Unit rationale, description and aim
Why do some people move freely across borders while others cannot? Who decides where a state begins and ends, and whose bodies bear the consequences? Critical political geography asks these
kinds of questions and takes seriously the role of power in answering them.
Building on foundational knowledge from earlier geography units, this unit advances students' understanding of political geography through engagement with critical, feminist, decolonial and more-than-human theoretical frameworks. Students will critically examine how borders, bodies and mobility are produced, contested and experienced as expressions of power, from the geopolitical to the everyday.
Topics include feminist geopolitics, racial capitalism, popular geopolitics, nationalism, surveillance, and geographies of violence and resistance.
The aim of this unit is to develop students' capacity to critically analyse how power operates across political geographic phenomena, communicate complex geographical ideas to diverse audiences, and apply theoretical knowledge to real-world geopolitical issues.
Campus offering
No unit offerings are currently available for this unit.Learning outcomes
To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.
Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from 糖心原创 with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.
Explore the graduate capabilities.
Critically evaluate the key theoretical framework...
Learning Outcome 01
Analyse how borders, bodies and mobility are produ...
Learning Outcome 02
Apply political geographic concepts and research s...
Learning Outcome 03
Communicate geographical research and arguments e...
Learning Outcome 04
Content
Topics will include:
? What is Political Geography? Tracing the emergence and scope of the sub-discipline
? Critical Geopolitics: theories, approaches and positionality
? Feminist Geopolitics: the body, the home and emotional geographies
? Decolonising Political Geography: positionality and geographies of racial capitalism
? Non-human worlds: political geography beyond the human
? Popular Geopolitics: travel, media and ludic geopolitics
? States, sovereignty and alternative territory-making
? Borders: from state lines to the body and offshoring
? Nationalism: flags, fears and imagined communities
? Mobilities: geopolitics in motion and the politics of (im)mobility
? Geographies of violence, peace and everyday resistance
? Surveillance: digital space, data and geographies of control
? Geopolitical futures: emerging challenges in political geography
Assessment strategy and rationale
The three assessment tasks are sequenced to build progressively on students' developing theoretical knowledge and research skills. The communication task, requires students to indepently and/or collabortaviely research a contemporary geopolitical issue and communicate political geography concepts to a public audience. The research essay is the centrepiece of the unit. Students select a case study addressing a question drawn directly from unit content (i.e. borders and mobility, non-human worlds, or surveillance and violence) and develop a sustained, evidence-based argument engaging with peer-reviewed political geography literature. This task develops independent scholarly analysis, critical argumentation, and advanced information literacy. The final examination requires students to demonstrate critical engagement with their own argument, as well as broader theoretical understanding of the unitframeworks and concepts.
This assessment suite reflects the progressive intellectual demands of a 300-level Geography unit, moving students from knowledge-building to critical analysis to confident scholarly communication.
Overview of assessments
Assessment Task 1: Podcast - Perspectives on a G...
Assessment Task 1:
Podcast - Perspectives on a Geopolitical Issue:
In this assessment, your assigned group will create a podcast exploring a contemporary geopolitical issue through multiple theoretical perspectives drawn from the unit. Attendance at relevant tutorials/workshops is essential.
25%
Assessment Task 2: Research Task: This assessmen...
Assessment Task 2:
Research Task:
This assessment asks you to write a critical research task engaging with key concepts and debates in political geography. Building on theoretical perspectives introduced across the unit, you will develop a sustained, evidence-based argument in response to one essay question. Parts of the essay may need to be completed in classes, and attendance at those sessions will be essential
40%
Assessment Task 3: Research Task Defence: In thi...
Assessment Task 3:
Research Task Defence:
In this assessment, you will answer questions about your research task to demonstrate that you have thought carefully and critically about your own work and where it sits within political geography covered in the unit.
35%
Learning and teaching strategy and rationale
This unit uses online-live lectures and tutorials as its primary mode of delivery. Lectures introduce theoretical frameworks and contemporary geopolitical content, while tutorials are designed as collaborative, discussion-based spaces where students apply, debate and interrogate ideas encountered in lectures and set readings. Several tutorials in the first half of semester are structured as collaborative workshops supporting the communication task.
This sequencing reflects the unit's commitment to active and dialogic learning. Political geography, particularly at the critical, feminist and decolonial end of the discipline, demands that students not only absorb content but interrogate it, situate themselves within it, and communicate it to others. The progression from a communicative task to a public audience to a critical research task to a viva voce final examination reflects the intellectual arc of the unit itself: from building a theoretical vocabulary, to independent critical analysis, to confident scholarly communication.