The critical revolution led to the development of a range of new approaches in Geography, including Radical geography, Humanistic geography, welfare geography, feminist geography, postcolonial geography, and cultural geography.
These approaches emphasised the importance of subjectivity, reflexivity, and situated knowledge in understanding spatial phenomena, and rejected the idea that there was a single objective truth about the world.
The critical revolution also led to a re-evaluation of the role of the geographer in society. Critical geographers argued that geographers had a responsibility to engage with social and political issues, and to use their expertise to challenge inequalities and injustices in society.
Important critical geographers or critics of the quantitative approach are:
Dudley Stamp, 1966, Minshul, 1970, Broek, 1965, David Harvey,
Humanistic Geography
Humanistic geography is an approach to geography that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, within the critical revolution in geography due to a deep dissatisfaction with the more mechanistic models developed during the spatial science revolution. In the context of the critical revolution, humanistic geography played an important role in challenging the positivist assumptions of the quantitative revolution and promoting a more critical and reflexive approach to research.
It is characterised by a focus on the subjective experiences of individuals and the cultural and symbolic meanings that people attach to places and landscapes.
It gives a central and active role to human awareness and human agency, human consciousness and human creativity.
Characteristics
Some of the key characteristics of humanistic geography in the light of the critical revolution include:
Emphasis on subjective experience: Humanistic geography emphasises the subjective experiences of individuals and their interactions with the built and natural environment. This includes the ways in which people perceive and interpret places, the emotions and attachments they have to particular places, and the cultural and symbolic meanings that people attach to landscapes and environments. It gives a central and active role to human awareness and human agency, human consciousness and human creativity.
Critique of positivism: Humanistic geography challenged the positivist assumptions of the quantitative revolution by emphasising the importance of subjective experiences of people within space and cultural context in shaping spatial phenomena. Humanistic geographers argued that traditional positivist methods and models were too simplistic and reductionist, and more mechanistic.
Focus on cultural and symbolic meanings: Humanistic geography emphasises the cultural and symbolic meanings that people attach to landscapes and environments. This includes the ways in which places are represented in literature, art, and media, and the ways in which these representations shape our perceptions and experiences of places.
Approaches of study: humanistic geographers give emphasis on the idealistic, phenomenological and hermeneutic approaches in studying and explaining human phenomena and behaviour in space.
Focus on qualitative methods: Humanistic geography emphasises the use of qualitative methods, such as interviews, ethnography, and participant observation, to gain a deeper understanding of subjective experiences and cultural contexts. These methods allow researchers to capture the complexities and nuances of human experience that may be missed by quantitative methods.
Emphasis on power relations: Humanistic geography pays close attention to power relations and how they shape spatial phenomena. This includes the ways in which social, political, and economic structures influence the distribution of resources, access to opportunities, and the production of space.
Environmental ethics: Humanistic geography is concerned with environmental ethics and the ways in which humans relate to the natural world. Humanistic geographers recognize the importance of sustainability and the need to develop more ethical and equitable relationships with the environment.
Recognition of multiple perspectives: Humanistic geography recognizes that there are multiple perspectives and voices in any given spatial context. This includes the perspectives of marginalised groups, such as Indigenous peoples, women, and people of colour, who have traditionally been excluded from mainstream geographic discourse.
Emphasis on social justice: Humanistic geography is concerned with social justice and the ways in which spatial phenomena impact different social groups. Humanistic geographers recognize that spatial inequality is often rooted in broader social and economic inequalities, and work to develop more equitable and just spatial policies and practices.
Proponents:
L Guelke,Hays, Relph, Kirk, Yi Fu Tuan, Buttimer, Johnston etc.
Approaches:
Idealistic approach: L Guelke advocated an idealistic approach by saying that geographers need to think not their techniques, but their philosophy. According to him, an individual's knowledge is ultimately based on his subjective experience of the world and the world can be experienced indirectly through ideas. The mental processes cannot be measured or controlled by the material things and processes.
Hays, 1979 criticised, idealistic approach, and argued that objective facts must influence behavioural outcomes, in addition to the thoughts of the actors.
Phenomenological approach: This philosophy has attracted more attention of the human geographers than idealism. Relph, 1970s introduced phenomenological approach where he pointed out that there is no objective word, independent of human existence- all knowledge proceeds from the world of experience.
Kirk, 1963 recognised two separate but independent environments: phenomenal, which is the real material environment and perceived or behavioural which is perceived from the real environment and unique for every human being. It involves the researcher seeking to identify how the individual structures the environment in an entirely subjective way.
Yi-Fu Tuan, 1971 said that Geography is the mirror of a man. To know geography it is essential to know oneself, careful study of landscape produced by someone around his place of work or residence just the same way literature and art reveals much of human life.
According to him, humanistic Geography is an understanding of the human world by studying people's relation with nature, their geographical behaviours as well as their feelings and ideas with regard to space in place.
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