Recent studies of the history of geography have sought to examine the role of the discipline beyond its academic core. Geographic concepts and information have been used in a wide variety of ways for a multitude of purposes, and geographers as scientists and practitioners have played varying roles in the development, maintenance, and transformation of public policy. One of the most intriguing topics on which this attention has begun to focus has been the establishment, expansion, management, and dissolution of national empires from the 18th into the 20th centuries. This award will support participation by American geographers in an international conference to examine interrelationships between geography and empire. The conference will be held in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, in April 1991 and will bring together roughly twenty scholars from around the world. These scholars will present papers and discuss issues related to the ways that the development of geography as a discipline contributed to the techniques and ideology of empire in many different forms and national contexts. Attention also will focus on how the experiences of empire influence geography's development as a discipline and as a body of knowledge. A published proceedings will disseminate papers and results of the conference. Support for the conference also has been provided by Queen's University and the Canadian Social Science and Humanities Research Council. This conference will convene historians of geography and science, geographers, and related scientists to share perspectives and insights about an important aspect of the development of geography as a discipline. In addition to bringing together scholars from across the globe who have had relatively little opportunity for focused, face-to- face discussions, the project also will provide opportunities for identification of new lines of basic research on this significant topic.
