Articles tagged with: geography

Phillip Mackintosh’s Newspaper City nominated for Heritage Toronto award

Thursday, October 11, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

Phillip Mackintosh’s Newspaper City: Toronto’s Street Surfaces and the Liberal Press, 1860-1935 has been nominated for a Heritage Toronto book award for Historical Writing.

Newspaper City tells the story of how the Toronto Globe and Toronto Daily Star campaigned for surface infrastructure improvements as liberal editors saw this as the leading expression of modern urbanity. This book traces the opinions expressed in news articles over 75 years to understand the conflict between newspaper editors and property owners who resisted paying for infrastructure improvements.

Winners will be announced at the 2018 Heritage Toronto Awards Ceremony on Monday, October 29, 2018.

Tags: awards, book, geography, Human Geography, Phillip Mackintosh, research
Categories: News
Brock family’s music tradition grows into Cicada festival

Thursday, October 11, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

FROM THE BROCK NEWS | TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 2018 | by Jeannie Mackintosh

Ben Goerzen and Erik Dickson (BA ’11) visit Henley Island, the site of this year’s Cicada Music & Arts Festival.

A music tradition that began in a Brock family’s backyard more than 20 years ago will have its sounds resonate across picturesque Henley Island this fall.

Cicada Music & Arts Festival started as an annual gathering of family and friends at the St. Catharines home of Thom Lepp and Karin Perry, Brock’s Program Co-ordinator, Training and Development for the Faculty of Graduate Studies.

The event began as a platform for budding neighbourhood musicians to share their craft, including Lepp and Perry’s son Evan, who is now a Brock Geography student.

When the festival outgrew the backyard, Lepp organized the event at various Niagara venues.

Although he passed away from cancer in 2017, the festival he created to foster young singer-songwriters continues in his honour. Three former Brock students — Ben Goerzen, Erik Dickson and Kaitlin Sanders — have taken up the challenge this year of organizing an expanded version of Cicada on Saturday, Oct. 13.

The festival’s lineup features established Canadian musicians — including Juno Award-winning indie rockers Dan Mangan and Said the Whale, and powerhouse Terra Lightfoot — but, in keeping with the festival’s roots, also showcases several rising stars.

All profits from Cicada Music & Arts this year will benefit research and awareness for prostate cancer and mental health through the Movember Foundation Canada.

As a child, Goerzen used to perform on Lepp and Perry’s backyard stage. He has now taken on the role of Cicada’s director, while Dickson (BA ’11) is the festival’s artistic director and Sanders, who studied Economics at the University, is managing vendors and media relations.

Goerzen, who studied Human Geography at Brock and later coached the women’s volleyball team, said Cicada exemplifies the concept of “Gemeinschaft,” a sense of community that he learned about from Associate Professor Chris Fullerton.

“It’s how we define ourselves in spaces,” he said. “I see Cicada as a perfect example, people coming together and creating a sense of place.”

A lifelong musician and local entrepreneur, Goerzen is driven by a passion for music and community. He credits his experience coaching at Brock for instilling in him crucial leadership and management skills he now brings to Cicada.

Similarly, Dickson’s extracurricular activities provided valuable experience. After completing his studies in Political Science, he continued to work at Brock, acquiring marketing and graphic design skills on the job before transitioning to music promotion.

The friends hope that Cicada will become a fixture in Niagara’s music scene and are already talking about what the festival might look like over the next five years.

“I see this as an opportunity to give back to a community that has given so much to me,” Dickson said. “Brock brought me here, and Brock keeps me here.”

For information on the event, to volunteer or to purchase tickets, visit the Cicada Festival website.

STORY REPOSTED FROM THE BROCK NEWS

Tags: Chris Fullerton, event, geography, Human Geography, music, student
Categories: News
Dr. Kevin Turner returns from fieldwork in northern Yukon

Monday, July 09, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

Dr. Kevin Turner and graduate students, Joe Viscek and Brent Thorne, recently returned from completing fieldwork in northern Yukon where they’re investigating the influence of changing climate and landscape conditions (fire and erosion) on lakes and rivers. Here are some photos from their time in the field. Learn more about Dr. Turner’s research.

