85491 - GEOGRAPHY OF THE EURO-MEDITERRANEAN REGION

Conoscenze e abilità da conseguire

The course aims at providing students a comprehensive vision of the role played by the Euro-Mediterranean area as a whole, following the different stages of its evolution. Specific attention will be paid to the peculiar mixing up of politics, space, cultures, and technics, which generated an original long-standing model whose today's crisis and mutation are keys to understand the global issues at stake. By the end of the course, students have basic knowledge, fundamental references concerning the topics at issue, and critical skills, put into historical perspective, about the main geographical models concerning the relationship between environment, landscape, and urban civilization in Mediterranean and Eurasia.

Contenuti

COURSE OUTLINE

BEFORE THE COURSE STARTS

BEFORE THE OPENING CLASS EVERY ATTENDING STUDENT IS EXPECTED TO SIGN UP TO VIRTUALE PLATFORM (https://virtuale.unibo.it/) IN ORDER TO TAKE ACTIVELY PART TO CLASSWORK, DOWNLOADING TEACHING MATERIALS AND JOINING COLLECTIVE TESTS.

EVERY ATTENDING STUDENT IS EXPECTED TO CHECK REGULARLY HIS INSTITUTIONAL MAIL ADDRESS TOO, BECAUSE ANY OFFICIAL COMMUNICATION ABOUT THE COURSE WILL BE EXCLUSIVELY POSTED THROUGH IT.

ON THE OPENING CLASS

ALL ATTENDING STUDENTS WILL BE DRAWN IN STUDY GROUPS, EACH GROUP WITH ONE OF THE FOLLOWING COURSE’S TOPICS ASSIGNED:

1. Edges of the Euro-Mediterranean Region
2. Euro-Mediterranean Cities as Islands
3. The Discrete Charm of Networks
4. Belonging: From States to Nets
5. Shifting Scales
6. Spatial Dynamics of Capital
7. Mobility
8. Inequality/Sustainability
9. Down to Earth: Complexity and the Globe
10. The Double Life of Housing
    

DURING THE COURSE

ATTENDING STUDENTS ARE EXPECTED TO READ THE TEXTS OR PREPARING SCHEDULED MATERIALS BEFORE EACH CLASS, IN ORDER TO JOIN THE DISCUSSION PROPERLY. THE LAST FOUR CLASSES WILL BE DEVOTED TO STUDENTS’ PRESENTATIONS TO BE ASSESSED AS PART OF THE FINAL GRADE.

A MID-TERM TEST IS SCHEDULED.


EVERY CLASS (SAVE FOR THE ONE DEVOTED TO THE MID-TERM TEST AND THE LAST FOUR ONES) WILL BE SPLIT IN TWO PARTS

1. THE FIRST PART DEDICATED TO THE PRESENTATION OF THE SCHEDULED TOPIC;
2. FOLLOWED BY A COLLECTIVE DISCUSSION ON IT LED BY THE STUDY GROUP HAVING THAT SUBJECT MATTER ASSIGNED, IN THE SECOND PART. IN ORDER TO ASSIST DISCUSSION, A TEAMWORK APP WILL BE EMPLOYED (https://www.mural.co/) AND A FREE ACCOUNT WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE TO EACH ATTENDING STUDENT.

EVERY STUDY GROUP IS ALSO EXPECTED TO GIVE A PRESENTATION ABOUT ITS ASSIGNED TOPIC DURING ONE OF THE LAST FOUR CLASSES.


THE ORGANISATION OF THE CLASSWORK THROUGHOUT THE COURSE IS THEN AS FOLLOWS:

Class 1: Opening class, introduction to the course, study groups’ draw and relative topic pairing.

Classes 2-15: a first round of lectures and class discussions about the course’s topics.

Class 16: mid-term test concerning only the theoretical and methodological issues presented in classes 2-15.

Classes 17-26: final round of lectures about course’s topics.

Classes 27-30: study groups’ presentations.


Final interview: at periodical exam dates attending students will be able to finalise their grading during an interview involving only the theoretical and methodological issues presented during the course.

 

CLASSES' TOPICS

Class 1.
Topic: Introduction to the course’s topics, groups’ formation, mid-term test, final examination, etc.

Class 2. Euro-mediterranean region and Anthropocene
Compulsory readings: F. Farinelli, Blinding Polyphemus: Geography and the Models of the World, trans. by Ch. Chalmers, London: Seagulls Books, 2018, pp. 104-14.

