The Dictionary of Human Geography

Comp. by: LElumalai Stage : Revises1 ChapterID: 9781405132879_4_R Date:2/4/09
Time:21:12:28 Filepath:H:/00_Blackwell/00_3B2/Gregory-9781405132879/appln/3B2/re-
vises/9781405132879_4_R-new.3d

Few have disagreed, for example, that every

pinpoint on the surface of the Earth is unique:

the problem lies in looking past the uniqueness

of mere points to say something of note about

geographically boundedassemblagesand dis-

tinctions and relations among assemblages

(see alsoidiographic). From this perspective,

the artefactuality of regions is not that they

are insubstantial (few geographers would claim

that they are pureabstractions) so much as

their definition demands disregarding certain

details. The region in this sense is a ‘way of

seeing’ that which exists, a device for organiz-

ing thought about the world; it is also, of

course, the focus ofregional geography.

The above ideas have given rise to a set

of specific terms used to describe regions of

different kinds (see Grigg, 1965).Formalor

uniform regionsare areas defined by one or

more of the features that occur within them;

for example, a region of Catalan-language spe-

akers or a mining region in some part of the

world where mining dominates the economy.

Formal/uniform regions are interpretive

devices that some geographers have used to

make sense of a fundamentally heterogeneous

world. There are no purely objective meas-

ures, therefore, that dictate what proportion

of Catalan speakers in an area make it a

Catalan-speaking region. Nor are there uni-

versally agreed criteria about what would

define a mining region – The proportion of

mine workers to non-mine workers? Income

generated by mining compared with non-

mining income? The land area covered by

mines? Criteria are set according to the pur-

poses of designating such a mining (or

Catalan-speaking) region at all. Thefunctional

ornodal regionis a geographically delimited

spatial system defined by the linkages binding

particular phenomena in that area. Which

phenomena? It depends on what kind of sys-

tem we are interesting in knowing about. The

paradigmatic example is the urban region, in

which there is posited a spatially delimited

network of transactions (e.g. trading) centring

on an urban core, or central place, and spread-

ing out into and functionally incorporating an

urban periphery or hinterland. (The func-

tional region bears a resemblance to the core

and periphery ofworld systems theory, and

shares some of its criticisms too.) A number of

other regional terms have been experimented

with, especially in the first half of the twentieth

century: single- and multiple-feature regions,

natural regions,cultural regions,genericandspe-

cific regions, and so on. Thegenealogyof the

region concept links it to related terms such as

the Frenchpays. Most of these terms are not

used with particular fervour any more, at least

not in a disciplining defining sense, but the

region nonetheless remains a core concept.

Certainly, it has played a central role in sutur-

ing the different realms ofhuman geography

andphysical geography. And it remains a

generative force in thegeographical imagin-

ation (Hart, 1982; Pudup, 1988; McGee,

1991; Paasi, 2003).

The region is also an embattled concept, as

Grigg (1965) pointed out several decades ago.

Features that may stand in geographical rela-

tion to each other rarely spatially co-vary

exactly. The grouping of different phenomena

together and the drawing of boundaries

around them are therefore by no means

obvious. (Althoughboundarymapping has

spawned a great deal of research, using the

quantifying tools of descriptive statistics,

factor analysis, and most recentlygeographic

information science.) There is the question

too of whether the region is too static a con-

cept, insufficiently attuned to change in the

world, and whether regions have been under-

stood too much in geographical isolation from

the world. Grigg took these criticisms to mean

that the region, especially its use bygeog-

raphy, needs always to be understood as a

means to an end and not an end in itself (cf.

Hartshorne, 1939). The point of ‘doing’ the

region is not ultimately to divide the world

intoregionsandrest content. It is rather, if

one wishes, to engage in classifying and

modelling geographical phenomena so as to

generate questions about their variability and

functioning with respect to other phenomena.

Indeed, for Grigg, whose essay appeared in a

seminal text of thequantitative revolution,

the regionisamodel.

In the 1980s and 1990s, some geographers

proposed to solve the problem of the region by

reframing the terms of study and ushering in

a ‘new regional geography’ (e.g. Pudup, 1988;

Thrift, 1994b; cf. Gregory, 1982). Spurred on

by an interest instructuration theory,social

theory,political economy and locality

studies, the goal was to see the region as a

medium and outcome of social practices and

relations of power that are operative at multiple

spatial and temporal scales, among which the

region might serve as a kind of fix. There was

also in the new regional geography an explicit

critique of an insufficiently spatialized social

theory and political economy. There has been

some debate as to whether the new regional

geography misconstrued the concept and uses

of the region during its heyday before the

Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_R-new Final Proof page 631 2.4.2009 9:12pm

REGION