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The concept of Iranshahr first surfaced in the Inscription of the First Shah Poor in the Ka'ba-ye Zartosht during the third century, proliferating in inscriptions, coins, and texts throughout the Sassanid era. With the collapse of the Sassanid dynasty due to the invasion of Muslim Arabs, the Iran plateau became part of the Islamic Caliphate. Some scholars argue that following the demise of the Sassanian dynasty, the unity of Iranshahr, along with its political independence, was disintegrated. The significance of Iranshahr in Islamic texts denotes the ancient plateau of Iran, evoking a nostalgic memory that endured in literature and collective consciousness. This study aims to scrutinize and reassess the continuity of Iranshahr's integrity through an examination of geographical and historical texts from the Islamic period. By analyzing these sources, the research seeks to elucidate and affirm the persistence of the concept during the Islamic era, portraying the region's cities as distinct from other Islamic cities within the dar al-Islam. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese nation has evolved through history and is inextricably linked with geographical factors. Since the inception of the concept of "Chinese nation" in the twentieth century, Chinese scholars have made significant contributions to understanding this concept from a historical geography perspective. This paper undertakes an examination and discussion of these contributions, highlighting three main aspects in which Chinese scholars in the twentieth century have significantly enhanced the concept of "Chinese nation" from a historical geography perspective: firstly, escaping the trap of "China Proper" and comprehensively understanding the Chinese nation from a geographical perspective; secondly, breaking the spatial barrier set up by the Great Wall, endowing the Chinese nation with a complete geographical space; thirdly, The Historical Atlas of China clarifying the connection between historical China and modern China, providing a comprehensive geographical basis for understanding the formation and development of the Chinese nation. The paper, contextualized within the historical backdrop, provides an analysis and discourse on these three aspects, indicating that the contributions of scholars in the twentieth century were instrumental in refining the concept of the Chinese nation from a historical geography perspective, illustrating the inseparable connection between nation and geography. Only through the organic integration of history, nation, and geography can we fully grasp the historical trajectory and geographical foundation of the Chinese nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the role of transportation in forced displacement and genocidal projects throughout history, with a focus on the Holocaust. It highlights the use of railways, vehicles, and maritime infrastructure in the movement of civilian populations during times of conflict. The article also raises questions about accountability for the agencies and individuals involved in conflict transport and explores the potential for further research on the topic. It emphasizes the need for a multi-perspectival and global understanding of conflict transport, beyond the classical geography of the Holocaust. [Extracted from the article]

The article presents an interview with Verena Winiwarter, Professor of Environmental History at the University of Vienna. She discusses the early history of the European Society for Environmental History (ESEH), including the first ESEH conference in Saint Andrews, Scotland, the establishment of the society's structure, and the creation of its website. Topics include the society's origins, early conferences, and initial digital resources.

While the contemporary influenza season in South Africa is understood, its historical occurrence and dynamics are not. This study applies methods in historical geography, using archival newspaper reports to reconstruct the historical influenza season in South Africa over the past century (1904–2019) to examine changes in the seasonality of influenza in South Africa, and to compare this to contemporary records. A 20% seasonal threshold was calculated and applied to the data to return this approximate 19-week season, with the start of the influenza season ranging from week one in 1917 to week 41 of the year in 1918. On average, over the past century, the South African influenza season has started in the first week of May and ended in the last week of August, lasting 19 weeks. This outcome aligns with the contemporary influenza season described in other studies. These records reveal considerable interannual variability in length and timing with no unimodal shifts. The most linked climate phenomenon to influenza transmission rate were cold and winter conditions. This has important implications in advancing the timing of influenza vaccines to the late summer and early autumn weeks. Moreover, this shows how archival newspaper proxy records can help us reconstruct the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of South Architecture / Nanfang Jianzhu is the property of South Architecture Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Tarih İncelemeleri Dergisi is the property of Tarih Incelemeleri Dergisi and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article presents a large corpus of Mamluk and Ottoman endowment deeds )15th and 16th centuries( regarding Palestine, and explores the contribution of one such deed, the Waqfiyya of Haseki Sultan )1552 CE( to the study of the historical geography of Palestine. The article presents a methodology for geographical-historical analysis of endowment deeds, their translation, spatial interpretation and identifying the sites mentioned therein. This methodology is then applied in relation to the Waqfiyya of Haseki Sultan, which includes 187 toponyms. The results include the identification of the Talmudic Kfar Tbay in Moshav Kfar Daniel, the identification of Beit 'Arif in the Ben-Shemen Youth Village, the delimitation of Kafr Sallam's possible locations in the Emek Hefer, the locating of 'Arab al-Jammasin north of the Yarkon )east of Ramat Hasharon(, indications for a possible route of the Umayyad aqueduct to Ramla north of Tel Gezer, and early evidence of oak forests south of the Yarkon

The article summarizes the results of the study of the macrotoponyms ‘Zhetysu’ and ‘Semirechye’ (South-Eastern Kazakhstan) widely used in archaeological science and oriental studies since the second half of the 19th century up until the present time. The aim of the study is to advance the research on the clarification of the toponyms ‘Zhetysu’ and ‘Semirechye’ and to propose their proper use in the archaeological science. In this paper, we expand the range of the sources in order to verify the main provisions of the previous study on the materials of Kazakh folklore and literature of the 19th — early 20th c. The results of the focused study are the following: the term ‘Zhetysu’ originated in the end of the 18th — beginning of the 19th century, before its Russian translation as ‘Semirechye’. Initially, ‘Zhetysu’ denoted difficult sections of caravan roads in the north and south-east of Kazakhstan, along which Russia’s international trade with Middle Asia and China was carried out. The toponym ‘Semirechye’ appeared around 1825 and was first used as a geographical name of the Southern Balkhash region, and after the creation of the Semirechenskaya Oblast (1867) it designated its administrative-territorial boundaries. In the latter meaning, the toponym was used until the 1930s. Since the 1930s, A.N. Bernshtam, breaking with the historiographic tradition, introduced into scientific discourse an erroneously extended meaning of ‘Semirechye’, which includes the Chu-Talas interfluve. In the Kazakh folklore, the toponym ‘Zhetysu’ appeared not earlier than the last third of the 19th century, as the Kazakh translation of ‘Semirechye’ after creation of the Semirechenskaya Oblast. The lack of understanding by Kazakh authors of the concrete territorial boundaries of ‘Zhetysu’ makes the synonymous replacement of the toponym ‘Semirechye’ incorrect. The current administrative region of Zhetysu occupies a part of Semirechye, i.e., South-Eastern Kazakhstan, that includes only the territory north of the Ili River.

