Undergraduate / Courses

GEOG 100 Introduction to Geography
Introduction to the study of human geography and the major themes of the discipline. Topics include: human-environment interactions, migration and human mobility, patterns of health and nutrition, industrialization and urbanization, and the geography of culture and politics.

GEOG 102 World Regions
Spatial study of world regions, based on historical, cultural, political, economic, and other factors. An attempt to understand the underlying forces that have led to the formation of regions and regional patterns.

GEOG 111 Global Youth
Global transformations in economic prospects and cultural possibilities have catapulted young people to the center of political life internationally. Tellingly, the World Bank focused its 2007 World Development Report on youth transitions to adulthood. But how can we connect the struggles of youth elsewhere with our own concerns? Global Youth 111 allows students to discuss the links between their own lives and those of students in other global contexts, with particular reference to health threats, environmental transformation, and educational change. More broadly, the course examines how a focus on young people might inform our understanding of key aspects of global social and political change. The course might be of interest not only to students early in their university careers but also to juniors and seniors keen to think creatively around the themes of youth, social justice, and global change.

GEOG 123 Introduction to Globalization
Provides an introduction to the debates over globalization. Focuses on the growth and intensification of global ties. Addresses the resulting inequalities and tensions, as well as the new opportunities for cultural and political exchange. Topics include the impacts on government, finance, labor, culture, the environment, health, and activism.
website

GEOG 195 Special Topics in Geography

GEOG 200 Introduction to Human Geography
Patterns and systems of human occupancy of the world. Emphasis on cultural processes, dynamic change, functional relations, networks, and diffusion models.

GEOG 205 Introduction to Physical Sciences and the Environment
Major atmospheric, hydrologic, and geomorphic processes used to interpret the character, distribution, and human significance of different natural and human-altered environments. Includes laboratory exercises for science and non-science majors, geography majors and nonmajors.

GEOG 207 Economic Geography
The changing locations and spatial patterns of economic activity, including: production in agriculture, manufacturing, and services; spatial economic principles of trade, transportation, communications, and corporate organization; regional economic development, and the diffusion of technological innovation.

GEOG 208 Geography of the World Economy: Regional Fortunes and the Rise of Global Markets
Examines the relationship between the globalization of economic activity and regional development. Topics include international trade, colonialism, industrial capitalism, advanced capitalism, and the globalization of labor markets.

GEOG 230 Urbanization and Development: Geographies of Global Inequality
Examines global to local interactions of economic, political, and social forces shaping urbanization and development processes across the globe. Provides an introduction to critical development studies, focusing on Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Also examines debates over the causes and geographic patterns of social inequality worldwide.

GEOG 236 Geography of Greater China
Studies the geography of development processes, patterns, and problems in "Greater China": mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Covers physical geography, history, and economic and political systems, with major focus on geographical issues in China's development: agriculture, population, industry and trade, and relations with Hong Kong and Taiwan.

GEOG 245 Geographic perspectives on U.S. Population Diversity
Introduction to population geography. Offers a practical understanding of population processes (fertility, mortality, and migration); knowledge of geographic variation in population structures and characteristics; knowledge of data sources for demographic research; experience using formal demographic methods for geographic research; and an appreciation for the demographic underpinnings of contemporary social issues.

GEOG 258 Maps and GIS
Explores how people represent the world with maps and geographic information systems (GIS). Trains students in map use for basic navigation, urban management, and environmental analysis. Considers role of spatial databases in commerce, decision-making, and analysis. Helps map readers better determine quality, usefulness, and representation of information.

GEOG 270 Geographies and International Development and Environmental Change
Considers the meaning of development and how debates over international development link to environmental concerns. Examines how the globalization of agricultural production and debates over genetically modified food alter ideas about development, nature, and the environment. Addresses fair trade policies and practices and the obligations of multinational corporations.

GEOG 271 Geography of Food and Eating
Examines food production, distribution, and consumption issues across geographic scales. Focus ranges from the microcosm of the individual body to food and eating at the national and global scales. Explores the political, social, cultural, and economic dimensions of food and eating in particular spaces, places, environments, contexts, and regions.

