Hi

It's been a while! We have been through a lot of topics in the mean time. The rural geography lecture made most of you sleep despite my attempts to keep you awake. Well, not everything has to be so excited in human geography for sure. But hey when we finally come to the rural sociology I had the feeling that the class was waking up (or was it the coffee break?). Anyhow, when we went into a more exciting cultural geography field I noticed that 'sex, drugs, and motorcycles' kept you awake so far...Well just a joke (except for the sex part, which I will clarify below)!

We have had an exciting (and quite wet) field trip to Antwerp, where we were warmly welcomed by OASeS (Center on Inequality, Poverty, Social Exclusion and the City) at University of Antwerp. Professor Jan Vranken delivered a fantastic guest lecture on inequalities, social cohesion, and exclusion. I think we all learned a lot on concepts that were too abstract before. I begin to hear you writing and talking about social cohesion after this class, which made me very happy! Professor Stijn Oosterlijnk explained us how a research center such as OASeS works. How do they get funding and conduct research, what is their area of interest, etc. Very informative! Then two OASeS researchers Pieter Cools and Elias Storms gave you an honest presentation of how they conduct their research and what is actually to be a researcher in the field of social geography. I think it was a nice meeting with reality.

Then, with an unfortunate timing to be outside, we took tram 11 to go to Zurenborg to make some observations. The idea was to walk through Dageraadplaats to observe the role of a public square in social cohesion but by then the rain was pouring so bad that we ended up observing the role of a local pub in social cohesion instead. That was fun! Then we made our way to Driekoningenstraat, which houses a lot of ethnic shops, restaurants and cafes and after some observations on this street, which recently won the 'street with a best climate' price of the city, we took the tram back and then I made sure you made your way back to Middelburg on time.

We went deeper into cultural geography with the topics on geography of food, social, ethnic and religious diversity, and multiculturality and had a fantastic guest lecture from Professor Maartin Loopmans of the Catholic University of Leuven on Geography of Sexuality. Well, that woke you up for sure!

Having the mid-term exam behind us and the Spring Break in between, we are now about to explore economic geography topics in the coming weeks, which will involve a field trip to the Port of Antwerp (co-organised by the University of Antwerp and Port of Antwerp).

Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow!

Assoc.Prof.Dr. Tuna Tasan-Kok

Geography of food...!

Sounded strange at first isn't it? Geography of food...but it is a very serious field in cultural geography with enormous amounts of research and publications going on. Scholars are busy discussing different aspects of food geography like the political aspects, the health aspects, the life style aspects, the sociology of it, the psychology of it, the governance of it..and yes, it is a fun topic too. Just to give you an idea I copied some sessions from the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting in New York I was participating last week:

• Advancing debates on sustainable and local food
• Biodiversity and Food in the Context of Development and Climate Change
• Biofuels, Food and the Bio-based Economy 1: Food for Fuel
• Biofuels, Food and the Bio-based Economy 2: Governing Sustainability
• Biofuels, Food and the Bio-based Economy 3: A Technological Fix?
• Critical Geographies of Food in the City: Activism and Community
• Food in the City: Exploring Space, Place, and Taste
• Food security, food sovereignty, & food justice: the Geographies of Food
• FoodMediaPolitics 1: Celebrity Chef Space
• FoodMediaPolitics 2: Production, Consumption, Representation
• Hunger & Food Systems - Urban & Global Perspectives
• Navigating the Geographies of Food: People, Place, Culture, & Power
• New Directions in Political Ecology II: Addressing Food, Agriculture, Well-Being and Rural Livelihoods
• Processes of Globalization in Agri-Food Networks
• Sustainable communities through food systems: Considering urban/rural intersections, challenges and opportunities
• The Political Ecology of Alternative Food Systems
• The Role of Geographers in Promoting Leadership in Environmental Sustainability, Food Security and Health Policy Initiatives in Africa
• Theorizing the Geographies of Food: New Directions and Interventions for Alternative Food Praxis

See what I mean? And this is not all...there were hundreds of presentations in the field of geography of food just in this conference.

From Monday on we will move to other fields of human geography (rural geography first, and then slowly we'll move deeper into cultural geography in the coming weeks).

Have a great weekend!

Dr. Tuna Tasan-Kok