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Gender and Mobility in the Middle East

"The adult daughter of Dubai’s ruler tried to escape a life of stultifying restrictions. She was captured at sea, forcibly taken back, and has not been heard from since. For all its megamalls, haute cuisine and dizzying skyscrapers, Dubai can flip at speed from international playground to repressive police state."

Source: www.nytimes.com

Both of these particular case studies are incredibly interesting but I want to talk about how this is connected to a larger cultural and political issue: that of female mobility in Persian Gulf countries.  The ability to move freely without familial supervision or approval is something that adults in most countries take for granted, but that is not the case in some countries in the Middle East.  How we experience place is dependent of our mobility—this is why there is no one singular geography or story of any given place, but there are many geographies that help to explain a place.  The story of the ‘vanished princess’ of Dubai and the woman seeking a divorce but trapped by her family cast a different light on the glamorous and glitzy reputation of the United Arab Emirates.    

 

GeoEd Tags: culture, cultural norms, gender, mobility, UAE, MiddleEast, political.

Scoop.it Tags: culture, cultural norms, gender, mobility, UAE, MiddleEast, political.

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Why Asia is the center of the world again

"Asians don’t think of themselves as Asian, but as the new Silk Roads re-emerge and propel Asia to the center of the world economy, Asians are rediscovering their greatness and forging a new Asian identity for the 21st century."

Source: www.youtube.com

When discussing global economic growth, it is impossible not to mention Asia. Parag Khanna is the author of the book, The Future is Asian, and in this TED talk he highlights how Asia is growing.  More importantly, he looks at how discrete Asian cultures are becoming more intermixed as the economic infrastructure of Asia becomes increasingly interconnected (a summary article is titled, We are all Asians Now).  His 2009 TED talk, Mapping the Future of Countries, about border conflicts, is an APHG classic.       

 

GeoEd Tags: regions, political, globalization, culture, economic, TED, video.

Scoop.it Tags: regions, political, globalization, culture, economic, TED, video.

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How an emerging African megacity cut commutes by two hours a day

The next 15 megacities #2: Could Dar es Salaam’s experiment with Africa’s first ‘gold standard’ bus rapid transit system offer an alternative to a future dependent on private cars?

Source: www.theguardian.com

This is a good article about the critical nature of transportation infrastructure to a growing city in the developing world.  More important than this one article, I want to highlight the entire Guardian series entitled "The Next 15 Megacities." 

In 1975 there were only 3 megacities (cities population over 10 million) in the world.  Today there are 33 megacities and by 2035, there are expected to be 48.  This acceleration is one of the more astounding and important facts about how the world is changing today. This series explores these emerging megacities that will have over 10 million by 2035; overwhelmingly these cities are in Asia.  

 

GeoEd Tags: Tanzania, Africa, urban, transportation, planning, megacities, regions, APHG.

Scoop.it Tags: Tanzania, Africa, urban, transportation, planning, megacities, regions, APHG.

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Kosovo-Serbia land swap could end conflict – or restart war

“A land swap proposal between Kosovo and Serbia could end the last ethnic conflict of the Yugoslav Wars, or it could reignite it. The proposal involves swapping Serbian-majority district of Mitrovica in north Kosovo, and the Albanian-majority Presevo Valley, in southwest Serbia. The deal excludes 6 Serbian-majority municipalities within Kosovo.”

Source: bigthink.com

Land swaps are about fixing problematic borders–and we know that the world is full of problematic, contentious, and disputed borders.  Yet land swap are incredibly rare because it upends the status quo.  A few years back Belgium and Netherlands swapped some land, but more often then not, calls to simply give land to another country just because the land appears to be controlled by the ‘wrong’ country usually go unanswered.  This proposed swap is especially intriguing because (to an objective outside observer) it could benefit both countries and lead to a mutual recognition of their shared border.  This BBC podcast explores local impacts and opinions about borders, ethnic identity, and place.  

GeoEd Tags: borders, political, territoriality, unit 4 political, Serbia, Kosovo, Europe.

Scoop.it Tags: borders, political, territoriality, unit 4 political, Serbia, Kosovo, Europe.

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Language Warriors

"The three Dixon brothers: one goes about teaching how geography influences global culture while another goes around the world teaching about how language learning improves global culture.  The smart one makes money."

