Blackwell Reference Online

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“Revolution is not about showing life to people but making them live”(Guy Debord, in Bracken, 1997, p. 1)Geography is an eclectic and fashion-prone discipline. The attention span in the discipline for major theoretical or methodological perspectives is rather short-lived. For many a geographer, it is very hard to keep up with the endless re-formulations of spatial or geographical perspectives and theoretical influences. In fact, the chapters of this reader illustrate this abundantly. Whims and preferences fade in and out in tune with the tumultuous re-ordering of tastes and interests in modern society. The relative absence in geography of a canonical mode of thinking that turns other disciplines into rather arcane and often idiosyncratic pursuits (think of classical economics, for example) is no doubt also a great advantage. It keeps geography alive and kicking and maintains a vibrant intellectual environment. However, it equally leads to often rather superficial dabblings with epistemological and methodological issues of intellectual traditions that are much more complex, variegated, and sophisticated than their customary cursory introduction into geography usually suggests.Marxism is one such perspective that has infused geographical theory and practice over the past two decades (in the Anglo-Saxon world at least). While it was the most exciting approach around in the 1970s and ... log in or subscribe to read full text