Celebrating humanistic geography and forecasting its robust future via phenomenology

This article is a first-person account of my encounter with humanistic and phenomenological geography. I review how I first became involved with geography and my graduate experience at Clark University, which in the 1970s was a major center of humanistic and phenomenological work, mostly because of geographer Anne Buttimer, today recognized as a founder of the humanistic tradition. I consider how phenomenology became central to my research and writing, and how my interest in what came to be called ‘environment-behavior research’ eventually led to my involvement with architecture, planning, and design programs. In the last portion of this article, I overview my recent work investigating place experience and lived emplacement, particularly the theme of how places change processually. I end by suggesting that the current disciplinary emphasis on ‘critical theory’ and ‘critical thinking’ might be usefully complemented with ‘empathetic thinking’ and a revitalized humanistic and phenomenological geography.