Geographers study the natural and social processes that form our environments and interpret the changing interrelationships between environment and society. Geography courses examine the role of the natural environment in limiting and creating opportunities for people, and the role of society in reshaping the Earth habitat. The study of the natural environment itself, and the broad question of society’s relationship to nature, along with such concerns as the management of scarce resources and many environmental crises, have long been of interest to geographers. At UBC, the Geography undergraduate program is divided into three fields: physical, human, and technical. The Department offers a wide range of courses leading to a Bachelor of Science Degree in physical geography or a Bachelor of Arts Degree in human geography. Technical courses are incorporated into both degrees. At the graduate level, The Department of Geography at UBC is widely acknowledged as one of the leading departments in the world in terms of its research accomplishments. The scholarly interests of faculty members and graduate students encompass a wide range of subject areas, philosophical approaches, methods of analysis, and geographical locations.
Spanning a decade now, Dr. David Brownstein has “taught in the UBC Geography Department” and “supervised over 275 fourth-year projects, many of which you can now find online” in cIRcle, UBC’s Digital Repository.
With a special thanks to Dr. Brownstein and to all of his students including the community partners, it was a pleasure to archive the Department of Geography`s undergraduate research from 2011 to 2016. And, while the two GEOG 419 & GEOG 429 courses have ended indefinitely as of spring 2016, it is hoped that cIRcle can resume archiving and showcasing this unique undergraduate research output in the future.
Until then, you can download the latest GEOG 419: Research in Environmental Geography and GEOG 429: Research in Historical Geography reports including some oral history interviews about various people and places located in and around British Columbia at: http://bit.ly/2an1DVn
Correction on August 9, 2016:
GEOG 419 is not cancelled but will be taught by a tenure track professor sans the community partners’ aspect due to the increase in the class size – 50 students”.
Above text excerpt in italics is courtesy of the UBC Department of Geography