 

Class 3.
Topic: Geography’s tools I. Measure.
Compulsory readings: V. Smil, Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization, Chichester, Wiley, 2014, pp. 7-43.

Class 4

Topic: Geography’s tools II. Edges.
Compulsory readings: A. Supiot, The Territorial Inscription of Laws, in G.P. Calliess, A. Fischer-Lescano, D. Wielsch, P. Zumbansen (hrsg.), Soziologische Jurisprudenz, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2009, pp. 375-393.

 

Class 5.
Topic: Geography’s tools III. Scales
Compulsory readings: G. Blöschl, H. Thybo, H. Savenije (eds.), A voyage through scales: the Earth system in space and time, Baden, Edition Lammerhuber.

Class 6.
Topic: Origins of Euro-Mediterranean region
Compulsory readings: F. Farinelli, Blinding Polyphemus: Geography and the Models of the World, trans. by Ch. Chalmers, London: Seagulls Books, 2018, pp. 114-24.

Class 7.
Topic: An edging sense of boundary. Citizenship and identity.
Compulsory readings: I. Malkin, A Small Greek World: Networks in the Ancient Mediterranean, Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2012 DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199734818.001.0001, Introduction: Networks and History, DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199734818.003.0001.

Class 8.
Topic: The new urban civilization and the secularization of culture. The Communes.
Compulsory readings: M. Neve, Geography of European Medieval Urbanism, 2018, on Virtuale.

Class 9.
Topic: Long standing networks of Euro-Mediterranean region: Saharan networks.
Compulsory readings: A. M. Medici, "A Sea Change in the Mediterranean Connections : The Fall of Saharan Networks (18th-20th c.)", Mediterranean world, 24, 2019, pp. 9-20.

Class 10.
Topic: Colonialism and Columbian exchange.
Compulsory readings: Alfred W. Crosby, The Columbian exchange : biological and cultural consequences of 1492, Westport (Conn.) : Greenwood Press, 1973, ch. 3.

Class 11.
Topic: Cartographic production of nation-state: Governing with maps.
Compulsory readings: J. Crampton, Mapping : A Critical Introduction to Cartography and GIS, Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010, ch. 6.

Class 12.
Topic: Cartographic production of nation-state II: Thematic maps and the notion of «race».
Compulsory readings: J. Crampton, Mapping : A Critical Introduction to Cartography and GIS, Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010, ch.11.

Class 13.
Topic: Cartographic production of nation-state III.
Compulsory readings: J.C. Scott, Seeing Like a State, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1998, ch. 1.

Class 14.
Topic: Cartographic production of nation-state IV.
Compulsory readings: J.C. Scott, Seeing Like a State, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1998, ch. 1.

Class 15.
Topic: Summing up and discussing the topics to prepare the mid-term test.

Class 16.
MID-TERM TEST

Class 17.
Topic: Spatial dynamics of capitalism I.
Compulsory readings: G. Arrighi, Adam Smith in Beijing. Lineages of the Twenty-First Century, London and New York: Verso, 2007, ch. 8.

Class 18.
Topic: Spatial dynamics of capitalism II.
Compulsory readings: M. Neve, Are We Turning into Flatlanders? Mapping and Human Complexity, in Travelling Maps, forthcoming.

Class 19.
Topic: Local/global I.
Chr. Bonneuil and J.-B. Fressoz, The Shock of the Anthropocene London: Verso, 2016, chrs. 1-2.

Class 20.
Topic: Local/global II.
F. Jullien, Living Off Landscape: or the Unthought-of in Reason, Lanham (MD), Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2018, pp. 15-16, 27-40.

Class 21.
Topic: Deculturation and deterritorialisation.
Compulsory readings: E. Holenstein, "Natural Constraints to Cultural Relativism Example: Ricci’s Pacific-Centered World Maps, Asiatische Studien - Études Asiatiques, vol. 73, no. 3, 2019, pp. 379-397. https://doi.org/10.1515/asia-2018-0023. 

Class 22.
Topic: The Double Life of Housing.
Compulsory readings: M. Neve, "Housing Identities: At the Roots of Present-Day Belonging's Uneasiness", Köz-Gazdaság - Review of Economic Theory and Policy, 16(3), 2021, 57-76.

Class 23.
Topic: Mobility.
Compulsory readings: D. Hoerder, Cultures in Contact (Comparative and International Working-Class History), Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2011, parr. 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3.

Class 24.
Topic: Networks.
Compulsory readings: S. Graham, When Infrastructures Fail, in S. Graham, Disrupted Cities. When Infrastructure Fails, New York and London, Routledge, 2010, pp. 1-25.

