A Misunderstanding?
The job title says, “Assistant Professor of Geography”. Read on and it says the candidate will be responsible for teaching “World Geography…in the Department of Humanities”. That’s exciting! Geography in the Humanities. Right up my alley.
But then, listed as the first requirement: “Ph.D. in History”. Even funnier, it says, “Ph.D. in History required for this position”.
WHAT??
It’s bad enough that people confuse Geography with geology, but having someone with a PhD in history teach geography? The students will be getting a world history class instead of a world geography class. And there is a HUGE difference.
Trust me. I've taken many history courses (it was one of my undergrad majors before I found Geography). I’ve also worked closely with Historical Geographers (who use history as a method to do Geography). The two disciplines are CERTAINLY, unequivocally different. If you’ve taken a course in both disciplines, you hopefully observed that (assuming your geography class was taught by a geographer and your history class was taught by a historian). In fact, I spend part of the first day in my introductory world regional class explaining how the class will be VERY different from a world history class.
Now, I enjoy history (or herstory) as much as the next person. I really do. But there is something just plain wrong when a position advertises for a Geographer but wants—nay, requires—a PhD in History. My closet-Geographer friend raised an incredulous eyebrow when she saw this advert. Her exact response was, “That’s like saying you want an English PhD to teach Anthropology”. I agree. I suspect this train of thought stems from the K-12 education realm where Geography is all too often relegated to social studies or, unfortunately, shoved-in with history.
Could a history PhD teach a world geography course? Sure. Could a Geography PhD teach a world history course? Sure. But should they? I would never presume I could teach a Latin America history class, even though I know a LOT about Latin American history. And I would hope that a historian would never presume to teach a Latin American Geography class, even though they specialize in that branch of history. I would hope. Of course, as with much of Geography, there’s overlap. But the overall concepts, both taught and learned, are VERY different.
Think of it this way: if you listened to a Verdi opera, Rigoletto for example, would it be the same if Bono (from the band U2) was the title character? I suppose it’s still an opera, and Bono’s voice might be adequate, but he’s certainly no Tito Ruffo (a famous Italian Barritone). And Tito could probably have handled U2’s Vertigo, but it wouldn’t be the same as Bono wailing “Hello, hello…”. That’s all I’m saying. (Pavarotti singing with the Spice Girls also comes to mind…remember that? Fun, but…)
Maybe it’s a misunderstanding, so I smudged-out the name of the institution (for their protection). But I think I’ll call them this week to see if they wrote the advert intentionally, perhaps with a specific candidate in mind, or if they actually want a history PhD to teach Geography?