Photos by Kevin Turner and Brent Thorne.

Tags: fieldwork, geography, graduate studies, Kevin Turner, northern Canada, research, Yukon
Categories: News
Brock prof’s book explores how cities were built for hurry

Monday, July 09, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

Architectures of Hurry — Mobilities, Cities and Modernity is a collection of 12 historical essays co-edited by Brock Associate Professor of Geography and Tourism Studies Phillip Gordon Mackintosh.

Story from The Brock News

June 25, 2018

Hurry up and wait. It’s a way of life in society today.

We weave in and out of traffic, sprint toward closing subway doors and run up and down escalators, but in the end we usually end up at a bottleneck being forced to do what we were trying to avoid: wait.

This is the central insight of Architectures of Hurry — Mobilities, Cities and Modernity, a collection of 12 historical essays co-edited by Brock Associate Professor of Geography and Tourism Studies Phillip Gordon Mackintosh.

The book examines the development of transportation modes and infrastructure as facilitators of hurry — as opposed to speed — in cities across the world, including London, Beijing, Buenos Aires, Toronto and Montreal, throughout the 1800s and 1900s.

The goal of this development was not only to increase the range, scope and speed of travel, but also to abet the modern urge to hurry, which often results in the opposite of hurry.

The various essays explore the evolution of transportation from horse and buggy to bicycles, automobiles, buses and subways, as well as the development of infrastructure such as street layouts, surfaces, rail routes and buildings to support new modes of mobility in a hurrying world.

There have been some unexpected innovations that helped facilitate travel. For example, one of the essays looks at the creation of a hotel industry in 19th century Montreal.

“This enables people to find home anywhere,” says Mackintosh. “You can now hurry around the world and find temporary shelter in any city. But this also means you’re waiting, often frustrated, in lines to check-in or check-out of hotels or airports, dropping off or collecting luggage, waiting for transport or transit.”

Another essay discusses the rapid appearance and disappearance of business exchanges in Lower Manhattan during the late 1800s.

“The buildings themselves live according to what geographers talk about as ‘geographical mobility,’” says Mackintosh. “We forget that many buildings have short lifespans, that the solidity of bricks and mortar can be fleeting. The only certainty is the land they sit on. Some buildings come into and slip out of existence with such remarkable ease, we can think of them as having a similar mobility as their occupants.”

Weaving the essays together is the central theme of hurry, perhaps the motivator of speed and efficiency. It reflects — and perhaps incites — our “pursuit of quality of life, convenience, comfort, power, security, consumption and accumulation,” says the book’s closing essay.

“We distinguish between speed and hurry,” Mackintosh says. “Speed is likely the implementation of hurry, which may well be instinctual, but is certainly part of the human geographical imagination.”

Mackintosh says the ‘hurry’ impulse that propelled cities’ interest in infrastructure development is still with us today. He says it’s fascinating that what we call “traffic generation” and “traffic volume” are measurable consequences of hurry.

“In North America, we knew over a century ago how to generate traffic. We chose to generate it with cars, but we could have just as easily generated it with public transit systems. For reasons good and bad, we didn’t,” he says.

This is probably because we don’t give enough thought to hurry.

“Everybody hurries, yet we rarely consider why beyond our immediate instrumental concerns. Part of our desire to hurry grounds to the urban capitalist imperative, but hurry isn’t modern. Hunter-gatherers hurried, so did early seed-sowers and classical Romans. Hurry predates capitalism and modern cities,” says Mackintosh.

We train ourselves to privilege our own hurry above others’. The result, he says, is that people caught up in traffic jams or line-ups become anxious and take out their frustrations on each other through road rage, swearing or other anti-social behaviours, increasing stress levels all around.

The phrase “Architectures of Hurry” comes from E.M. Forster’s 1910 novel Howard’s End, and was the inspiration for Architectures of Hurry — Mobilities, Cities and Modernity.