GEOG 276 Introduction to Political Geographyy
Examines both the geography of politics and the politics of geography at a variety of spatial scales and in different global locations. Typical topics include: geographies of the state and state power; geopolitics and globalization; national and local politics, and other politics of culture, health, nature, and the body.

GEOG 277 Geography of Cities
Study of (1) systems of cities--their location, distribution, functions, and competition; and (2) their internal structure--the location of activities within urban areas. Particular emphasis on current urban problems-sprawl, housing, segregation, economic growth, and metropolitan transportation.

GEOG 280 Introduction to the Geography of Health and Health Care
Concepts of health from a geographical viewpoint, including human-environment relations, development, geographical patterns of disease, and health systems in developed and developing countries.

GEOG 295 Special Topics in Geography

GEOG 300 Concepts of Regions
Historical development and application of the concept of region. Examines systematically how varied societies constitute parts of a total world order.

GEOG 301 Cultural Geography
Analysis of the role of culture in the formation of landscape patterns; components of culture that contribute not only to a "sense of place," but also to the mosaic of settlement patterns and occupancy that can be traced to culture.

GEOG 302 The Pacific Northwest
Settlement pattern in the Pacific Northwest, emphasizing economic and historical factors, including the location of resource-oriented industries, policies regarding the use of public lands, and bases of the development of major urban areas in the region.

GEOG 304 Western Europe
Physical and socioeconomic characteristics of western Europe. Contemporary political and economic integration trends in their regional context.

GEOG 308 Canada: A Geographic Interpretation
Examines the overlapping economic, cultural, and political geographies shaping life in contemporary Canada. Topics include: free trade, constitutional crisis, feminism in Canada, aboriginal politics, and border region phenomena. Attention paid to how specific geographic interpretations of Canada by Canadians actually play a part in national life.

GEOG 310 Immigrant America: Trends and Policies from a Geographic Perspective
Examines U.S. immigration trends and policies from a geographic perspective. Topics include where immigrants come from, where they settle in the United States. immigrant employment enclaves, the effects of U.S. immigration policy on immigrant settlement and employment patterns, illegal immigration, citizenship, and barriers to immigrant success in the United States.

GEOG 313 East Asia
Introduction to the contemporary geography of East Asia, including China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, and Korea. Topics include: physical geography, historical settings, general development patterns, agriculture, population, industry, and trade. Focuses on major geographic issues in development. Case studies from different countries used to illustrate various themes.

GEOG 315 Explanation and Understanding in Geography
Covers the beginning steps in the research process. Introduces the discipline of geography, the department, and current faculty through the research aims of explanation and understanding that frame social scientific inquiry. Students develop basic library and writing skills as preparation for future research methods classes and independent research.

GEOG 316 Urban Economics
Application of economic analysis to urban trends, problems, and prescriptions, such as changing urban form and function, urban public finance, housing and renewal, poverty and race, transportation, and environmental problems.

GEOG 326 Quantitative Methods in Geography
Introduction to quantitative methods in geography, with a primary focus on statistical techniques. Examines the basic concepts, reasoning, and procedures geographers use in developing, analyzing, applying, and presenting quantitative methods. Topics include: generating and describing data; elementary probability, hypothesis testing, comparative tests; finding relationships; and using and misusing statistics.

GEOG 330 Latin America: Landscapes of Change
Examines operation of economic, social, and political processes across countries of Latin America-on international, national, and local scales-to understand common issues facing the region and different impacts in particular countries. Topics include internationalization of Latin American economies; agrarian and urban change; popular movements.

GEOG 333 Russia's Changing Landscape
The Russian landscape as it has been affected by Soviet planning, migration and settlement, urbanization, industrialization, the results of collectivization in agriculture, and the growth of a transport network.

GEOG 335 Geography of the Developing World
Characteristics and causes, external and internal, of Third World development and obstacles to that development. Special attention to demographic and agricultural patterns, resource development, industrialization and urbanization, drawing on specific case studies from Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

GEOG 336 Development and Challenge in China
Examines the geography of China's development since 1949. Introduces China's physical geography, history, and economic and political system. Emphasizes China's uneven development in agriculture, population, industry, and trade. Also examines problems China faces in meeting its internal food demand, as well as the external processes of globalization.

