Strange encounters: a dialogue on cultural geography across the political divide

ABSTRACT

Disagreement is a fundamental aspect of scholarly inquiry, yet it is exceedingly rare for scholars on opposite sides of the political spectrum to engage in a sustained dialogue across the political divide. This article seeks to contribute to precisely such a dialogue with specific reference to the field of cultural geography. The discussion featured herein consists of an encounter between “critical” and “conservative” approaches to cultural geography in the form of a back-and-forth exchange of arguments and counter-arguments by the interlocutors. The dialogue covers a wide range of issues, including the cultural politics of essentialism, white supremacy, racial segregation, patriarchy, traditional morality, secularism, justice, authority, friendship, difference-as-strangeness, and the very question of disagreement itself. The broader aim of this dialogical intervention is not to find some sort of common ground that will resolve all differences but rather to explore what those differences are with the hope of opening up a space for more constructive dialogue on cultural geography across the political divide.

KEYWORDS:

• Conservatism
• critical geography
• dialogue
• disagreement
• political divide

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Reuben Rose-Redwood is an associate professor in the Department of Geography at the University of Victoria.

Jonathan M. Smith is a professor in the Department of Geography at Texas A&M University.