More Reflections on a White Discipline

Abstract

Recently, the American Association of Geographers (AAG) Climate Action Task Force set forth to imagine academic knowledge production and sharing beyond the current conference model to address the ecological impacts of large-scale, conventional, in-person conferences. Building on provocations of Pulido’s (2002) paper “Reflections on a White Discipline,” this article seeks to ensure that racial justice is part of that imagining. There is much to be ecologically gained by moving toward smaller regional gatherings and large virtual conferences. Our task, however, is to assess the loss of mentorship, affirmation, and community found at the AAG Annual Meeting that sustains Black, Indigenous, and people of color geographers in the current climate of our discipline. We deploy the term climate for two reasons. First, climate refers to “toxic environments” of home institutions within which geographers of color often teach, research, and write (Mahtani 2014). We call on all geographers to contend with the epistemological, institutional, and individual actions needed to detoxify spaces and places of geography. Second, in pace with Pulido (2002), we argue that knowledge production on the climate crisis is enhanced when geography becomes a safer place for geographers of color. Action taken toward climate justice cannot happen without actions to achieve racial justice.