Source: language-warriors.com

My brother recently he introduced me to his new online course, Learning How to Learn a Language (complete with a really fun book), as well as a companion website.  If you want to improve your language skills, you will find a lot of free resources on his Facebook group (just search Language Warriors) and his website. 

 

In fact, in the Our Story portion of the website, you get the story of what made me go back to grad school and eventually become a geography professor.  My brother, ever the storyteller, explains how this family story relates to the challenges of learning a language. 

 

As you fellow geographers know, learning a new language is a great way to explore the world.  For the next five days, he’s offering geography teachers a 60% discount on his online course and book by clicking here.  I’m loving this course so far and would love to hear about your experiences learning other languages. 

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Spotify data shows how music preferences change with latitude

"The farther from the equator, the greater the seasonal swings."

Source: arstechnica.com

I’m not posting this in spite of its controversial nature—I am sharing this precisely because it raises eyebrows.  Many have read this and see elements of environmental determinism while simultaneous recognizing some of its core assumptions.  Arctic communities have devastatingly high suicide rates that most agree is in part impacted by the cold weather, the lack of sunshine, or in other words, the physical environment.

  

Questions to Ponder: How much environmental determinism actually is in this research and its assumptions?  How much does latitude impact the human condition?  How much of a factor is the environment in shaping cultural patterns?  How would you adapt to the physical environment if you lived north of the the Arctic Circle? 

 

GeoEd Tags: environment, music, Arctic,  environment adapt, unit 1 geoprinciples.

Scoop.it Tags: environment, music, Arctic, environment adapt, unit 1 GeoPrinciples.

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Macedonia signs NATO accession agreement

This comes after Greece backed a deal to rename its neighbour North Macedonia, ending a long row.

Source: www.bbc.com

Oh, what’s in a name?  National pride, fear of irredentist dreams, border disputes and supranational exclusion…that’s all.  Ever since the collapse of Yugoslavia, Greece has opposed an independent neighbor using the name "Macedonia" when they have an adjacent region of the same name.  This has be a point of contention, in part, over the historic memory of Alexander the Great and Hellenic grandeur which Greece feels have been wrongfully appropriated.  It is also regarding expansionist ambitions of a "greater Macedonia" so Greece has blocked Macedonia’s entry to NATO and the EU.  To appease Greece, lessen international strife, and gain greater access to the global community Macedonia approved this change, but this move has lead to internal strife as many Macedonians feel that this name change is unfair.           

GeoEd Tags: culture, Political, place, toponyms, historical.

Tags:  culture, political, place, toponyms, historical.

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The last Blockbuster: ‘I’m proud that we’ve survived’

“The company was founded in 1985 in Dallas, Texas, and it was worth billions of dollars at its peak, employing dozens of thousands of people. It was so popular across the US that, in 1989, a new store was opening every 17 hours. The rapid rise of digital services such as Netflix, which launched in 1999, and online retailers, like Amazon, made Blockbuster’s video and DVD business model practically obsolete.”

Source: www.bbc.co.uk

In my neighborhood, as in neighborhoods around America, there is an old Blockbuster building that is used to sell fireworks before the 4th of July and Halloween paraphernalia in October.  Most of the year however the property is a vacant lot where you might find police officers filling out their paperwork in the parking lot.  If video killed the radio star, Netflix killed the Blockbuster store.  Creative destruction leaves littered industries that, because of technological innovations, are no longer viable (if you want a deep dive into the demise of Blockbuster that goes beyond the obvious rise of streaming technology, this article by Retail Dive is solid).  

In addition to technological changes, some product shifts hint at societal and demographic changes (see this witty article about the demise of mayo). 

GeoEd TAGS: globalization, industry, economic.

Scoop.it Tags: globalization, industry, economic.

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Belize: A Spanish Accent in an English-Speaking Country

"BELIZE has long been a country of immigrants. British timber-cutters imported African slaves in the 18th century, and in the 1840s Mexican Mayans fled a civil war."

Source: www.economist.com

This is an older article (2012), but the pattern mentioned here is all the more relevant.  Belize has a much higher Human Development Index ranking that its Central American neighbors such as Guatemala.  That fact alone makes Belize a likely destination for migrants.  Given that Belize was ‘British Honduras’ during colonial times, English is (still) the official language, but that is changing as increasingly Spanish-speaking immigrants are changing the cultural profile of Belize.      

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