GEOG 342 Geography of Inequality
Geographies of social, political, and economic inequality. Focus is usually on North American cities. Examines the theoretical underpinning of inequality. Explores topics such as the spatial distribution of wealth and poverty, the geographies of exclusion, and discrimination in paid employment and housing.

GEOG 344 Migration in the Global Economy
Analyzes the relationship between human mobility in the late 20th century and changes in the global economy. Allows the students to gain familiarity with scholarly research on international migration from a diversity of approaches and methods.

GEOG 349 Geography of International Trade
Introduces the theories and practice of international trade and foreign direct investment. Topics include: trade theory and policy; economic integration; currency markets and foreign exchange; trade operations and logistics; the international regulatory environment; and marketing, location and entry, and finance, accounting, and taxation.

GEOG 350 Local Economies and Market Areas
Intermediate economic geography. Methods and concepts for analysis of economic and business patterns, processes, and problems at regional and local levels. Tools for collecting, organizing, and analyzing data for investigating local economic issues.

GEOG 360 Principles of GIS Mapmaking
Provides students with an opportunity to learn and use concepts, techniques, and software tools that are part of geographic information systems (GIS). GIS brings together traditional cartographic principles, computer assisted analytical cartography, relational database design, and digital image processing and analysis to enable people to develop geospatial databases, analyze those databases and depict them in the form of 2D and 3D map displays. Students apply principles of map design for different types of maps depicting sustainability – social, economic, and environmental - topics at geographic scales from global to local. Students practice critical thinking skills during geographic information representation and use of GIS mapping software. Geography 360 is for undergraduate students, and graduate students should register for Geography 560. No previous work in GIS is necessary.

GEOG 366 Introduction to Regional Economic Development
The process of regional economic development. Theories and conceptualizations of economic growth and structural change, technological change and industrial development, spatial variation in economic activities and government policies.

GEOG 367 Economic Uses of Geographic Information
Uses of area data and the geographic information systems (GISs) that handle them in routing, marketing, service-are assessment, and site location. Considers key economic-geography concepts, marketing approaches, questions of data availability and suitability, and GIS.

GEOG 370 Problems in Resource Management
Principles and practices of effective conservation and utilization of natural resources. Role of technology in resource use. Physical, political, and economic aspects of resource management for food, population, land, water, air, energy, and timber resources.

GEOG 371 World Hunger and Resource Development
Addresses issues of hunger and poverty in their relationship to resource development at the local, national, and global levels. Examines various approaches to the problem of world hunger rooted in critical development studies.

GEOG 375 Geopolitics
An introduction to both political geography and geopolitics, addressing the fundamental links between power and space. Topics covered include: theories of power, space, and modernity; the formation of modern states; international geopolitics in the aftermath of the Cold War; the post-colonial nation-state; and the geopolitics of resistance.

GEOG 377 Urban Political Geography
Examines how the spatial structure of cities and towns affects and is affected by political processes. Considers both traditional and newer forms of politics, as global and local issues. Special attention paid to where politics take place within local contexts across state, civil society, home, and the body.

GEOG 378 Policing the City
Investigates how and why formal and informal order is established in urban areas, how this order produces advantages and disadvantages, and possibilities of alternative visions of order. Topics include formal means of control (zoning, laws, policing, building codes) and informal means of control (gossip, ostracism, peer pressure, local politics).

GEOG 380 Geographical Patterns of Health and Disease
Geography of infectious and chronic diseases at local, national, and international scales; environmental, cultural, and social explanations of those variations; comparative aspects of health systems.

GEOG 395 Special Topics in Geography

GEOG 401 Culture, Capital, and the City
Examines current themes in social theory as they apply to the urban landscape. Includes the interconnections of cultural and economic processes and the spatial patternings of race, class, and gender in the modern urban context.

GEOG 425 Qualitative Methodology in Geography
Historical and philosophical overview of qualitative methodology in design of geography research strategies. Techniques of interviewing, participant observation, and archival research. Forms of analyses such as textual interpretation, discourse analysis and computer-aided analyses of interview transcriptions and ethnography. Questions of ethics, field notes and write-up.

