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Lessons from experience: French geographers and the transcontinental excursion of 1912Department of Geography, University College London, 26 Bedford Way, London WC1 H OAP, UK On the eve of the first world war, American academic geography was in its infancy compared with the maturing discipline in Germany and France. The transcontinental excursion of 1912 was a remarkable venture whereby W.M. Davis promoted the vitality of American scholarship, as well as demonstrating his ideas on physical geography in the field. Unpublished writings by Albert Demangeon, together with a selection of published materials, present the reactions of French participants to this novel experience that exposed them to the growing economic might of the USA, its territorial magnitude and environmental grandeur. Friendships established among geographers in 1912 helped the exchange of information at the Paris peace conference, and facilitated subsequent academic publications on both sides of the Atlantic. The impact of Davisian geomorphology would prove to be enormous in France; ironically, Americans would welcome the brand of geographic humaine practised by Demangeon less readily than an alternative version from Jean Brunhes (who did not go on the excursion) that found favour with Isaiah Bowman.
Key Words: transmission of geographical knowledge • France • USA • Far West • physiography • human geography
Progress in Human Geography, Vol. 28, No. 5,
597-618 (2004) |
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