Abstract The Chinese nation has evolved through history and is inextricably linked with geographical factors. Since the inception of the concept of “Chinese nation” in the twentieth century, Chinese scholars have made significant contributions to understanding this concept from a historical geography perspective. This paper undertakes an examination and discussion of these contributions, highlighting three main aspects in which Chinese scholars in the twentieth century have significantly enhanced the concept of “Chinese nation” from a historical geography perspective: firstly, escaping the trap of “China Proper” and comprehensively understanding the Chinese nation from a geographical perspective; secondly, breaking the spatial barrier set up by the Great Wall, endowing the Chinese nation with a complete geographical space; thirdly, The Historical Atlas of China clarifying the connection between historical China and modern China, providing a comprehensive geographical basis for understanding the formation and development of the Chinese nation. The paper, contextualized within the historical backdrop, provides an analysis and discourse on these three aspects, indicating that the contributions of scholars in the twentieth century were instrumental in refining the concept of the Chinese nation from a historical geography perspective, illustrating the inseparable connection between nation and geography. Only through the organic integration of history, nation, and geography can we fully grasp the historical trajectory and geographical foundation of the Chinese nation.

This article seeks to explore past and present trends in the study of the Palestinian countryside, as reflected in Israeli and Arab-Palestinian scholarship about the Plain of Sharon—a key section of Palestine’s coastal plain. The article presents a detailed exposition of the different schools of thought, and by establishing the drawbacks of each school, it argues the need for an integrative approach to the subject and sources at hand. Scholars must therefore consider all the relevant primary sources and secondary literature. Furthermore, they should discuss their object of inquiry from both the perspective of the village and that of the region as a whole.Before 1948, Palestinians lived in a predominantly rural society. Therefore, a systematic treatment of the Palestinian countryside is vital for conducting any thorough discussion of the country’s history. Indeed, the social, economic, and demographic history of the Palestinian countryside during the Ottoman and British Mandate periods has received a significant scientific attention. Historians, archaeologists, anthropologists, sociologists, economists, demographers and material-culture researchers all long participated in a lively scholarly discourse in English, Hebrew, Arabic, Turkish, and more, mainly European languages. This attention reflects not only an interest in the ongoing Palestinian-Zionist conflict, but—more importantly—the accelerated pace of digitization of archival materials. The digital revolution, with the internet and social networks, removed previous political, geographical and financial barriers to scholarly exchange, and provided direct access to primary sources in various languages and from a wide variety of archival collections in Israel/Palestine and abroad.Jewish ethnographic accounts of the Palestinian countryside were inspired by everyday contacts with Palestinian society during the British Mandate period and influenced by available Western studies. Later, Zionist intelligence officers, like Ezra Danin, Tuvia Ashkenazi, and Ya‘akov Shimoni, documented land ownership patterns, structures of power and high politics for the purposes of the Jewish Yishuv. Following the establishment of the State of Israel, Israeli geographers like David Amiran, Yehuda Karmon and Gidon Golani of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, working in the service of the Israeli state planning apparatuses, presented a spatial perspective of the ‘Arab Village’. They utilized geographical tools and also based their work on field work and official statistics. Early Israeli scholarship about the ‘Arab village’ (Heb. Ha-kfar ha-‘Aravi) reflected Jewish perceptions of the Arab-Palestinian ‘Other’. More specifically, it embodied the ways in which Israeli scholars, most of whom of European origin, conceived the ‘Arab Village’ in light of general Orientalist perceptions of the East, and specific Zionist national preoccupations. Their studies of the ‘Arab village’ were motivated by the need to understand, to contain and to control Israel’s Arab citizenry. With few exceptions, early Jewish scholars like Karmon and Amiran regarded the ‘Arab village’ as an Oriental, traditional, backward, unorganized settlement form, constrained by the limitations of the environment. Jewish settlements, on the other hand, were hailed as a Western, modern, advanced, planned and prosperous settlement form, which overcame nature for the benefit of humanity.This dichotomy of settlement forms manifested Jewish ethnocentric, temporal and spatial conceptions about the Land of Israel (Heb. Eretz Israel), encoded in Zionist doctrine and praxis. Zionist scholars, officials and educators, formulated, in scholarly terms, a ‘Theory of Settlement Decline.’ For them, the perceived miserable condition of the ‘Arab Village’ proved the decline of the Land of Israel after the exile of the Jewish People. The previous condition of the country could only be reversed, they argued, by the return of the chosen people to their ancestral home.This narrative served to marginalize and de-legitimize traditional Arab forms of settlement, as well as ownership, possession and use of land. More severely, it served Israeli functionaries as justification for the appropriation of vast swaths of privately-owned Arab-Palestinian land for exclusive Jewish use. The importance that Israel’s state apparatus and the security establishment attached to this legitimizing work is evident in the material support they extended to researchers who carried out these studies on their behalf. This trend has diminished since the 1970s, especially because of the more scientifically rigorous and less ideologicallyminded scholarship of a new generation of geographers, led by David Grossman of Bar Ilan University, and fellow colleagues from Tel Aviv University and the University of Haifa.Arab-Palestinian scholarship, for its part, embodies a national discourse whose aim is to secure, perpetuate and confirm the Palestinian Right of Return, and to highlight the Arab-Palestinian character of the land against Israeli attempts to ‘Judiaize’ it. Arab-Palestinian scholarship focuses mainly on the socio-cultural aspects of individual villages, and pays little attention to the geographical, or wider regional, dimensions. In the hundreds of ‘village books’ written since the 1940s, the claim of Palestinian historical continuity and autochthonous existence since Canaanite times stands in sharp contrast to the more recent reported origin of village families from other parts of the Levant.Since the 1980s, Sharif Kana‘ana’s team scholars from Bir Zeit University, followed