Handbook

Subject Area: Geographical Studies

This course provides an overview of human geography approaches to understanding urban environments in Australia and beyond. Contextualising cities as part of wider environmental understandings and concerns, this course considers the changes to thinking about urbanism over time. Case studies engage the varied and multiple experiences of urbanism, by for instance, class, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and so on, but also in times of increasing natural hazards and environmental awareness. Contemporary perspectives include (post)colonialism, critical race theory, environmentalism and consumerism, and new approaches to nature. Students will experience data generation using various quantitative and qualitative methodologies.

You will critically reflect upon the role of public relations in key environmental debates, problematise the power relations that constrain community interests and understand the value of public relations as a potential mechanism for advancing policy and socio-cultural change. Social media, as culturally constituted discursive spaces, offer alternative avenues for environmental public relations through a shift to participatory cultures and an opening up or reconfiguration of notions of the public interest. You will consider the implications of such shifts and the potential dynamics of public relations that play out during moments of controversy and crisis. The course will also offer you an opportunity to develop vocational communication practices.