November 28, 2007
Bowling
Green, Ky. - Western Kentucky University Geography and Geology Department Head David Keeling will participate in a public forum on global human terrain analysis this Friday at the Harvard Club in New York, organized by the American Geographical Society (AGS).
The forum is designed to focus attention on America’s need to develop a better understanding of foreign lands and peoples.
Increasingly, the United States is perceived as a mighty global power crippled by its own ignorance of its vast global domain. According to the AGS, the problem lies not necessarily within the government and its diplomatic, military, and intelligence agencies, but throughout U.S. society as a whole. Generations of school children and even college graduates have grown up without being taught geography and now they are the politicians, diplomats, analysts, scholars, journalists and voters upon whom the country depends for wisdom in foreign policy, international affairs and global commerce.
Geographic ignorance is now so deeply ingrained in our society that most Americans do not even know what geography entails -- cultural, physical and spatial understanding of people and places. To address this problem, the AGS is sponsoring expeditions, named in honor of former AGS director Isaiah Bowman who served as President Woodrow Wilson’s and President F.D. Roosevelt’s geographer, to conduct field research in foreign regions and to inform the public and the government about world geography.
Expeditions to Mexico, the Antilles Region, Colombia, and Jordan have been funded by the Foreign Military Studies Office (FMSO). Each expedition is designed to send a team of geographers to increase American understanding of a foreign area, to build a geographic information system (GIS) of cultural and physical databases for that region, to support research on one security-related topic selected by the investigator, and to build collaborative relationships with foreign scholars and institutions. In Mexico, Jordan, and likely Iraq, the AGS is conducting property surveys in accordance with FMSO’s belief that secure property ownership is essential for peace and prosperity. The AGS believes that these Bowman Expeditions can be a substantial open-source component of foreign intelligence.
Since 1851, the AGS has advised and assisted the U.S. government in great enterprises undertaken in the national interest, such as building the Transcontinental Railway, Transatlantic Telegraph Cable and the Panama Canal. In World War I, President Wilson commissioned the AGS to run “the Inquiry,” a massive analysis of foreign intelligence conducted throughout the war, expressly to support the peace negotiations afterward. As part of that effort, the AGS was responsible for drafting President Wilson’s famous “Fourteen Points.” In this same spirit, the AGS offers its assistance in solving a major problem faced by the nation today.
Dr. Keeling is a National Councilor for the AGS, lectures around the world for the AGS’s educational travel program and is directing the Bowman Expedition to Colombia.
According to Dr. Keeling, “WKU’s involvement in this global human terrain analysis project through the Department of Geography and Geology supports the university's goal of expanding its international reach. It also engages faculty and students in issues of importance to our society and helps to prepare WKU students for success in an increasingly complex global environment.”
More WKU news is available at www.wku.edu. If you’d like to receive WKU news via e-mail, send a message to WKUNews@wku.edu.
For information, contact David Keeling at (270) 745-4555.
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