Class 25.
Topic: The Mediterranean city: back to the future.
Compulsory readings: L. Leontidou, "«Smart Cities» of the debt crisis: grassroots creativity in Mediterranean Europe", The Greek Review of Social Research, special issue, 144 Α ́, 2015, 69-101.

 

Class 26.

Topic: Smart cities?
Compulsory readings: M. Neve, Cities' Mind: Some Lessons Learnt From the Mediterranean, in Urban Forms of Life, forthcoming.

Class 27.
Topic: Students’ presentations (instructions for presentations will be made available on Virtuale)

Class 28.
Topic: Students’ presentations

Class 29.
Topic: Students’ presentations

Class 30.
Topic: Conclusions, overall summary, and discussion.

Testi/Bibliografia

READINGS FOR ATTENDING STUDENTS ARE PROVIDED AS COMPULSORY CLASSWORK FOR EACH CLASS IN THE SYLLABUS.

 

Compulsory readings for the final exam for students NON ATTENDING classes

1. F. Farinelli, Blinding Polyphemus: Geography and the Models of the World, trans. by Ch. Chalmers, London: Seagulls Books, 2018;
2. V. Smil, Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization, Chichester, Wiley, 2014, pp. 7-43.
3. I. Malkin, A Small Greek World: Networks in the Ancient Mediterranean, Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2012 DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199734818.001.0001, Introduction: Networks and History, DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199734818.003.0001;/
4. A. Supiot, The Territorial Inscription of Laws, in G.P. Calliess, A. Fischer-Lescano, D. Wielsch, P. Zumbansen (hrsg.), Soziologische Jurisprudenz, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2009, pp. 375-393.
4. A. M. Medici, "A Sea Change in the Mediterranean Connections : The Fall of Saharan Networks (18th-20th c.)", Mediterranean world, 24, 2019, pp. 9-20;
5. Alfred W. Crosby, The Columbian exchange : biological and cultural consequences of 1492, Westport (Conn.) : Greenwood Press, 1973, ch. 3;
6. J. Crampton, Mapping : A Critical Introduction to Cartography and GIS, Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2'10, chrs. 6 and 11;
7. J.C. Scott, Seeing Like a State, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1998, ch. 1;
8. G. Arrighi, Adam Smith in Beijing. Lineages of the Twenty-First Century, London and New York: Verso, 2007, chr. 8;
9. G. Blöschl, H. Thybo, H. Savenije (eds.), A voyage through scales: the Earth system in space and time, Baden, Edition Lammerhuber.
10. Y. Courbage & E. Todd, A Convergence of Civilizations : The Transformation of Muslim Societies Around the World, New York: Columbia University Press, 2011, chrs. 1-3;

11. E. Holenstein, "Natural Constraints to Cultural Relativism Example: Ricci’s Pacific-Centered World Maps, Asiatische Studien - Études Asiatiques, vol. 73, no. 3, 2019, pp. 379-397. https://doi.org/10.1515/asia-2018-0023.
12. D. Hoerder, Cultures in Contact (Comparative and International Working-Class History), Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2011, parr. 1.1, 1.2, 1.3;
13. S. Graham, When Infrastructures Fail, in S. Graham, Disrupted Cities. When Infrastructure Fails, New York and London, Routledge, 2010, pp. 1-25.

14. M. Neve, "Housing Identities: At the Roots of Present-Day Belonging's Uneasiness", Köz-Gazdaság - Review of Economic Theory and Policy, 16(3), 2021, 57-76.

15. L. Leontidou, "«Smart Cities» of the debt crisis: grassroots creativity in Mediterranean Europe", The Greek Review of Social Research, special issue, 144 Α ́, 2015, 69-101.
16. M. Neve, Cities' Mind: Some Lessons Learnt From the Mediterranean, in Urban Forms of Life, forthcoming.
17. Chr. Bonneuil and J.-B. Fressoz, The Shock of the Anthropocene, London: Verso, 2016, chrs. 1-2.

18. F. Jullien, Living Off Landscape: or the Unthought-of in Reason, Lanham (MD), Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2018, pp. 15-16, 27-40.

19. M. Neve, Are We Turning into Flatlanders? Mapping and Human Complexity, in Travelling Maps, forthcoming.

Metodi didattici

Course will be taught through a mixture of formal lectures and discussion classes. Its aim will be to facilitate interaction between the lecturer and students and to stimulate debate among students.
Class attendance is critical to take advantage of a way of learning not feasible through homework, and it turns out to be crucial in order for the student to adequately satisfy exam requirements.