by their colleagues from Al-Najah University in Nablus, made an indispensable contribution to the understanding of the history of the Palestinian countryside. They were the first to make extensive use of previously untapped local and Ottoman sources, including the oral accounts of village residents. Later, Arab Palestinian residents of Israel, educated in Israeli universities, made steps towards bridging the gap between Palestinian and Israeli scholarship. They utilized their linguistical proficiencies and access to archives on both sides to present a more rigorous account on the history of the Palestinian countryside than ever before. The main gap between Israeli and Arab-Palestinian scholarship is thus an ideological one, a state worsened by the often selective and non-exhaustive use of different corpora of sources. Researchers are now able to re-evaluate existing scholarship in light of the new data as well as insights gleaned from archaeology, ethnography, the history of the Ottoman Empire, the history of nomadic societies, oral history, cartography and digital mapping (GIS studies), as discussed in the article.

The French anarchist geographer Élisée Reclus (1830–1905) dedicated several hundred pages to London. Addressing different audiences and adopting different tones accordingly, he produced travel guides, geographic treatises, and meditations (posthumously published) that recounted contemporary London in various ways. This article examines Reclus’s reflections on the city, serving as both a companion for Anglophone readers exploring Reclus’s work and an invitation to view London through new eyes—that is, those of a foreign traveller whose conflictual, yet affectional, relationship with London may still describe that of many today. As this article shows, globalisation, progress, environment, and social habits are recurrent themes in his accounts: at times they are approached with considerable scientific rigour, and at others, they immersed in a romantic indefiniteness articulated by way of a frenetic expressive tempo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental history contributes to historical geography in Quebec through the attention it pays to the spatial and material dimensions of the relationship between society and the environment. This contribution, which can be characterized by the term "environmental historical geography," can be seen in a series of works that enrich our understanding of the relationships between populations and their different milieux de vie, exemplified as forest, rural, and urban environments in this article. The use of digital tools, such as geohistorical information systems, and digitized sources, such as historical maps and survey archives, makes it possible to recast our understanding of the relationships between Quebec societies and their territories and to offer a geographical and ecological reinterpretation of historical problems. By jointly rethinking time and space with novel questions, methods, and theories, as well as sources recently revealed or digitized, environmental historical geography projects new intellectual niches to grasp the relationships between populations and their living environments. Messages clés: Les objets, les thématiques et les approches de recherche que se partagent l'histoire environnementale et la géographie historique rendent difficile tout travail de démarcation entre ces deux champs d'études.L'étude des dimensions matérielles et spatiales des rapports entre milieux de vie et populations en histoire environnementale contribue à la pratique de la géographie historique au Québec.Les méthodes de la géographie historique environnementale se sont enrichies de la numérisation de sources multiples et l'application d'outils numériques pour la spatialisation et la visualisation des données. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper makes an argument for a geography of girlhood, located at the intersection of historical geographies of globalisation and empire on the one hand, and feminist interventions in the geography of childhood and youth on the other. A focus on girlhood, I argue, opens up a debate on the discipline's own implication in a debate on climate science, moral hierarchies of civilisation and reproductive health at which intersection the category of 'girl' was materialised in the 19th century. This focus extends and historicises the argument made by scholars like Nicola Ansel that geographies of childhood speak not only to intimate scales of experience ‐ such as the home and neighbourhood—but instead suggest the ways in which everyday life is implicated in the scale of the global and the geopolitical. Drawing on an inter‐disciplinary scholarship, the paper argues that debates on gender and maturity—converging on the figure of the 'girl'—shaped raced and classed imaginaries of progress in the 19th and 20th centuries. Through this, the paper demonstrates that 'girlhood' is at the heart of historical geographies of urban planning, social care, and health, as well as indexing the continuities in the transition from a colonial discourse of civilisation to a mid‐20th century concern with development. Finally, the paper asks how to write about girls through an archive that is almost obsessively fixated on them as subjects of education and reform, even whilst they rarely appear in it as speaking subjects. I argue that both an emergent focus on non‐textual objects as sources, as well as the use of ephemeral material—including notes, creative writing exercises from the classroom, school diaries etc.—alongside the official archive might open the scholarship up to a multi‐scalar analysis of girlhood as imbricated in larger global and national discursive and material practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the increasingly diverse societal landscape in Greece for more than three decades within a context of migration, understandings of its fragile histories are still limited in shaping a sense of belonging that is open to 'otherness'. While Greek communities have utilised history as a pathway to maintain identity, other parallel histories and understandings do not resonate with 'Greekness' for most, such as the case of Greek Jewry. Critical historical perspectives can benefit from tracing 're-membering' as a feminist practice in the reassessment of societal values of inclusivity. Histories of violence and injustice can also include elements of 'difficult histories' and must be embraced to seek acknowledgement of these in promoting social change and cultural analysis for public humanities informing curation and curricula. Between eduscapes, art heritage spaces, an entry into contested and conflictual histories can expand a sense of belonging and the way we imagine our own connected histories with communities, place and nation. Greek Jews do not constitute a strong part of historical memory for Greeks in their past and present; in contrast to what is perceived as 'official' history, theirs is quite marginal. As a result, contemporary Greeks, from everyday life to academia, do not have a holistic understanding in relation to the identities of Jews in Greece, their culture or