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Module BODIES AND ENVIRONMENTS

Module code: GY626A
Credits: 10
Semester: 1
Department: GEOGRAPHY
International: No
Coordinator: Prof. Gerry Kearns (GEOGRAPHY)
Overview Overview
 

This module will introduce students to the political and cultural dimensions of the relations between human flourishing and its natural contexts. The geographical concepts of space, place, environment and scale will be explained and applied to matters of life, death, health, and dependence upon and as well as obligations to non-human life. The cultural politics of these matters will be explored through an explication of the political dimensions of epidemiology, the broad ramifications of what might be termed vital geographies, and the urgent necessities of the Anthropocene. These are among the most urgent issues in the fields of Medical Humanities and Health Geographies. Throughout, the creative engagement and interaction of scientists and artists will be at the heart of the course. In this way the course takes students into the emerging field of Arts and Geography.
The module content thus includes:
1. Designing spatial metaphors for the AIDS pandemic. A normative and retrospective interrogation of the spatial metaphors used by scientists and artists as they tried to comprehend both the new disease and the social dimensions of its impact. This session introduces students to a practical engagement with discourse analysis.
2. A place-based ethics of care. Place has long been a central concept in Geography but the integration of this geographical concept with feminist discussions of care is currently under development in the fields of cultural geography, social psychology and health geographies. These themes have also been taken up in current artistic practice.
3. The bodily performativity of social life and the corporeality of citizenship. The first of these ideas has been developed in feminist philosophy but its implications for the embodiment of citizenship has yet to receive adequate attention in political philosophy. Building upon work in the first two sessions, this session develops a novel and critical perspective on social relations. It takes the topic of life at the focus for a new place-based politics.
4. Therapeutic Landscapes. This is a new field within health geographies focusing upon the perceived environmental correlates of healthy living. This is also a concern of some artists as they reflect upon their life-worlds. The common themes of geographers and artists in this area will be focus of this session.
5. Hybrid Geographies. The study of the relations between human and non-human life has been revolutionized by recent Science Studies scholarship including the works of Haraway. This has been developed within Geography by Gandy, Parry and Whatmore, among others. There are evident Health Geography applications for a perspective that re-thinks the prosthetic and manufactured nature of modern human and other living forms. This new way of conceptualizing the more-than- and other-than-human elements of people has also engaged dancers, painters and writers.
6. Studio/Gallery visit. The class will engage with an artist in a relevant place of cultural production. This will provide an opportunity to explore the Health Geographies themes with an artist.

Open Learning Outcomes
 
Open Teaching & Learning methods
 
Open Assessment
 
Open Autumn Supplementals/Resits
 
Open Timetable
 
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