Human and physical geography: can we learn something from the history of their relations?

Abstract

A short overview of the history of academic geography since the 19th century shows that there has never been a unity of physical and human geography in the past, at least in the form that is strived for today to justify the relevance of geography in coping with the present problems faced by humanity. But the fact that the limits of positivism start to be recognized in physical geography opens a way to collaboration for addressing the pressing problems affecting our planet today. The paper ends with some examples of how such a collaboration might look like and advocates greater attention to a political chorological approach, concentrating on the diversity of regions in the world, by taking both their internal and external relationships in terms of power structures into account.

Keywords

• human geography
• physical geography
• chorology
• postpositivism