Cultural Geography: A Critical Introduction

Citation

Mitchell, D. (2000). Cultural Geography: A Critical Introduction. Blackwell.

Chapter Summary

The book runs to about 350 pages in the Critical Introductions to Geography series. Its contents list an introduction ("A Critical Introduction"), three parts, a conclusion, a bibliography and an index. The publisher describes it as a critical evaluation of the transformation of cultural geography over the two preceding decades, explaining cultural change in different geographical settings, from the politics of everyday life to the production and consumption of landscapes, and to the politics of sexuality, gender, race and nationality.

A Critical Introduction

The opening section sets out the book's stance. According to the publisher, it analyses recent changes in cultural geographic theory while salvaging the most valuable aspects of older traditions.

Part I: The Politics of Culture

The title makes culture a political matter. The publisher describes the book as encouraging debate over the ideology of culture, the production of value and the role of cultural struggle in reproducing social life, which indicates the kind of questions at stake, although the page does not say which part treats which.

Part II: The Political Landscape

The title makes landscape political. The publisher lists the production and consumption of landscapes among the topics through which the book explains cultural change, without assigning topics to parts.

Part III: Cultural Politics

The third part is titled for cultural politics. The publisher says the book illustrates cultural geographic theory with contemporary "culture wars" and ranges over the politics of sexuality, gender, race and nationality.

Conclusion: Cultural Rights, Cultural Justice, Cultural Geography

The title names cultural rights and cultural justice, together with cultural geography itself, as the concerns on which the book ends.

Key Concepts

Introduction and Part I

• Culture as ideology: the publisher says the book encourages debate over the ideology of culture.
• Cultural struggle: the idea that cultural conflict is part of how social life is reproduced.
• Production of value: a question the book links to culture and politics.

Parts II and III and the Conclusion

• Landscape: its production and consumption, as part of cultural change.
• Culture wars: contemporary disputes the book uses to illustrate theory.
• Cultural rights and cultural justice: the concerns named in the conclusion.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• A clear argument. The book is a critical, argued account rather than a neutral survey. A review quoted by the publisher from the Annals of the Association of American Geographers calls it a significant and provocative book that deserves serious scrutiny.
• Readable and well illustrated. Another review quoted on the publisher's page describes it as a highly readable introduction to social and cultural geography for undergraduates, well illustrated with case-study material, whose provocative style makes students engage with the arguments.
• Links older and newer work. The publisher stresses that it keeps the most valuable parts of older cultural geography while analysing recent theoretical change, and that it ties difficult concepts to contemporary issues.
• A simple frame. The contents show an introduction, three parts and a conclusion, so the book's progression is easy to see.

Limitations

• It argues rather than surveys. Because the book advances a critical position, readers wanting a neutral overview of the subfield will find it less even-handed than a general textbook.
• Fixed in 2000. Its account of recent transformations covers roughly the previous two decades, so later developments in the field are outside it.
• Pitched at the advanced student. The publisher describes the approach as meaningful to the advanced student, relating difficult concepts to contemporary issues, so first-year readers may find it demanding without an introductory text alongside.

Where It Fits in the Course

Mitchell's book is the critical-theory entry among the course's introductions to culture and place. Norton and Walton-Roberts's Cultural Geography is a general textbook that surveys the discipline's tradition, landscape, identity, power and place, and is the better first book for a broad overview; Mitchell's text is a good second book because it argues for a particular view of culture and politics.

Mitchell's book belongs to the Critical Introductions to Geography series, the series in which Cresswell's Geographic Thought also appears, so the two share a critical, argument-led format. Massey's For Space and Lefebvre's The Production of Space are theoretical works on space as produced by social relations and pair with Mitchell's emphasis on power for readers who want more theory. Cresswell's Place: An Introduction and Tuan's Space and Place are shorter and more concerned with how place is experienced and given meaning, and can balance Mitchell's political emphasis.

How to Use This Book

The publisher describes the approach as accessible and meaningful to the advanced student, relating difficult concepts to contemporary issues, while a quoted review recommends it for undergraduates. An introductory human geography course, or some familiarity with social theory, helps.

The author's biography in the publisher's listing mentions his earlier study of migrant workers and the California landscape, which fits the political-economic emphasis of the book. Read the introduction and Part I first, since they set out the position the rest of the book develops. Parts II and III can then be read according to interest, landscape or cultural politics. The conclusion is the place to test whether the argument holds.

Treat the book as an argument to be answered: after each part, note the claim, find a counterexample or alternative view in a general textbook such as Norton and Walton-Roberts, and discuss it. Reading it before the more purely theoretical works makes them easier to place.