the Holocaust. Given the emergence of a new wave of artistic activism in recent years in response to the ever-increasing dominance of authoritarian neoliberalism, along with activist practices in the art field as undercurrents of resistance, in this intervention I bring together bodies of works to create a dialogic reflection with historical, artistic and feminist sources. In turn, the discussion then explores the spatiotemporal contestations of the historical geographies of Holocaust monuments in Greece. While interrogating historical amnesia, I endeavour to provide a space to engage with 'difficult histories' in their aesthetic context as a heritage of healing and social justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Nature's Ideological Landscape: A Literary and Geographic Perspective on its Development and Preservation on Denmark's Jutland Heath" by Kenneth Olwig is a highly regarded book in the field of landscape studies. It delves into the cultural and environmental histories of the agricultural heathlands of Jutland, exploring how these landscapes have been understood in terms of nature, culture, and nation. Olwig's humanistic approach to geography emphasizes the emotional and experiential aspects of landscapes, drawing on literary sources and historical narratives. While the book lacks explicit theoretical elaboration, it offers a comprehensive exploration of Western concepts of nature and the complexities of ideas surrounding landscape. [Extracted from the article]

In this 'Historical Geography at Large' review I recount my participation in an August 2023 summer school led by Professor Alan Lester at the University of Sussex, entitled 'How to talk about British colonialism in the middle of a culture war'. The workshop encouraged the participation of non-academics who desired greater knowledge of the British empire and its legacies, to help them negotiate contemporary debates over race, slavery, colonialism, and national identity. I recount the two days of lectures and debate led by Lester, as well as a day-long walking tour of London, where we discussed contentious statues and the even more contentious interior of the government's Commonwealth, Foreign and Development Office building. These generative encounters present an activist and participatory form of historical geography at large. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how early Cold War anti-communism transformed labor processes at the Port of Manila. In 1950 the threat of communism at the city's port gained the attention of the highest reaches of the US State Department. Shifting diplomatic discourses and a changing Cold War map imbued new meaning into trade union racketeering and Filipino dockworkers who were, it was dubiously argued, on the verge of joining the country's communists. Through archival analysis of diplomatic dispatches, intelligence reports, and newspaper sources, this article examines a series of spectacular events and covert political diplomacy. In particular it explains how an American Jesuit priest in Manila earned the trust of the State Department and played an outsized role in remaking pier-side labor politics. As concern grew in Washington, American diplomats covertly intervened to back the priest. In detailing how the piers staged global geopolitics, the article also situates these affairs in local political contexts to argue for a more nuanced understanding of anti-communism in Southeast Asia. Filipino trade union leaders and government officials colluded with but also subverted and remade American discourses and diplomacy to their own political and economic advantage. • Traces the shifting geographies of anti-communism in Manila during the early Cold War. • Examines the role of American government officials in reshaping Filipino trade union politics. • Contributes to studies of Manila's historical geographies and labor histories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is an attempt to understand a mesh of complex relationships among tangible and intangible socio-economic factors that turned a desert city into the headquarters of one of the mighty polities in the Middle East in the fourteenth century CE. This paper argues that proto-industrialization led to the growth of 'virtual water' that helped the city of Yazd, in central Iran, to break free from its water limitation for the first time in its history. Yazd was almost absent in history until the twelfth century, as a peripheral oasis whose sparse population lived off subsistence agriculture irrigated by qanat systems (groundwater-mining subterranean channels). Following the Mongol invasion in the thirteenth century, the influx of landless refugees changed the relations of production and paved the way for proto-industrialization whose development hinged on skill and capital rather than water and land. Sufism and waqf (endowment tradition) contributed to the expansion of trading routes that facilitated the mobility of goods and people. The qanats were urbanized, and Yazd became an industrial hub where raw materials were processed into tradable products with considerable value added. This paper contributes to a broader understanding of the historical geography of the arid Middle East. • The Iranian city of Yazd rode out the Mongol invasion in the thirteenth century. • A surge of refugees upset the balance between population and agricultural resources. • Abundance of skilled workers led to a Middle Eastern mode of proto-industrialization. • Proto-industrialization engendered virtual water as an adaptation strategy. • Virtual water made a transition to a non-hydraulic society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wetland reclamation was an intrinsic part of nineteenth-century global agricultural transformations. In Swedish research, reclamation has mainly been situated in larger general processes of population rise, commercialization and societal/technological development. The intersection of reclamation, physical environments and local economies has seldom been studied in detail. This paper conducts a local analysis of nineteenth-century wetland reclamation in two parishes in Sweden, Knätte and Mörlunda, through combining a study of specific reclamation processes with an analysis of local agrarian-economic development. The results show that these processes varied depending on specific historical-geographical circumstances. In Knätte, reclamation was not primarily related to population rise, but to increasing commercialization during the period. The case in Mörlunda instead shows how reclamation was first a response to increasing population but later developed into a project of agricultural market adaptation. In both cases, the physical environment led to varying degrees of geographic constraint in the process. In combination, these results point to the importance of detailed case studies in nuancing our understanding of nineteenth-century wetland reclamation both in Sweden and internationally. • Local factors are important for nuancing general trends in wetland reclamation. • In Sweden, population rise and commercialization are considered primary drivers. • The active drivers vary between the