Geographers on Film
Production
ProducersMaynard Weston Dow, and
Nancy Freeman Dow

Geographers on Film is an archival collection and series of more than 550 filmed interviews with experts of the geographic scholar community.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8] This is a 40 year long initiative.[9]

Production

The series was created as an historical and educational resource by geographer and professor emeritus Maynard Weston Dow (1929 - 2011)[1] of Plymouth State University,[3] and his wife, Nancy Freeman Dow.[10] The series was supported in part by the American Association of Geographers,[11] the National Science Foundation, Plymouth State University, and the Marion and Jasper Whiting Foundation, of Boston. It has been ongoing or 40 years.[8]

Synopsis

The series "highlights leading voices that transformed the discipline of cartography and geography in the 20th century in America."[1]

A prếcis of the collection's point was penned by Maynard Weston Dow:

"August 1970 marked the origin of Geographers on Film (GOF). Participants speak for the record (varying from ten to eighty-nine minutes) that samples of the geographical experience are maintained on video; the ultimate concomitant goal is full transcription. The project resulted from teaching thought and methodology courses; students therein would pore over the writings of cognoscenti to acquire an appreciation for the genesis and development of geography as a field of learning. After considering the advantage of having Aristotle on film it was decided to secure in a permanent medium something of the more fertile minds of modern geography. In the beginning concentration was on elder statespersons, thus coverage spans much of 20th Century geography."[2]

The Library of Congress and the American Association of Geographers hold the films in their collections and have both preserved and digitized them. Initial work for digitization of the films and hosting them on a publicly accessible website was undertaken by a student at Plymouth State College in 1997 as part of her senior project in her Computer Science degree program,[12] on which she collaborated with Dr. Dow. "Geographers on Film are a collection of recorded interviews conducted with hundreds of geographers from August 1970 until the mid-1980s."[1] The National Gallery of the Spoken Word at Michigan State University has a copy, at least some of which is available on line. [A]

As a complement to Geographers on Film, "sixteen thematic video presentations have evolved" which include compilations from the larger oeuvre.[2]

25 Archival Gems

Short clips from 25 of the interviews are available as a 35-minute, streaming video via the AAG website and YouTube.[13] Geographers featured in this video include, in order of appearance:[14]

References

Notes

  1. ^ "Copies of the GOF collection are deposited in the National Gallery of the Spoken Word (NGSW) at Michigan State University. The Gallery facilitates worldwide utilization of GOF via digitization of the series by providing Internet access to the audio and selected video images. The NGSWis an expansive repository of aural resources, a NSF-funded online fully searchable database of significant spoken word collections."[2]

Citations

  1. ^ a b c d "About this Collection | Geographers on Film | Digital Collections | Library of Congress". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA.
  2. ^ a b c d Dow, Maynard Weston (August 27, 2003). "GEOGRAPHERS ON FILM: 292 CAPSULE COMMENTS: Visual Record and Archival Resource". Plymouth State University. Retrieved December 31, 2022.
  3. ^ a b "Wes Dow Honored for Geographers On Film". Plymouth Magazine. Plymouth State University. October 20, 2008. GOF productions include 305 film and videotape GOF interviews (149.88 hours) of the thought and reflection of 273 geographers, plus 240 GOF Additional Holdings (137.75 hours), which feature distinctive themes (varying from 10-196 minutes) and embody 130 supplemental geographers expanding the number to 393 geographers incorporated within GOF.
  4. ^ DeVivo 2014, p. 196.
  5. ^ Boyle 2021, pp. xxxiii, 55, 130, 166, 102, 176.
  6. ^ Mannix & Burchsted 2015, p. 123.
  7. ^ Johnston & Sidaway 2015, pp. XXI, 456, 511.
  8. ^ a b Martin, Geoffrey J. (2013-01-01). "Maynard Weston Dow (1929–2011) and "Geographers on Film"". Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 103 (1). Taylor & Francis: 1–4. doi:10.1080/00045608.2012.732480. ISSN 0004-5608. S2CID 140639530.
  9. ^ Gandy, Matthew (2021). "Film as Method in the Geohumanities". GeoHumanities. 7 (2). Taylor & Francis: 605-624 at 622. doi:10.1080/2373566X.2021.1898287. A key intervention here is the "filmgeographies" collective, initiated by Jessica Jacobs and Joseph Palis, that grew out of a regular screening festival for short films held in collaboration with the American Association of Geographers. Other important resources include the "Geographers on film" initiative, underway for over forty years, with the archives co-curated by the AAG and the Library of Congress.
  10. ^ Seda-Galarza, Benny (June 18, 2018). "Geographers on Film Series Tells the Story of the 20th Century in America PR 18-076". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. ISSN 0731-3527. Retrieved 2022-12-31.
  11. ^ "Archiving Accessing Geography's History" (PDF). Association of American Geographers. April 2008. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-05-10. Retrieved 2009-08-02.
  12. ^ "Plymouth State University CS & IT Senior Projects"
  13. ^ "25 Archival Gems from the first 25 years of Geographers on Film," Archived 2015-01-17 at the Wayback Machine AAG website. Accessed: January 16, 2015.
  14. ^ "Geographers on Film: 25 Archival Gems" (listing) Archived 2010-12-26 at the Wayback Machine, AAG website. Accessed: January 17, 2015.

Bibliography

External links

Geography topics
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