Social geography 1900-1-GSP

The class consists of lectures (30h) and exercises (15h).

The lecture aims to familiarise students with the subject and scope of research in contemporary social geography. An important element is to indicate the role that geography can play in explaining phenomena and processes in the contemporary world.

The following topics are discussed during the lecture:
1. Social geography - object and scope of research - introduction.
2. Diversified research approaches. The development of social geography in Poland.
3. Human-environment relations in the view of social geography (socially and culturally conditioned human approach to environment and the need for its protection, perception of environmental threats).
4. Socially conditioned susceptibility to environmental threats. Building pro-environmental attitudes (social vulnerability to environmental threats, models of social and adaptive resilience, dimensions of environmental awareness).
5 .The social dimension of demographic change (demographics as an explanatory and explained variable, characteristics of contemporary demographic processes, significance of the changes taking place).
6. Mobility (mobility and internal migration, (in)mobility and exclusion, living here and there: multilocality).
7. Migration. Migration transformation in Poland (immigrants and refugees as new social groups).
8. i 9. Dimensions of social differentiation (education and differentiation in access to knowledge, poverty, unemployment and social exclusion, sociogeographical aspects of housing).
10. Social differentiation, social integration and social movements (society vs. community, changes in social structure in Poland, new classes and social divisions, social exclusion, social involvement).
11. The cultural turn in social geography research (“traditional” vs. “new” cultural geography, reinterpretation of social divisions related to religion, language, nationality; gender studies).
12. Globalisation and spatial identity (changes brought about by globalisation and deglobalisation, categories of spatial identity, importance of “rootedness” and “genius loci”)
13. Social geography of cities (classical socio-spatial differentiation studies of the Chicago school, social area analysis, segregation, polarisation, gentrification, privatisation)
14 The city and urbanity (urban landscape and street art, urban lifestyles, representation in space of social groups: between Savix and Mordor, urban movements).
15. Geographic studies of development (“unequal worlds”, the global north-south divide, concepts of sustainable development and “degrowth”).

Exercises are designed to strengthen the ability to interpret phenomena and processes observed in the student's immediate environment. Workshop techniques and self-conducted simple research tasks in the exercises provide opportunities for active learning about selected social problems.

The estimated number of hours that a student must spend to achieve the learning outcomes defined for the subject.
Lecture and exercises: 3 ECTS = 3x25h= 75h (in direct contact 2 ECTS)
(N) - work in direct contact with the teacher,
(S) - student's own (independent) work.
Classes (lecture) = 30h (N)
Classes (exercises) = 15h (N)
Preparation (independent) for the exam = 15h (S)
Independent preparation for exercises - 1h/week. = 7h (S)
Analytical and project work = 4h (S)
Credit for exercises, lecture test, exams = 4h (N)
Total approximately 75h