compared cases, depending on context. • Reclamation was primarily a part of local agrarian developments. • Wider relations of the local economy, for example through trade, also impacted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite human geography's sophisticated analyses and overwhelming focus on space, time in its various guises has certainly not been absent in the literature. The same cannot be said for historical geography, which is particularly interesting as its main concern is purportedly with space and place in and across other times. In response, this paper examines the ontology and epistemology of time in "modern" historical geography since the early 2000s and does so in discussion with recent developments in theory and philosophy of history, specifically the notion of 'new presentism'. An idea which broadly posits that the past and the future do not exist as separate categories but are always projections of specific presents, they exist as the present's own immanent modes. This is achieved by adopting Robert Dodgshon's concept of the 'specious present' in order to (1) affirm, albeit on different epistemological grounds, the partiality, situatedness and contingency of historical geographies as well as the embodied and performative nature of archival labour; (2) offer an accessible conceptual tool in thinking about the role of time in the practice of future historical geography research; and finally (3) suggest that thinking historical geography as a practice in and through the 'specious present' makes questions of ethics, accountability, and politics of knowledge production both central and inevitable, as opposed to just being examples of "good practice" or worse still, being completely sidestepped by virtue of an imagined spatio-temporal distance between the bygone past and the present moment of research. • Examines the ontology and epistemology of time in the subdiscipline of human geography. • Provides an explanation for the field's lack of engagement with time in its investigations. • Offers a onto-epistemic framework for incorporating the specious present in historical-geographical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the Linguistic Survey of India (LSI), a monumental exercise supervised by George Grierson to survey and classify the languages of colonial India. It considers why the LSI developed into an atypical scheme that corresponded with a multiethnic and multinational network of officials and scholars to survey India's languages. It makes the case that the networked practice of surveying was reciprocated at different scales, from localised linguistic surveys in districts and princely states to gather information and specimens, to a loosely governed transnational exercise involving Indians and Europeans to edit, review and publish results. The paper argues that the LSI's scalar geographies were negotiated by Grierson and, more importantly, his assistant Gauri Kant Roy and demonstrates that scale, as an analytic or process, was not an abstraction or predetermined for those entangled in the LSI's survey of India's languages. • Examines the Linguistic Survey of India from a historical geography perspective. • Highlights the LSI's uniqueness as a colonial Indian survey. • Draws on underutilised materials from National Archives of India. • Proposes a scalar and networked approach to the history of science and surveying. • Emphasises the significance of Gauri Kant Roy and various Indian surveyors in shaping India's linguistic geography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Copyright of Ortaçağ Araştırmaları Dergisi (OAD) is the property of Ortacag Arastirmalari Dergisi (OAD) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

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The Bronze Age Harappan Civilisation thrived between 2600 BCE and 1900 BCE in the northwestern part of the Indian Subcontinent. The Harappans established robust interregional trade networks, efficiently managing procurement and distribution across various regions. Water transport was crucial to these trade activities, offering a cost-effective and faster means of transportation. This was particularly important in the Kachchh region, where the unique geographical features favoured waterborne trade. Extensive maritime routes allowed the Harappans to expand their trade pursuits to distant regions such as Mesopotamia, the Persian Gulf, and the Arabian Peninsula. The intercultural trade and exchange were facilitated by a series of settlements on the Kachchh coast, prominent among them being Dholavira, Shikarpur, Bagasra, Kanmer, Surkotada and sites on the Makran coast. By incorporating satellite data, on-site observations and existing literature, the present study reinvestigates Lothal, an important Harappan port town and production hub, including its adjoining region. This paper explores the contemporary and historical geography of the region, focusing on the Harappan maritime routes that were once active but have become entirely defunct due to geomorphic and climatic changes. The analysis identifies three major navigable waterways: the shallow inland water route through the Nal Corridor connecting Lothal to the Little Rann of Kachchh, offering a much shorter and safer path to Harappan sites north of Lothal; the riverine route through the Sabarmati River, leading to Aravalli and the eastern hinterland; and the sea route through the Gulf of Khambhat to the south, providing access to the Ratanpur-Rajpipla mines. This suggested that Lothal was strategically positioned at the intersection of these routes during the Harappan Period, demonstrating the Harappans' advanced geographic knowledge. The results highlight the dynamic nature of procurement and distribution networks and the pivotal role of Lothal and its surrounding landscape in facilitating direct or indirect interregional and intercultural economic exchanges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Olga Petri's book, "Places of Tenderness and Heat: The Queer Milieu of Fin-de-Siècle St. Petersburg," explores the queer historical geography of pre-revolutionary Russia. Petri examines the engagement of queer men with urban spaces and the negotiation between authorities and those who desired queer sex. The book draws upon an archive of sources, including policing records, local administration documents, sanitation reports, and journalism, as well as extracts from the diary of queer novelist and composer Mikhail Kuzmin. Petri argues that the urban geography of St. Petersburg, along with the city's attempts to modernize and discipline its spaces, played a significant role in shaping a queer milieu. While the book offers valuable insights, it misses opportunities for engagement with existing historical scholarship. [Extracted from the article]

