by glaciers and drain to inland lakes. River valleys are shallow owing to weak fluvial downcutting and the glacial landforms are small in comparison with those in the surrounding mountains. Lake terraces and sand ridges are widely present, owing to water-level oscillations in the past. Unique species of plants and animals live in this arid land, despite the thin soil and sparse vegetation. To date, none of these features have been well studied, providing a unique opportunity for scientific exploration.

A Century of Physical Geography Research in the Annals

In this article I summarize the status and trends in physical geography over the first 100 years of the Annals of the Association of American Geographers. Drawing on the original papers and recent literature that reviews biogeography, climatology, and geomorphology, I describe the change in the focus of physical geographers over the last century and anticipate future developments in physical geography. Physical geographers have always responded to changes in methodologies and to broader developments in earth and environmental sciences. Their work currently explores environmental systems developing process-based understanding. Recent methodological and conceptual developments include the adoption of approaches from complexity science to understand dynamic and nonlinear behaviors of environmental systems. There is also a growing move toward the challenge of addressing coupled human and natural systems in an integrated and holistic manner. This is not only a challenge for physical geography but also for geography as a whole, reflecting the capacity of the discipline to analyze and understand complex behaviors and dynamics using a diversity of quantitative and qualitative methods; methodologies that span social, economic, behavioral, and biophysical systems; and an ability to link basic and applied research to use geographic expertise to address contemporary environmental issues of importance.

A conceptual model for integrating physical geography research and coastal wetland management, with an Australian example

We have developed a conceptual model to assist integration between physical geographical sciences, institutional frameworks and management in the context of coastal wetlands. Wetlands are key interconnected systems that will respond early to climate change and especially to associated sea-level changes. A major constraint on management of wetlands is the lack of congruence between the ecosystems and the institutional frameworks that govern their management: connectivity in coastal systems is overlain by institutional fragmentation. We introduce a model that facilitates integration of physical geographical (biophysical) information into the legislative, planning, policy and management process. It consists of interconnected parallel subprojects in science and in planning with strong cross-links with stakeholders at all levels, founded on long-term and trusting relationships. We also show progress that has been made in applying the model, with an Australian example. It is concluded that the approach has potential to move towards the goal of sustainable management but that it urgently needs to evolve, so as to meet the challenges of climate and associated changes.

A shift from lithostratigraphic to allostratigraphic classification of Quaternary glacial deposits

The bedrock of the northern halves of North America and Europe is covered by Quaternary glacial deposits, forming a surficial overburden that is relatively thin, nonlithified, litho logically variable on a small scale (in terms of grain-size, mineralogy, texture, fabric, structure, and color), and often has a well-preserved depositional topography. These geologically unique characteristics and the fact that the glacial overburden was long considered to be of only restricted economic value have caused it to be treated differently in geological research from the older, regularly lithified strata. Due to the striking geomorphology of these glacial deposits, their investigation has also been incorporated into physical geography research. Thus, the segregation of the Quaternary research community into different schools of geology and geography has created multiple classification approaches and has caused the formal stratigraphic classifications successfully applied in pre-Quater nary geology to be applied less regularly to Quaternary glacial strata. This has led to inefficient use of Quaternary geological data for scientific and socio-economic purposes. The few currently existing national Quaternary stratigraphic frameworks are based on lithostratigraphy. These are poorly suited for describing deposits in glaciated shield areas in particular; we propose a classification for such areas based on the combined use of allostratigraphic and lithostratigraphic data, with alloformations as the fundamental units and lithostratigraphic units filling out the framework where appropriate. This classification would provide a hierarchical framework for gla ciogenic deposits that could potentially support stratigraphic information systems, databases, and digital spatial models more effectively than the traditional lithostratigraphic frameworks.

Why Not in My Backyard?: Field-Based Physical Geography in the Southeast

Observations that submissions of physical geography research to the Southeastern Geographer have been low prompted us to question if the Southeast is understudied by physical geographers relative to other regions. We reviewed over 7,000 articles in eleven journals to estimate the frequency and types of field-based research being done. We also reviewed the online publication lists of physical geographers living in the Southeast to determine where they conduct their research. Based on the journal articles reviewed, 72% of the field sites were in international locations. Of the 28% that used U.S. field sites, only 8.4% (2.3% of the total) were in the Southeast. Given that the Southeast makes up over 12% of the land area and is home to 37% of the geography programs in the U.S., the concentration of research in the area is low. Aside from being understudied, field-based research in the Southeast is also unevenly distributed. North Carolina and Georgia were the most studied states. North Carolina was the most frequently used location for geomorphology studies and Tennessee was cited most often for biogeography. Kentucky and South Carolina were the least studied states. Few researchers from states outside the SEDAAG region come into the Southeast to conduct research. At the same time, a significant portion of the research efforts of geographers living in the Southeast have been put toward field sites in other states and countries. The resulting lack of focus on the unique environments of the Southeast is limiting our knowledge of the region.

Complexity in Physical Geography

Physical geographers attempt to understand the behaviour of Earth surface systems. However, with the advent of high powered computers and the means of collecting and analysing vast amounts of data, scientists are realising that classical principles are often inadequate in explaining the forms and processes present in the natural world. The field of complexity includes a variety of topics that have become prominent research areas in recent years. This article highlights the growth of complexity within physical geography and assesses the extent to which the new framework can be viewed as an evolving, new paradigm for research in physical geography.