At one point in Howard’s End, the character Margaret Schlegel calls the modernizing London street, in the new automobile age, an ‘architecture of hurry.’ She worries that the only point of urban life is the accommodation of hurry.

Following their “Architectures of Hurry” conference sessions at the Royal Geographical Society in 2015, Mackintosh and co-editors Richard Dennis, Emeritus Professor of Geography at University College London, and Deryck Holdsworth, Emeritus Professor of Geography at Pennsylvania State University, were approached by an editor from Routledge Publishing who thought that a collection of essays exploring ‘hurry’ would make a good book. The 247-page volume is now available in the James A. Gibson Library.

Story from The Brock News
June 25, 2018

Tags: book, geography, Phillip Mackintosh, publication, research
Categories: News
Brock employees among grads receiving degrees

Monday, July 09, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

Christine Alic, Administrative Assistant for Custodial and Grounds Services, was one of eights Brock employees who graduated this Spring. Alic graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Human Geography.

The Department of Geography and Tourism Studies would like to extend congratulations to Christine Alic for graduating with her Bachelor of Arts in Human Geography this Spring! Christine has worked very hard over the last 7 years to earn this degree. Read more about her story and the other Brock employee grads in the Brock News Story below.

Story from The Brock News
June 7, 2018

It has been a big year for Christine Alic.

In addition to celebrating her 50th birthday, the Administrative Assistant for Custodial and Grounds Services was one of several Brock employees who graduated this week.

Seven years of balancing two courses per semester and working full time at Brock finally paid off for Alic when she graduated Tuesday with a Bachelor of Arts in Human Geography.

“There were times I fantasized about quitting,” she said. “I worked longer hours at work so I could attend daytime classes and I was often up until two or three in the morning reading textbooks and writing papers. I was so tired and frustrated that my degree was taking so long, but I stuck with it.”

As many Brock employees do, Alic took advantage of the University’s tuition waiver, choosing to study Human Geography because of her lifelong interest in how humans and the planet affect each other.

“I didn’t know what I wanted to do when I was younger, so I didn’t go to university,” she said. “When I read some of the course outlines for Human Geography, it sounded like a whole bunch of everything I was interested in — history, politics, sociology and culture.”

As she crossed the Convocation stage, Alic felt a huge sense of accomplishment.

“It was a good feeling,” she said. “For seven years, I put everything I had into my classes. I gave up a lot of free time for my degree. Now that I’ve graduated, I’m going to have to learn to spread out my activities — I don’t have to cram in everything I want to do all at once.”

Along with Alic, several other Brock employees graduated this week.

Marion Barbas, Admissions Officer with the Registrar’s Office, graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Labour Studies. She was the recipient of the Distinguished Graduating Student Award — Labour Studies, which is awarded to the student with highest major average in the Department of Labour Studies.

Barbas’ original plan of taking one general Humanities course quickly escalated after learning about Labour Studies.

“I overheard a group of students talking about how great LABR 1F90 is and how everyone should be required to take it in first year,” she said. “I declared Labour Studies as my major before the course even came to completion.”

Bryan Boles, Associate Vice-President, Ancillary Services, graduated with a Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Human Resources.

Boles is thankful for the opportunity to continue his education in a university focused on experiential learning.

“I’m a big believer in continuous learning and would encourage anyone with the opportunity to keep learning,” he said.

Tyler Harrison, Club and Camp Co-ordinator for Brock Sports, graduated with a Master of Arts in Sport Management.

As a student, Harrison was instrumental in engaging the Brock Sports fan base and the ‘We Are Ready’ campaign. When asked what he plans to do with his degree, Harrison said that he’s “looking forward to continuing to pursue my passion to work in intercollegiate sport here in Canada and abroad.”

Daniel Lonergan, Senior Experiential Education Co-ordinator with Co-op, Career and Experiential Education, graduated with an MBA in Human Resources.

Lonergan plans to use his experience from the MBA program to “continue strengthening the experience for current and future MBA students from an experiential learning point of view,” he said.