"The Ancient Israelite World," edited by Kyle H. Keimer and George A. Pierce, is a comprehensive volume that explores various aspects of ancient Israel. It covers topics such as historical geography, material culture, society and economy, language, religion, and the relationship between Israel and neighboring nations. The book provides a valuable resource for understanding ancient Israel from an interdisciplinary and theoretical framework. This article critiques the use of certain terminologies in the book and highlights the absence of discussions on patron-client relationships and postcolonial criticism. However, it acknowledges the volume as an impressive scholarly product that provides a comprehensive analysis of the ancient Israelite world from a material culture perspective. [Extracted from the article]

Joseph Besson's 1660 account of Jesuit missions in Syria offers a rare glimpse into the region's cultural landscape from the perspective of French Jesuits living among diverse communities of Jews, Christians (Greek-Orthodox and Catholic), and Muslims. Drawing on unpublished Jesuit relations from 1625 to 1659 and an unsigned map of Syria, this article explores Besson's portrayal of Greater Syria, a region encompassing modern-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, and western Jordan, within the Ottoman empire. A detailed analysis reveals that the map is likely an original Jesuit creation, highlighting how Jesuit spirituality influenced their interpretation of physical spaces. Furthermore, the study illuminates the Jesuits' role in shaping European views of the Orient and the Holy Land, contributing to the early development of Orientalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neighborhood characteristics including housing status can profoundly influence health. Recently, increasing attention has been paid to present-day impacts of "redlining," or historic area classifications that indicated less desirable (redlined) areas subject to decreased investment. Scholarship of redlining and health is emerging; limited guidance exists regarding optimal approaches to measuring historic redlining in studies of present-day health outcomes. We evaluated how different redlining approaches (map alignment methods) influence associations between redlining and health outcomes. We first identified 11 existing redlining map alignment methods and their 37 logical extensions, then merged these 48 map alignment methods with census tract life expectancy data to construct 9696 linear models of each method and life expectancy for all 202 redlined cities. We evaluated each model's statistical significance and R2 values and compared changes between historical and contemporary geographies and populations using Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE). RMSE peaked with a normal distribution at 0.175, indicating persistent difference between historical and contemporary geographies and populations. Continuous methods with low thresholds provided higher neighborhood coverage. Weighting methods had more significant associations, while high threshold methods had higher R2 values. In light of these findings, we recommend continuous methods that consider contemporary population distributions and mapping overlap for studies of redlining and health. We developed an R application {holcmapr} to enable map alignment method comparison and easier method selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review departs from the perception that children's geographies are theoretically 'stuck', by showing how the field's growing decolonial scholarship pushes its boundaries. Decoloniality involves delinking from Western constructs and developing pluralistic theoretical frameworks firmly grounded in the realities of marginalised childhoods. Organised around the themes of decolonial theory, praxis, and conceptualisations of childhood, the review focuses on embracing historical geographies of non-Western childhoods, developing relational and place-based methodologies, centring on childhoods on the margins of global knowledge production, addressing the interlinked marginalisation of children through colonial violence and adult dominance, and challenging the Anglo-centric modes of academic publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the little-studied period between the 30th and 38th years of King Samsu-iluna's reign in Babylon (1720-1712 BCE). The author examines the year names of Samsu-iluna and their context, shedding new light on Babylonian policies and history during this transitional period. The article also discusses the scarcity of available texts from this time period and their provenance in Sippar and Pī-Kasî. This document contains a list of various tablets and inscriptions from ancient Mesopotamia, specifically from the reign of King Samsu-iluna. The tablets and inscriptions provide valuable insights into the architectural activities and royal patronage during this period. This document contains a list of texts from different locations, including Sippar and Pī-Kasī, that mention King Samsu-iluna. The texts describe various events, such as the destruction of walls, the defeat of towns, and the overthrow of troops. The texts also mention the strength and heroism given to King Samsu-iluna by his king Enlil. The document provides valuable information for researchers studying the reign of King Samsu-iluna and the historical events of that time. This text provides information about King Samsu-iluna and his reign in ancient Mesopotamia. After his 30th regnal year, Samsu-iluna lost control over territories in the south to the Sealand Dynasty. However, [Extracted from the article]

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This study is focused on topography and its changing role in determining urban environments. An increasing indifference and neglect towards topography in urban planning practices has recently been observed, and this trend can also be seen in Ankara's urbanization process. The current state of the city, in terms of its unique topography and related waterscape, represents a disconnection from the built environment. In this context, one of the primary objectives of this study is to investigate the process of urbanization within the framework of physical, cultural, and historical topography. The capacity of topography to define both a place and its transformation is examined through the selected area of Karakusunlar, Ankara, and its surroundings. The conducted research on the Karakusunlar area, which represents the distinctive landform character of Ankara, analyzes the geographical, spatial, and cultural transformation of the district, as well as its urbanization, from the 1930s onwards. It is crucial to investigate the history of the site and related experiences in order to comprehend the physical and cultural transformation of topography. The traces left by geography in collective memory are significant layers in terms of how they were used and what meaning they have for locals during different time periods. In this context, this is a field study of Karakusunlar based on findings from historical maps and semi-structured in-depth interviews with individuals who have lived in the area. The main areas that the field study focuses on are landforms, water elements of the area, interventions made to these elements, the spatial attributes of these interventions, the interpretation of place identity based on toponyms, and the mapping of the topographical and spatial transformational process in the Karakusunlar area.

