Undergraduate Module Descriptor

POC2108: Political Geographies: Local to Global

This module descriptor refers to the 2021/2 academic year.

Please note that this module is only delivered on the Penryn Campus.

How this Module is Assessed

In the tables below, you will see reference to 'ILO's. An ILO is an Intended Learning Outcome - see Aims and Learning Outcomes for details of the ILOs for this module.

Formative Assessment

A formative assessment is designed to give you feedback on your understanding of the module content but it will not count towards your mark for the module.

Form of assessmentSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Essay Plan 400 words + 3 annotated sources1-5, 7Written
Guidebook Informal Discussion10 minutes1-6, 8Verbal

Summative Assessment

A summative assessment counts towards your mark for the module. The table below tells you what percentage of your mark will come from which type of assessment.

CourseworkWritten examsPractical exams
10000

...and this table provides further details on the summative assessments for this module.

Form of assessment% of creditSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Guidebook Entry30750 words + 1 image1-4, 7Written
Guidebook Reflection20500 words1-8Written
Critical Research Essay502,000 words1-5, 7, 8Written
0

Re-assessment

Re-assessment takes place when the summative assessment has not been completed by the original deadline, and the student has been allowed to refer or defer it to a later date (this only happens following certain criteria and is always subject to exam board approval). For obvious reasons, re-assessments cannot be the same as the original assessment and so these alternatives are set. In cases where the form of assessment is the same, the content will nevertheless be different.

Original form of assessmentForm of re-assessmentILOs re-assessedTimescale for re-assessment
Guidebook Entry750 words + 1 image1-6, 8-9August/September reassessment period
Guidebook Reflection500 words1-6, 8-9August/September reassessment period
Critical Research Essay2,000 words1-6, 8August/September reassessment period

Indicative Reading List

This reading list is indicative - i.e. it provides an idea of texts that may be useful to you on this module, but it is not considered to be a confirmed or compulsory reading list for this module.

Basic reading:

Agnew, J. 2003. Geopolitics: Revisioning World Politics. London: Routledge.

--------. 1994. The territorial trap: The geographical assumptions of international relations theory. Review of International Political Economy (RIPE) 1: 53-80.

Amoore, L. (2006) Biometric borders: Governing mobilities in the war on terror. Political Geography, 25, 336-351.

Blomley, N. K. 2004. Unsettling the city: Urban land and the politics of property. New York: Routledge.

Crampton, J. W. 2003. The political mapping of cyberspace. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Cresswell, T. 1996. In place/out of place: Geography, ideology, and transgression. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Fall, J. J. 2010. Artificial states? On the enduring geographical myth of natural borders. Political Geography, 29(3): 140-147.

Flint, C. and P.J. Taylor 2007. Political Geography: World-system, nation-state and locality. Fifth Edition. New York: Pearson.

Johnson, C., R. Jones, A. Paasi, L. Amoore, A. Mountz, M. Salter & C. Rumford. 2011. Interventions on rethinking 'the border' in border studies. Political Geography, 30, 61- 69.

Kuus, M., and J. Agnew. 2008. “Theorizing the State Geographically: Sovereignty, Subjectivity, and Territoriality.” In K. Cox, M. Low, and J. Robinson (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Political Geography. California: Sage, pp. 95-106.

Magnusson, W. 1985. Urban politics and the local state. Studies in Political Economy 16: 111-142.

Mountz, A. 2003. Human smuggling, the transnational imaginary, and everyday geographies of the nation-state. Antipode, 35(3): 621-44.

 Newman, D., and A. Paasi. 1998. Fences and neighbours in the postmodern world: boundary narratives in political geography. Progress in Human Geography 22 (2): 186-207.

Newman, D. 2006. The Lines that Continue to Separate Us: Borders in our ‘borderless’ world. Progress in Human Geography 30: 143-161.

Ó Tuathail, G. 2006. “Introduction, Overview Part I.” In G. O Tuathail, S. Dalby, and P. Routledge (Eds.). 2006.The Geopolitics Reader. Second Edition: London: Routledge, pp: 1-12; 17-30.

Sharp, J. 2007. Geography and gender: finding feminist political geographies. Progress in Human Geography 31 (3): 381-387.

Taylor, P. J. 1995. Beyond Containers: Internationality, Interstateness, Interterritoriality. Progress in Human Geography 19 (1): 1-15.

———. 1994. The State As Container: Territoriality In The Modern World-System. Progress in Human Geography 18 (2): 151-162.

Tesfahuney, M. 1998. Mobility, Racism and Geopolitics. Political Geography 17: 499-515.