GEOG 426 Quantitative Methods in Geography
Quantitative methods for empirical research in geography. Emphasis on statistical analysis; use of geographic data bases like the United States Census; understanding special issues and problems associated with geographically ordered data; verbal and graphic presentation in a computer environment.

GEOG 430 Contemporary Development Issues in Latin America
Contemporary development issues in Latin America, seen from a spatial perspective. Concept of development; competing theories as related to various Latin American states. Economic structural transformation, migration, urbanization, regional inequality, and related policies.

GEOG 431 Geography and Gender
Examines theories and case studies across international, national, and regional scales in order to illustrate the impacts of social and economic processes upon the construction of gender in particular places.

GEOG 432 Population and Urbanization Problems of Russia and the Newly Independent States
Historical background and evolution of Soviet/Russian population and urbanization processes and problems. Distinguishing demographic characteristics and recent trends in the growth and migration of rural and urban populations. Analysis of problems associated with ethnicity and nationality, regional-temporal labor demand and supply issues, and spatial-temporal well-being.

GEOG 433 Resource Use and Management in Russia and the Newly Independent States
Geographic and historical background of the natural resource base of Russia and the Newly Independent States. Geographic and historical perspectives on Soviet natural resource use and management in theory and practice. Implications of the breakup of the USSR for natural resource use and management.

GEOG 435 Industrialization and Urbanization in China
Examines the impacts of industrialization strategies adopted by the Peoples Republic of China on urbanization and rural-urban relations. Topics include: economic development strategies, industrial geography, rural industrialization, urban development patterns, migration, and urbanization policies.

GEOG 436 Social and Political Geographies of South Asia
Introduces the social and political geographies of South Asia through reference to agrarian change in India. Outlines key concepts related to the reproduction of inequality in the region, particularly theories of caste, class, gender, and religious communalism, and examines the mechanisms through which these inequalities are reproduced in South Asia.

GEOG 439 Gender, Race, and the Geography of Employment
Focuses on the geography of employment for men and women of different racial and ethnic backgrounds in American cities. Presents evidence on labor market inequality for different groups and explanations of these differences. Emphasizes the importance of a spatial perspective in understanding employment outcomes for women and minorities.

GEOG 440 Regional Analysis
Regional industrial structures and economic change. Application of shift-share, cohort, multiplier, input/output, and programming models to the analysis and projection of regional population and employment patterns, regional growth differentials, and regional impact analysis. Recommended:

GEOG 443 Location and Movement Models
Application of models of optimum location and allocation; assignment, transportation, and spatial equilibrium; spatial interaction; geographic simulation; and spatial diffusion.

GEOG 445 Geography of Housing
Focuses on the geography of housing, especially in the United States. Topics include: the American dream of home ownership; housing affordability and differential access to home ownership; homelessness; the history of public housing; hosing demography; residential mobility and neighborhood change, and discrimination in the housing market.

GEOG 447 The Geography of Air Transportation
Geographic analysis of world air routes, passenger and cargo flows, and airport activities; consideration of physical, economic, political, and institutional determinants of routes and flows.

GEOG 448 Geography of Transportation
Circulation geography, principles of spatial interaction emphasizing commodity flow, the nature and distribution of rail and water transport, the role of transport in area development.

GEOG 449 Geography of Ocean Transportation
Geographic analysis of ocean trade routes, cargo and passenger flows, and port activities. Evaluation of the role of the transportation carrier in international trade.

GEOG 451 Cultural Geography of Latin America
Interdisciplinary senior seminar examining how physical and social geographies are culturally constructed and interconnected with subjectivities and power in Latin America. Topics include identity formation grounded in particular territories and the social constitution of space via an interplay of material and cultural forces.

