The Dictionary of Human Geography

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the spread of the Internet, have both altered

the geographical experience of time and argu-

ably led to new geographical realities. To some

extent irrespective of geographical location,

the experience of simultaneity may be shared

by people living in most ‘core’ urban areas

of the world – and is used by stock market

traders on a 24/7 basis to further their eco-

nomic gains. us

Suggested reading

Adam (2006); May and Thrift (2001).

time-geography An approach to human

geographytreatingtime andspaceasre-

sourcesdirectly involved in the constitution

of social life. It was developed by the Swedish

geographer Torsten Ha ̈gerstrand and his asso-

ciates at the University of Lund during the

1960s and 1970s (Ha ̈gerstrand and

Lenntorp, 1974). Time-geography is not sup-

posed to be a theory, but rather anonto-

logical contribution focusing on how

different phenomena are mutually modified

because they coexist in time and space. As

such, Ha ̈gerstrand attributed a certainnatur-

alismto the approach, characterizing it as a

‘topoecology’ designated to grasp a society–

nature–technology constellation. He acknow-

ledged an affinity withphenomenologybut

still argued for a physical approach to the so-

cial world (Ha ̈gerstrand, 1982).

Time-geography was developed in relation

to empirical work and an intensive involvement

in Swedish planning. Its basic element is con-

nections between continuous trajectories of

individual entities in time–space. From these,

descriptive concepts were developed, such as

paths,stations,projects,prisms,time–space bundles

and time–space domains. They constitute a

world view on the human condition stating

that everybody is subject to confinement in

time–space within the limits formed by the

bounded capacity of individuals to engage in

more than one task at a time, by the speeds at

which it is possible to move and assemble indi-

viduals, tools and materials, and by regulations

of access and modes of conduct within do-

mains of local order. Most well-known is the

translation of this view into a non-linguistic

notation system representingpossibleconfigur-

ations in time–space (see figure). It proved a

useful tool in planning and was heavily used

also in earlyfeminist geographiesof time–

space constraints in women’s everyday life.

While time-geography’s representational po-

tential is widely acknowledged, its metaphysical

basis has been severely criticised. Two streams

of criticism have prevailed. One points to a

problematic relationship tosocial theory,

and especially how the naturalism or ‘physical-

ism’ of the approach leads to a defective con-

ception of human thought-and-action and

erodes the possibility of developing a social

understanding of time–space (Gregory,

1985). The other line of criticism charges

time-geography with masculinism (Rose,

1993). It regards time-geography as a visual

strategy that renders space objective and trans-

parent (seevision and visuality). Further-

more, the moving bodies of time-geography

are seen as ‘imaginary bodies’; ‘universal’ and

deprived of social and cultural markings of

‘race’,genderandsexuality.

Some geographers have sought to develop

more socialized versions of time-geography.

In the 1980s, these attempts often relied

upon a convergence withstructuration the-

ory. Perhaps the most prominent of these

attempts came from Allan Pred (e.g. 1986),

who studied agrarian and urban change in

nineteenth-century Sweden as an interaction

between social restructuring, everyday rou-

tines and the production of meaning. Since

the 1980s interest in time-geography has been

renewed on two levels. First, its descriptive

capacity has been developed through GIS-

based technologies and 3-D visualizations

of human activity patterns. Second, Ha ̈ger-

strand’s emphasis on encountering, events

time-geography Ha ̈gerstrand’s web model

Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_T Final Proof page 756 31.3.2009 9:40pm Compositor Name: ARaju

TIME-GEOGRAPHY