geography

June 22, 2002

Today's Reading
The Golden Chersonese by Isabella Bird, Trans-Himalaya by Sven Hedin, A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems translated by Arthur Waley

This Year's Reading
2002 Book List

Today's Starting Pitcher
Derek Lowe



On the TV news last night I learned that American kids don't know geography. Wasn't it just recently that we found out American kids don't know history? And wasn't it last year we found out that American kids are falling behind in science? This makes me wonder what we are teaching them.

This morning I was reading Sven Hedin's Trans-Himalaya at the breakfast table. "Looking at" might be a better description because the part I was interested in was the maps at the end of Volume 1. The maps of Tibet predate Sven Hedin's expeditions. One of them is from the George Bogle expedition. One of them showed the Nyenchen Tangla range way further south than it is, though it did correctly show Lake Nam-tso on the other side of the mountains. Another of the maps had what looked like way too many rivers flowing in way too many directions, some of them improbable. The major geographical features are there, but, of course, the place names and political boundaries vary widely. That got me thinking about geography again.

So what exactly is geography anyway? And why aren't American kids interested in it?

Does anybody spend rainy summer afternoons flipping through piles of moldy old National Geographics anymore? Certainly those old National Geographics, some of them dating back to the end of the 19th century, sparked my imagination as a kid. I longed to explore the South Seas with Martin and Osa Johnson, sail around Cape Horn, botanize China with Joseph Rock (no wait, I think I got into the great plant hunters later), explore Montana with the Craighead brothers ... (I told you those National Geographics were old!) This when I hadn't been outside of New England yet!

Speaking of New England, when I first started browsing the web back in the distant mists of the early 1990's I was astounded to learn from a Texas elementary school web site that New York and New Jersey are part of New England. All my life I thought the New England states were Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. And I was never too sure of Connecticut what with its being firmly in the Yankees fan-shed and within easy commuting distance of New York City. New England is a state of mind and not a set of topographic features anyway. Certainly New York is more like Massachusetts than it is like Texas in terms of geology, flora and fauna, and climate. For that matter, Hokkaido is more like Massachusetts than Texas is if you go by climate and flora. So what makes New England New England?

What made Yugoslavia Yugoslavia? That's easy: Tito. Take a bunch of little countries, unite them under a very strong ruler, and voila, you've got a different country. Political boundaries and identities change constantly. When Lizzy showed me her geography homework last year, a blank map of Africa to be filled in, I couldn't do it. The names and boundaries of so many of the countries are different from what I learned in school and unless there's been a major news story about Burkina Faso I couldn't tell you where it is. About all I could place for sure was South Africa. Cape of Good Hope y'know. Other than islands, few countries on the map are bounded by physical features. I couldn't look at the blank map of Africa and say from this edge of the desert to this river is such and such a country. I can't look at a blank map of the Balkans and identify some physical divide between Serbia and Macedonia. Borders are political constructs.

OK so far "geography" covers political constructs, natural features, flora and fauna, and climate. Then we have to add in nationalities, ethnicities, tribes with their languages and cultural constructs. Certainly those old National Geographics included plenty of articles about "primitive" or "exotic" cultures. But those things are not obvious on maps. The map doesn't tell me what it's like to live in Burkina Faso any more than it tells me what it's like to live in Texas, but National Geographic does. And if you go by language and culture, Massachusetts is a lot more like Texas than it is like Hokkaido.

Then there are the principle exports and natural resources and industries and so on. That's geography too, at least the way I was taught it in the 4th grade. Webster's dictionary defines geography as:

The study of the earth and its features and of the distribution of life on the earth, including human life and the effects of human activity.

That's a heck of a lot and goes way beyond memorizing the principle products of Portugal or the capital of Burkina Faso (BTW, I have no idea whatsoever what the capital of Burkina Faso is). So why aren't kids today curious about the distribution of life on earth and the effects of human activity? Would more stacks of moldy National Geographics help? I really don't know.

I can't rattle off a list of world capitals or principle exports (well, the principle export of the Dominican Republic is ballplayers...) but I have seen a lot of the places I read and fantasized about as a kid. I've set foot on 5 of the 7 continents - I have yet to visit Australia or Africa - and have some vague idea where just about every place is in relation to here. I'm in love with Massachusetts (thank you Jonathan Richman) but I long to see the places I read about in those old National Geographics.

I read old travel books from the heyday of Brits' traveling to the far reaches of the empire so they could write home about how uncomfortable they are (cold, hot, mosquito-bitten, and so on). I get the impression from those 19th century and early 20th century narratives that the ordinary Brit had a pretty good grasp of geography. At least the writers assumed that the readers did. I wonder if American readers of the same period could locate Lhasa on the map, or Penang, or Kuala Lumpur. I'll bet not. That's just a guess though.

The USA is big. That's a lot of geography to learn just to understand the home country. The world is big and keeps changing. That's a lot to learn and keep up with. I mean I hadn't the foggiest notion where Kyrgyzstan was before the fall of the Soviet Union, let alone that its capital is Bishkek and its principle export is whatever its principle export is. Certainly before I take my Silk Road trip - if it ever becomes possible for an American to take a Silk Road tour safely again - I know where to read up on Kyrgyzstan's principle products and culture.

China is big too. The mountains are high and the emperor is far away, as the old saying goes. This afternoon I picked up a reprint of Arthur Waley's A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems at Myopic Books (down the street from Nancy's place). Turning to the introductory essay, unpromisingly titled "The Limitations of Chinese Literature", I found this startling thought:

" In mind, as in body, the Chinese were for the most part torpid mainlanders. Their thoughts set out on no strange quest and and adventures, just as their ships discovered no new continents."

"He's faulting them for not being British!" I blurted out right there in the bookstore. Why being an island nation peopled by explorers who have to map compulsively the entire world should result in great novels (Waley is trying, I think to explain, poorly I might add, why the masterworks of Chinese literature are poems) I don't quite know and he doesn't say much about the Chinese knowledge of geography, but I made a connection anyway.

Thus the explanation for Chinese novels not being up to Waley's standards is the same as the explanation for American kids not knowing geography. China big and could ignore rest of world. USA big and could ignore rest of world. Since this is no longer true, we can expect Chinese novels and US geography scores to improve spectacularly.

The world is really very very small.

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Copyright © 2002, Janet I. Egan