GEOG 461 Urban Geographic Information Systems
designed for students with previous introductory-level coursework in GIS who wish to develop further expertise in urban applications of GIS. Within this focus on urban applications, students explore urban spatial analysis and decision making in a GIS environment, including project planning, spatial data acquisition, data preparation and coding, analysis and visualization of project findings, and communication and implementation of project results. Students gain experience in locating and obtaining geospatial data from local, state, and federal government sources; developing primary data for urban spatial analysis; and analyzing and representing these data using a desktop GIS software. We examine a range of urban applications of GIS by local government, but also non-governmental users such as neighborhood activist organizations, paying particular attention to the differing hardware, software, data, and ‘human’ resources and needs of these different user groups. Geography 360/560 or an equivalent is a prerequisite background for this course. Geography 461 is for undergraduate students, and graduate students should register for Geography 561

GEOG 462 Coastal GIS
Provides students with a learning experience that links the theory underlying geographic information systems with its application in a coastal application domain. The course combines an overview of general principles of geographic information science and practical experience in the analytical use of geospatial information. The lectures introduce students to the analytical treatment of geographic information using several frameworks for understanding data, software operations, and systems. The course adopts a thematic focus on coastal concerns in the Puget Sound Region, particularly nearshore vulnerability using an environment-society perspective. Coastal is defined as the watershed basins that drain into Puget Sound as well as the water of Puget Sound, including social and natural features in those areas. Student lab assignments using GIS software make use of coastal data sets from Puget Sound to address feature measurement, characterization, and movement related to the land-water interface. Geography 360/560 or an equivalent is a prerequisite background for this course. Geography 462 is for undergraduate students, and graduate students should register for Geography 562.

GEOG 464 GIS-Based Decision Support
Provides students with a learning experience about “GIS methods” in the context of several pervasive decision support contexts facing urban-regional settings. Two significant categories characterize the decision support contexts – topics and decision situations. Three inter-related topics – land use, transportation, and water resources – are fundamental to how people upgrade and/or degrade the quality of life in communities, each having a significant influence on the natural environment. Three pervasive decision situations – planning, improvement programming, and project implementation – are ways that communities attempt to address quality of life changes in the long, medium and short terms. Students work with GIS methods in both commercial-off-the-shelf and customized software to address various decision support scenarios that characterize those nine contexts (of 3 topics by 3 decision situations). Students gain exposure to group-based decision support methods to address those nine contexts; those contexts being among the most complex and important topics in the 21st century, particularly in coastal urban-regional settings where pressures from population growth are continuing to place pressures on natural resources in ever expanding ways. Geography 461/561 or 462/562 are the respective prerequisite background for this course. Geography 464 is for undergraduate students, and graduate students should register for Geography 564

GEOG 465 Databases and Programming
Provides students with a learning experience that links the development and use of databases set within the context of a computer programming activity. Digital maps have always been thought of as databases used for analysis as much as they have been for display. GIS databases are the foundation of GIS work, whether for analysis and/or display. We emphasize “transformations” within and among spatial database management, spatial analysis, and geovisualization display techniques. Each of those technique areas involves a type of language for processing data and converting it into information as appropriate to context. The course makes a connection to the four user-interface modes of ArcGIS geoprocessing: command line, dialog box, ModelBuilder, and Python Scripting. Each has its advantages. The course lab assignments focus on the Python programming/scripting interface so that students can develop skills with a programming/scripting language. Students will undertake lab exercises to learn about ArcGIS geoprocessing, making use of environmentally related datasets (air, soils, and water) provided by instructors. Students can work in study groups, but assignments will be turned in as individuals. Geography 461/561 or 462/562 is a prerequisite background for this course. Geography 465 is for undergraduate students, and graduate students should register for Geography 565.

GEOG 466 Regional Economic Development
Provides a theoretical overview of sub-national, regional economic growth and structural change, including the roles of interregional interaction and international trade, technological change, social, and legal institutions. Emphasizes inter-regional disparities in the context of relatively wealthy countries. Explores the constraints and effectiveness of government (and other organizations') policy.

