Philosophy of geography

Philosophy of geography is the subfield of philosophy which deals with epistemological, metaphysical, and axiological issues in geography, with geographic methodology in general, and with more broadly related issues such as the perception and representation of space and place.

Though methodological issues concerning geographical knowledge have been debated for centuries, Richard Hartshorne (1899–1992) is often credited with its first major systematic treatment in English, The Nature of Geography: A Critical Survey of Current Thought in the Light of the Past, which appeared in 1939, and which prompted several volumes of critical essays in subsequent decades. John Kirtland Wright (1891–1969), an American geographer notable for his cartography and study of the history of geographical thought, coined the related term geosophy in 1947, for this kind of broad study of geographical knowledge. Other books oft-cited as key works in the field include David Harvey's 1969 Explanation in Geography and Henri Lefebvre's 1974 The Production of Space. It was a discussion of issues raised by the latter which in part inspired the founding of a Society for Philosophy and Geography in the 1990s.