Erin Plyley, Academic Advisor with the Faculty of Education and part-time instructor in the Teacher Education program, graduated with a Master of Education in Teaching, Learning and Development.

Plyley is happy and proud to be a “Badger for life,” she said.

“Starting as a Brock student and now having the opportunity to work with students on a daily basis is something I’m grateful for. I love what I do and the incredible students I have met.”

Catharine Pelletier, Senior Platoon Supervisor with Campus Security Services, graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. She was the recipient of the Cara Chefurka Memorial Book Prize, which is awarded to the student with the highest graduating average in Psychology at Spring Convocation.

Sarah Andrews, Communications Operator and Dispatcher with Campus Security Services, graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree.

Phil Alexander, Academic Advisor with the Student Success Centre, graduated with a Bachelor of Education in Adult Learning.

Kristen Nilsen, Change Management Co-ordinator with Human Resources, graduated with a Bachelor of Education with a specialization in Administration and Leadership in Education.

Henry Gerbrandt, Program Services Co-ordinator with the Student Success Centre, graduated with a Bachelor of Accounting with first-class standing.

Gerbrandt says that he’s “thankful for all of the support I received as a student and staff member,” he said.

Story from The Brock News
June 7, 2018

Tags: alumni, convocation, geography
Categories: News
Achievements of Geography and Tourism Studies professors and students recognized by FOSS

Wednesday, January 31, 2018 | By Samantha Morris
The Department of Geography and Tourism Studies would like to congratulate our professors and students who were recognized last week by Brock’s Faculty of Social Sciences at their annual Celebration of Excellence.
- Dr. Julia Baird, Assistant Professor (Canada Research Chair, Human Dimensions of Water Resources and Water Resilience)
- Dr. David Butz, Professor (Brock SSHRC Institutional Grant)
- Dr. Michael Pisaric, Professor (NSERC Discovery Grant)
- Dr. Kevin Turner, Assistant Professor (Canada Foundation for Innovation John R. Evans Leaders Fund)
- Dr. Ebru Ustundag, Associate Professor (Ontario Undergraduate Students Alliance Teaching Excellence Award)
- Katelyn Pierce, MA in Geography student (Ontario Graduate Scholarship)
- Connor Dingle, MA in Geography student (Best Major Research Paper)
Read the full story on the Brock News.

Graduate student award winners and their supervisors and mentors were among the honorees at the Faculty of Social Sciences Celebration of Excellence. From left, Dawn Zinga, Acting Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Research, Megan Earle and supervisor Gordon Hodson, Xiaomei Zhou and supervisor Catherine Mondloch, Christie Milliken accepting on behalf of Devon Coutts, Ebru Ustundag accepting on behalf of Connor Dingle, and Ingrid Makus, Interim Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences.
Tags: awards, David Butz, Ebru Ustundag, funding, geography, graduate studies, Julia Baird, Kevin Turner, MA Geography, Michael Pisaric, research
Categories: News
Groundhog Day highlights the challenges facing those who rely on consistent weather

Tuesday, January 30, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

From the Brock News
TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018 | by Dan Dakin

When it comes to predicting long-term weather, humans hold little advantage over Wiarton Willie or Punxsutawney Phil.

That’s not good news for businesses who need consistent forecasts to succeed, but are increasingly faced with volatile weather patterns.

“Even though short-term weather forecast models have gotten very good, long-term forecasts are not very accurate, so there’s a lot of uncertainty in terms of what’s going to happen,” says Brock Geography and Tourism Studies Professor Tony Shaw. “Industries that rely on the weather have to take necessary precautions. Those uncertainties mean the risks are quite high.”

Shaw says that while January thaws like what we experienced late last week and over the weekend are not unusual, the dramatic swings in temperature are.

“What we’re seeing is changes on a daily basis tend to be on a bit of the extreme,” he says. “With climate change we can expect to see more volatility and variability in the weather.

“On the optimistic side, despite the occasional extreme cold temperatures, winters in Niagara are getting warmer and spring is arriving earlier based on long-term temperature trends.”

