Fall 2024 - GEOG 221 D100
Economic Worlds (3)
Class Number: 4654
Delivery Method: In Person
Overview
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Course Times + Location:
Sep 4 – Oct 11, 2024: Tue, 2:30–4:20 p.m.
BurnabyOct 16 – Dec 3, 2024: Tue, 2:30–4:20 p.m.
Burnaby -
Exam Times + Location:
Dec 10, 2024
Tue, 12:00–3:00 p.m.
Burnaby
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Instructor:
Rosemary-Claire Collard
rcollard@sfu.ca
Office Hours: Tuesdays 10am-noon (tentative)
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Prerequisites:
GEOG 100.
Description
CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:
The fundamentals of economics geography, the study of the forces that shape the arrangement of economic activity in the real world. Breadth-Social Sciences.
COURSE DETAILS:
This course is about economies: the organized ways people individually and collectively provide for themselves, daily and over generations. It focuses on capitalist economies but also discusses other more reciprocal economies. The course introduces several on the ground economic processes and the models and theories that try to explain them. These are processes we all participate in or bump up against all the time – like watching towering container ships unloading at one of Vancouver’s port terminals, buying a t-shirt at Walmart, doing the dishes at home, or working part-time serving caffeine-hungry customers in a coffee shop. In this course we ask how these and other seemingly mundane economic processes came to be, how they shift and move, and what their effects are for people, places and ecologies. The overarching theme of the course is economic inequality and how and why this inequality plays out spatially in repetitive distributions of wealth, industry, and jobs (and what kind of jobs). The course carries this theme through several general sectors of the economy: the extraction of primary goods; manufacturing; trade and circulation; and retail and services. Throughout, we also pay attention to collective struggles for equality.
Note: There will be no tutorials the first week of class.
Grading
- In-class mid-term exam 20%
- Mini-assignments 15%
- Commodity chain research project, paper and presentation (in tutorial) 25%
- Final exam 25%
- Tutorial attendance, preparation and participation 15%
NOTES:
Evaluation (tentative)
Grading scale
A+ 90-100
A 85-89
A- 80-84
B+ 76-79
B 72-75
B- 68-71
C+ 64-67
C 60-63
C- 55-59
D 50-54
F 0-49
Materials
REQUIRED READING:
No required course textbook
REQUIRED READING NOTES:
Your personalized Course Material list, including digital and physical textbooks, are available through the SFU Bookstore website by simply entering your Computing ID at: shop.sfu.ca/course-materials/my-personalized-course-materials.
Registrar Notes:
ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: YOUR WORK, YOUR SUCCESS
SFU’s Academic Integrity website http://www.sfu.ca/students/academicintegrity.html is filled with information on what is meant by academic dishonesty, where you can find resources to help with your studies and the consequences of cheating. Check out the site for more information and videos that help explain the issues in plain English.
Each student is responsible for his or her conduct as it affects the university community. Academic dishonesty, in whatever form, is ultimately destructive of the values of the university. Furthermore, it is unfair and discouraging to the majority of students who pursue their studies honestly. Scholarly integrity is required of all members of the university. http://www.sfu.ca/policies/gazette/student/s10-01.html
RELIGIOUS ACCOMMODATION
Students with a faith background who may need accommodations during the term are encouraged to assess their needs as soon as possible and review the Multifaith religious accommodations website. The page outlines ways they begin working toward an accommodation and ensure solutions can be reached in a timely fashion.