The Great Oak Forest (Arabic: al-ghaba) was one of the most prominent features of the landscape of the Sharon plain in the Ottoman period. Large swaths of woodland consisting mainly of Tabor oak trees (Quercus ithaburensis) covered the area between the Yarkon and Hadera rivers. Western travelers and scholars who witnessed the forest in the 19thcentury saw in it a testament to the region’s Christian past, such as the glorious victory of Richard the Lionheart in the Battle of Arsuf (1191). However, by the end of the 19th century the last remnants of the forest had been felled. Early Israeli scholars such as Ze'ev Vilnai and Yehuda Ziv, who did not witness the forest with their own eyes, regarded its existence as proof of the decline of habitation in the area, following the end of Jewish settlement and the Muslim conquests. In the Ariel Encyclopedia, Vilnai declared that "with the destruction of the land, the Sharon was also destroyed ...", while following the renewed Jewish settlement, "desolate areas were covered with fields and orchards."The article presents the forest as a natural resource distributed among the highland villages to meet the needs of their expanding population. Using local sources in Arabic and Ottoman Turkish, and a reassessment of Western sources, it traces the diverse interactions that took place between the forest and the developing Arab settlement. The article makes use of visual sources, written evidence and oral history to describe and explain the ghābat system in the forest areas, which was the culmination of the spatial planning of the rural population in Jabal Nablus during the late Ottoman period.Furthermore, the article settles a long-standing controversy over the boundaries of the forest and its characteristics in the 1870s. An analysis of the field charts in the Palestine Exploration Fund’s Survey of Western Palestine prepared using Spatial Geographic Information Systems (GIS) shows that the actual woodlands were, by then, restricted to the area between present-day Even Yehuda and Kefar Yona. Lastly, the article suggests that the clearing of the forest by the local population was a double-edged sword: it allowed for the expansion of agricultural cultivation, while also leading to severe ecological problems such as soil depletion and soil erosion, which were felt in full severity at the beginning of the Jewish colonization of the Sharon.

The Military Survey of Scotland (1747-1755) was an influential document in the history of cartography. Commissioned in response to the last Jacobite Rebellion (1745-1746), it systemized cartography in the United Kingdom and across the British Empire. Researched from primary sources and existing literature, this paper emphasizes the importance of the survey in increasing the number of surveys and maps produced in the British Empire, creating a "family" of maps in places as distant as Ireland, British North America, and India. The most important legacy was the creation of the Ordnance Survey in 1791, due to the efforts of William Roy, the lead engineer on the Military Survey of Scotland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims at calling geographers' attention to the works of Italian historical demographer Massimo Livi Bacci, who authored fundamental texts on the indigenous genocide in the Americas, on the history of world population, on global migrations and on population's environmental 'sustainability'. In denouncing colonial crimes, critically questioning commonplaces of Malthusian origin and challenging sovereignist prejudices against migrations, Livi Bacci stresses the need for scholars to fully address the complex relations between space and population in both analyses of empirical cases and elaborations of broader theoretical models. He explicitly raises geopolitical matters on the potential political consequences of demographic and migratory dynamics. Yet, Livi Bacci's huge scholarly production is highly influential among historians and demographers, but seems to have been overlooked by most geographers hitherto. For these reasons, I argue that scholars committed to critical, radical and decolonial geographies of population (past and present) should (re)discover Livi Bacci's contributions. Re‐reading Livi Bacci's works through geographical lenses and connecting them with current geographical scholarship, I show how 'geo‐demography' can help geographers to address demographic matters at different scales, by providing insights for a new critical geo‐history of population. This interdisciplinary engagement with the relations between geopolitical matters on sustainability and the ongoing changing in global population has the potential to plurally nourish critical geographical agendas, including on global migrations and colonial legacies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the use of emancipatory research principles in archival research and contends with the suitability of academic conventions that characterise ethical practice when the research goal is to elevate the voices of marginalised historical groups. Drawing on a case study of Le Court Cheshire Home, England (1948–1975) to address a critical gap in the literature, I highlight some ethical dilemmas I encountered when working at the nexus of historical geography and geographies of disability. This paper demonstrates what an emancipatory research approach means for an archival study of disability, using examples to illustrate how ethical decisions impacted all stages of the research design and the write‐up of findings. I argue that ethics should not be envisaged solely as an approval process completed at the project's outset. Rather, the explorative nature of archival research necessitates that ethics should be an iterative undertaking, with archival sources having the potential to shape both the content and conduct of the research. The paper uses a case study of Le Court Cheshire Home to explore research ethics and the applicability of emancipatory research principles for an archival study of disability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jews and geography have been inextricably related for millennia. This paper examines the importance of geographic analysis in fostering an understanding of contemporary Jewry by employing geographic concepts and methods that illuminate our understanding of American Jewry. Topics covered include Jewish identity studies completed for academic journals and local Jewish community studies completed for planning in the Jewish community. It highlights some methodological contributions, including the development of a community level data set, the Decade 2000 data set, and the Century 21 data set. Also, it presents the use of distinctive Jewish names (DJNs) for examining the historical geography of a Jewish community and for selecting the best location for a facility. Several maps are shown that illustrate the importance of cartographic analysis in understanding American Jews. It shows how a geographer's "touch" has enhanced the utility of the US Jewish population chapter in the American Jewish Year Book. Finally, it connects an interest in completing academically-sound research that can improve American Jewish communities, with a plea for doing so while remaining a neutral provider of facts rather than an advocate for any particular programs in the Jewish community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the concept of "SIGuache," which combines geographic information systems (GIS) with the Chicano aesthetic practice of "rasquache." It discusses how businesses in the Spanish-speaking borderlands of the United States used spatial narratives and local community knowledge to advertise in Spanish-language newspapers during the 19th century. The authors argue that SIGuache challenges the top-down approach of GIS and offers a more inclusive and community-centered approach to digital mapping. The article also discusses the concept of rasquachismo and its application in various contexts, including academia and migration. It raises questions about how to map Brownness and emphasizes the interconnectedness of different forms of difference. The text also explores the relationship between SIGuache and Indigenous mapping, highlighting the differences between the two approaches and the challenges of translating Indigenous knowledge. It acknowledges the complexity of Indigenous mapping and refrains from declaring SIGuache as capable of mapping Brownness on its own. [Extracted from the article]