GEOG 469 GIS Workshop
Designed as the capstone experience in the Department of Geography GIS curriculum. The main course goal is that students become independent and effective GIS users who can develop and use GIS databases for spatial analysis and problem solving, meeting the needs of project partners. The course is an intensive workshop that involves hands-on experience in which student teams will develop GIS data analysis as part of applications working in collaboration with local partners (who may be from the University, community agencies, or local government). In contrast to introductory GIS courses (which ask you to build conceptual understanding and applied skills in spatial data representation and manipulation in GIS), this course immerses students in the full range of tasks associated with a GIS application. Working in teams, students communicate with project partners to identify project goals, acquire and prepare spatial data for GIS data analysis, communicate with project partners to assess progress, manage spatial data, and produce necessary maps for presentation as part of a final report. In lecture and readings, students examine GIS project management strategies (in a variety of organizational and application contexts), and concepts and skills for data acquisition, data preparation, and database design. Geography 460, 461, Urban Design and Planning 422, or permission of the instructor is the necessary background to enroll in this course. Geography 469 is for undergraduate students, and graduate students should register for Geography 569.

GEOG 471 Methods of Resource Analysis
Economic and noneconomic criteria for resource analysis. Theory and methods of linear models of natural resource analysis. Includes materials-balance modeling, residuals management, constrained system optimization approaches to water quality analysis, land-use patterns and interregional energy use, and multiple objective planning techniques applied to natural resource problems.

GEOG 472 Ecoscapes: Nature, Culture, and Place
Relationship between nature, culture, and place as the heart of geographic inquiry. Examines how perceptions of nature are influenced by changing political-economic, cultural, and scientific practices. Uses cultural studies of ecological science as a primary method of analysis.

GEOG 474 Geography and the Law
Examines the relationship between geography, law, and socio-legal analysis; reviews significant instances where law and geography intersect, such as the regulation of public space, the regulation of borders and mobility, and disputes over property and land use.

GEOG 476 Women and the City
Explores the reciprocal relations between gender relations, the layout of cities, and the activities of urban residents. Topics include: feminist theory and geography (women, gender, and the organization of space); women and urban poverty, housing and homelessness; gender roles and labor patterns; geographies of childcare; and women and urban politics.

GEOG 477 Advanced Urban Geography
Geographic patterns and social processes within metropolitan areas. Canvases current research topics, methods, and theoretical debates in urban geography. Issues covered range across urban economic, political, and cultural geography.

GEOG 478 Intraurban Spatial Patterns
Geographic patterns and processes within metropolitan areas. Economic land-use patterns (commercial and industrial location), social land-use patterns (segregation, housing, and neighborhood change), urban political geography, analysis of urban infrastructure, and assessment of contemporary and future trends in urban development.

GEOG 479 Race, Ethnicity, and the American City
Explores America's cities as sites where ethnic and racial interaction have generated specific patterns of opportunity and disadvantage in housing and labor markets; how ethnic identities and racial formations are changed by living and working in cities, and questions of assimilation, multiculturalism, and America's ethno-racial future.

GEOG 480 Environmental Geography, Climate, and Health
Demonstrates and investigates how human-environment relations are expressed in the context of health and disease. Local and global examples emphasize the ways medical geography is situated at the intersection of the social, physical, and biological sciences. Examines interactions between individual health, public health, and social, biological, and physical phenomena.

GEOG 490 Field Research: The Seattle Region
Field methods for contemporary urban research. Survey designs used in the analysis of transportation, land use, location of employment, shopping and housing, political fragmentation, and environmental degradation. Field report required, based on field work in the Seattle region.

GEOG 493 Assessing Geographic Learning
Enables graduating geography majors to articulate and assess their academic development and professional readiness by examining ways of representing geographic skills and capabilities.

GEOG 494 Senior Essay
Supervised individual research and writing of major paper during senior year.

GEOG 495 Special Topics
Topics vary and are announced in the preceding quarter.

GEOG 496 Internship in Geography
Internship in the public or private sector, supervised by a faculty member. Credit/no credit only.

GEOG 497 Tutorial in Geography
Intensive directed study and tutoring. Literature reviews, formulations of project outlines and research designs, orientation in contemporary geographic thought and trends. Directed writing.

GEOG 498 Undergraduate Seminar in Economic Geography and Regional Science
Selected advanced topics and current problems in economic geography. Emphasis on formulating research questions, developing an appropriate research process, selecting methods, searching for resources, writing up and documenting research results, and using the Internet for research purposes.

GEOG 499 Special Studies
Supervised reading programs, undergraduate and graduate library and field research; special projects for undergraduate honors students.