Modalità di verifica e valutazione dell'apprendimento

ATTENDING STUDENTS

The final exam consists of an interview involving only the theoretical and methodological issues presented during the course.

 

NON-ATTENDING STUDENTS

The exam consists of an oral examination on the entire course’s bibliography.

 

FINAL GRADING

Given the importance of class attendance for an appropriate training process there will be two distinct grading scales: for attending and non-attending students.

 

ATTENDING STUDENTS
Active participation and mid-term test count for 30% each of the final grade, while student’s presentation (prepared on one of the class’ topics) and final interview count for 20% each of the final grade.

The achievement of a coherent framework of the course's topics, the application of critical thinking and suitable means of expression will be considered and evaluated with the maximum grading = A (27-30 con lode).
A predominantly mnemonic acquisition of course's contents and discontinuous language and logical skills will be assessed in a grading range from good (B = 24-26) to satisfactory (C = 21-23).
A minimum level of knowledge of the course contents, combined with training gaps or inadequate expression, will get as grade ‘barely passing' (D = 18-20).
The absence of a minimum level of knowledge of the course's contents, combined with inadequate expression and training gaps, will produce a fail (E) grading, even in spite of an assiduous attendance.

NON-ATTENDING STUDENTS
Non-attending students’ work will be assessed exclusively on the ground of course's bibliography specifically devoted to them, in order to properly present the contents of the course.

The knowledge of course’s literature, when combined with the achievement of a coherent framework of the course's topics, the application of critical thinking, and suitable means of expression will be considered and evaluated with the maximum grading = A (27-30 con lode).

A predominantly mnemonic acquisition of course's contents along with discontinuous language and logical skills will be assessed in a grading range from good (B = 24-26) to satisfactory (C = 21- 23).
A minimum level of knowledge of the course contents, combined with training gaps or inadequate language and logical skills, will get as grade ‘barely passing' (D = 18-20).
The absence of a minimum level of knowledge of the course contents, combined with inadequate language and logical skills and training gaps, will produce a fail (E) grading.

 

 

AS OF JANUARY 2016, THE LIMIT TO THE NUMBER OF ENTRIES FOR EVERY EXAM'S LIST HAS BEEN REMOVED, SO, ONCE THE LISTS ARE OPEN (15 DAYS BEFORE THE EXAM) YOU MAY REGISTER WITH NO LIMITS. OF COURSE, IF THE NUMBER OF STUDENTS ENROLLED EXCEEDS 20, EXAM WILL LAST MORE DAYS. THE NUMBER OF EXAMINATIONS FOR EACH ACADEMIC YEAR IS 6, ACCORDING TO THE MINIMUM NUMBER REQUIRED BY THE TEACHING REGULATION OF THE SCHOOL, TWO FOR EACH PRE-EXAM BREAK. EXAMINATIONS' DATES WILL BE AVAILABLE AT THE BEGINNING OF EACH SEMESTER. THEY ARE NOT ACCEPTED, FOR ANY REASON, REQUESTS FOR EXAMINATIONS IN DIFFERENT YEAR'S PERIODS.

IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE NEW EXAMS' SCHEDULE, REARRANGED TO MEETING THE STUDENTS' REQUESTS, THE ORDER OF REGISTRATION TO THE LIST OF EACH EXAM'S DAY WILL NOT BE CHANGED. WHOEVER HAD SPECIFIC REASONS TO TAKE THE EXAM IN A GIVEN DAY (AND CONSIDERING THAT THE EXAMS WILL BE HELD ON MORE DAYS) IS ALLOWED TO CONTACT HIS/HER COLLEAGUES AND ASK FOR SHIFTING THE LIST, PROVIDED THAT THE NUMBER OF EXAMS EXPECTED FOR THAT DAY MUST REMAIN THE SAME.

INFORMATION ABOUT EXAMS AND PROGRAM OF EXAMINATION ARE TO BE FOUND ONLY ON THE DEDICATED WEB PAGES, THROUGH THE TEACHER-STUDENTS' LIST, THROUGH THE PROGRAMME’S TUTOR. OTHER SOURCES OF INFORMATION ARE TO BE CONSIDERED AS UNRELIABLE AND WILL NOT BE TAKEN INTO CONSIDERATION.

Strumenti a supporto della didattica

Lectures with main topics discussed with students. Multimedia tools.

Orario di ricevimento

Consulta il sito web di Mario Angelo Neve