Identity area
Type of entity
Corporate body
Authorized form of name
Union of Socialist Geographers
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
- USG
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1974-1981
History
The Union of Socialist Geographers (USG) was formed in Toronto in May of 1974. It was the third such group to form in North America following Antipode (in 1969) and the Socially and Ecologically Responsible Geographers (SERGE in 1971), all dedicated critical approaches to the discipline of socialist geography through an explicitly radical lens. The idea to form the USG grew largely from a group of graduate students from across North America and relied heavily on the support of Michael Eliot Hurst, the then-Chair of the Geography department at Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Burnaby, B.C.
The USG was in existence for approximately 7 years, with chapters (or collectives) in places like Toronto, Vancouver, and Minnesota (to name a few), as well as in Sydney, Australia and London, England. Internal politics led to an early demise for the USG, largely centered around the contested decision of some members to splinter off in 1979 and form a Socialist Geography Specialty Group under the umbrella of the American Association of Geographers. The result was a sharp decline in membership and participation in the USG, with it finally petering out of existence in 1981
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Functions, occupations and activities
Mandates/sources of authority
Internal structures/genealogy
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Entry created December 13, 2017. JMH
Language(s)
- English
Script(s)
Sources
Peake, L and Shppard, E. (2014) “The Emergence of Radical/Critical Geography within North America”. ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies, 13 (2), 305-327. Downloaded 11Dec2017 from: http://www.geog.ucla.edu/sites/default/files/users/esheppard/Peake%26Sheppard%20ACME%202014.pdf
Union of Socialist Geographers (22-24 Nov., 1974) “Seminar in Marxist Geography”. Presentation notes, Clark University, Worcester, MA, USA. Downloaded 11Dec2017 from: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8330.1975.tb00678.x/pdf