Goodman School of Business Professor of Finance Don Cyr says the weather volatility means businesses across many sectors are having to turn to measures such as weather derivatives — financial contracts that protect them by allowing them to hedge weather conditions.

“There is a growing interest in this quasi-insurance market as the weather becomes more volatile,” says Cyr. “Weather-related risk can affect about 25 per cent of the gross domestic product for Canada. In some countries, it’s as high as 40 per cent. It’s pretty significant.”

He says insurance companies and other financial intermediaries have long offered financial protection to industries such as agriculture, tourism and outdoor sport resorts such as golf courses and ski hills.

“These weather contracts allow firms to hedge against systemic weather risks — volatilities that wouldn’t typically be covered through insurance,” says Cyr, adding that these contracts have been famously used by a salon in a mall that noticed a drop in business on sunny weekends and a restaurant chain specializing in outdoor dining to cover their losses due to cool, rainy summers.

Municipalities have also used the contracts to hedge against the unexpected costs of snow removal when winters are worse than expected.

Article reposted from the Brock News

Tags: Anthony Shaw, geography, research
Categories: News
Dr. Phillip Mackintosh’s research on the history of Toronto streets highlighted in the Toronto Star

Tuesday, January 30, 2018 | By Samantha Morris

Toronto’s been road-raging about cars, bikes and streetcars for over 100 years. We’re not about to stop

From The Toronto Star
By KATIE DAUBS, Feature Writer
Fri., Jan. 26, 2018

In the long history of Toronto streets, change has never come easily.

Downtown, where the streets are narrow relics of a Victorian age, there is little middle ground, only middle fingers.

The flipped bird on King St.’s restaurant row is the latest symbol of irritation, a stand-in for the frustration certain business owners feel toward city hall, and a transit pilot they say isn’t working for them.

Toronto was a city of walkers when it was incorporated in 1834, and that remained the main form of transportation (supported by transit) until the growth of its suburbs after the Second World War, says Phillip Gordon Mackintosh. The geography professor at Brock University researched Toronto’s streets for his book Newspaper City: Toronto’s Street Surfaces and the Liberal Press, 1860-1935. Torontonians paid for concrete sidewalks long before they agreed to finance asphalt roads, because most people simply didn’t use them, he notes.

This 1900 photo shows one of the Toronto Railway Co.’s electric streetcars. The company began modernizing its fleet in 1892, and by 1894, horse cars were no longer in use. (ALFRED J. PEARSON / TORONTO ARCHIVES)

Toronto has greeted change on its streets with excitement, anxiety, finger pointing, politicking, gloomy predictions and ideological bickering for most of its history. Even in the 1860s, when Toronto had close to 45,000 citizens and the roads were covered with filth and roaming animals, we argued about the “itinerant Toronto hog.”

“Have we no ‘health inspector?’ What are our ‘police’ doing?” one citizen wrote to the Globe in 1862, complaining about the pig nuisance. Another defended the pigs, because they were performing a valuable trash-disposal service. When a tenacious gutter pig bit the skirt of a woman walking on King St., the Globe demanded that the pig nuisance be an election issue… continue reading.

Tags: geography, Phillip Mackintosh, research
Categories: News
Congratulations to Andrew McCartan on the successful completion of his MA in Geography thesis

Tuesday, December 05, 2017 | By Samantha Morris

The Department of Geography and Tourism Studies would like to extend our congratulations to Andrew McCartan and his committee for the successful defence of his MA in Geography thesis entitled “Glasgow’s Queer Battleground” on December 4, 2017.

Andrew’s research was supervised by Dr. Catherine Nash, and committee members, Dr. Philip Mackintosh and Dr. Ebru Ustundag. Thanks to Dr. Linda Peake (York University, City Institute) for serving as the external examiner, and to Dr. David Butz for serving as the Acting GPD for Andrew’s defense.

We wish Andrew all the best for his feature endeavours, including his doctoral studies in Ireland starting in January 2018!

Tags: Catherine Nash, geography, graduate studies, research, thesis defense
Categories: News