This paper examines the socio-ecological implications of reindeer-caribou hybridization during the rise and collapse of the reindeer industry in Alaska. Following their introduction in the late nineteenth century, reindeer populations increased dramatically as herds spread throughout the territory. As populations increased, domesticated reindeer often escaped from their herds and ran off with migratory caribou. By the 1920s, Alaskan wildlife managers and scientists came to view feral reindeer as a form of biological pollution and a threat to the health and purity of the region's wild caribou. Despite divergent evolutionary histories, reindeer and caribou are related at the subspecies level and can interbreed to produce hybridized offspring. I argue that managerial anxieties about reindeer-caribou hybridization were bound up with broader concerns regarding race and related efforts to protect ostensibly pure spaces of wilderness and nature. Throughout the paper, I consider managerial attempts to mitigate reindeer-caribou hybridization in northern Alaska, which included the demarcation and reinforcement of conceptual and spatial boundaries between wild and domesticated forms of life. However, between the late nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries, feral reindeer and hybridized caribou repeatedly demonstrated the violability of the biological categories and conceptual boundaries that wildlife managers employed as they sought to order life on the northern tundra. • Considers the historical geography of reindeer-caribou hybridization in northern Alaska. • Demonstrates that managerial anxiety about hybridization was connected to concerns about race. • Shows how managerial responses to hybridization shaped the geographies of wilderness in Alaska. • Develops a spatial historical approach to science, environment, and conservation in Alaska. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article develops a dual analysis of commemoration in Wales and Trinidad that extends outwards from a monument in the Welsh town of Carmarthen to Lieutenant General Sir Thomas Picton, the most senior officer to die at the battle of Waterloo and an aggressive imperialist who has since been accused of committing crimes against humanity in the name of the British Empire. Using torture and public executions to control the enslaved population of Trinidad during his term as military Governor of Trinidad between 1797 and 1803, Picton accumulated great personal wealth through ownership of slaves and plantations. The article seeks to extend emerging scholarly analysis of commemorative activism and, specifically, the application of memorial publics to a contemporary Caribbean context. Archival research on the history of the Picton monument from regional archives in Carmarthen and national archive collections in Aberystwyth is connected to data from contemporary interviews with activists and public officials in Wales and Trinidad and Tobago as well as detail from public surveys, audits, and policy reviews concerning commemoration in the public realm. Despite wavering public support since its first iteration in 1828, Carmarthen's Picton monument has endured to become an important social arena for reckoning with British colonial violence as demands for its removal in Wales has helped initiate Picton-related decolonising efforts in Trinidad and Tobago producing memorial publics that are variously confined and extended. • Develops an historical geography of a monument to Thomas Picton in Carmarthen. • Provides a dual analysis of commemoration in Wales and Trinidad. • Extends the concept of memorial public. • Details how memorial publics are confined and expanded in commensurate efforts to decolonise public space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines public attitudes towards communist monuments as part of the contentious heritage of totalitarianism in post-communist Bulgaria from the 1990s to the present. Its main goals are, first, to analyse the place of political monuments as political subjects of social change during the Bulgarian transition from a totalitarian to a democratic society; second, to study the monuments as 'realms of memory' within the changes of collective memory in the post-communist period. The research combines the approaches of political (social) anthropology, cultural anthropology and historical geography. Exploring political subcultures, it investigates ex-communist and anti-communist activities regarding the future of totalitarian monuments. The research is focused on two urban landmarks in Sofia: the Mausoleum of the communist leader Georgi Dimitrov, and the Monument to the Soviet Army. • Communist monuments in Bulgaria are functioning realms of memory. • The communist monuments aid the collective memory of the totalitarian past. • There is an ongoing reinterpretation of communist monuments in Bulgarian society. • Among the general population, practicality replaces ideology when considering the fate of the communist monuments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is a component in health administration or healthcare management programs and their curricula, there are many barriers to the successful integration of these concepts in institutions of higher education. Voluntary, engaging, and enjoyable activities can minimize barriers to teaching and advancing DEI. This article describes an activity that can strengthen DEI competencies among higher education faculty and staff in an academic department. A DEI-focused experiential learning experience was created by developing a departmental social event during Black history month (February 2022). Specifically, this group activity included touring relevant local historic sites, visiting a museum focused on DEI issues, and patronizing several Black-owned local businesses. These activities fostered team building, organic discussions of DEI issues, awareness of local DEI history, and overall civic mindfulness. Most survey respondents gained a deeper understanding of the concepts related to racial equity (77.8%), were more confident about discussing racial equity within the African American community (77.8%), and recommended the event as an ongoing organization-wide activity (88.9%). Participants enjoyed the event and found it valuable to engage with colleagues, support Black-owned businesses, learn about local Black history, and build a foundation to promote DEI-reflective classrooms. A similar learning experience could be replicated in other academic programs and expanded to focus on other DEI topics including, but not limited to culture, ethnicity, religion, ability, and/or sexual orientation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the recurring issue of water shortages and droughts at the Panama Canal, which has led to restrictions on ship traffic and disruptions to global trade. The construction and expansion of the canal, along with the increase in maritime traffic, have contributed to this problem. The article challenges the narrative of the canal as a triumph of human conquest over nature, highlighting the negative environmental consequences and the displacement of marginalized communities. It emphasizes the need to understand the complex relationship between infrastructure, water supply, and socioeconomic demand in order to address the issue effectively. [Extracted from the article]