Doing groups: Situating knowledge and creating stories

This paper presents group research as a potentially powerful research tool for cultural geographers interested in the ways knowledge is produced at the interpersonal level. I argue that groups can create unique research spaces that incorporate 'sociality', the everyday social norms, logics and languages that guide ordinary conversations, into the research agenda. By concentrating on these discursive norms, insights can be obtained into the ways that knowledge is negotiated, produced and constrained in different places. To demonstrate the value of group research, a case study involving Australian environmentalists is analysed, to show how forests are constructed, contested and naturalised within this particular subculture. The article concludes by emphasising the importance of group research to critical geographers interested in social empowerment and change.     

人海关系地域系统视角下海洋本体的解构与研究重点

在揭示人海辩证关系与海洋社会属性的基础上,从人海关系地域系统的视角,解析了海洋的构成。第一海洋（自然海洋）是人海关系地域系统中自然存在而非人为构筑的海洋部分,其核心要素是地理位置、物质构成和空间形态。第二海洋（人工海洋）是人类海洋实践中所建造的设施及相应的物质、能量及信息流动,包括基地设施、人类主体之间的物质信息交流和人类与海洋之间的采集排放活动。第三海洋（关系海洋）是不同人类主体在海洋实践中形成的互动关系,核心内容是主体构成、内容组成以及表现形式。第四海洋（观念海洋）是人类对海洋及海洋实践活动的认知,核心是在处理人类与海洋、陆地与海洋和人类主体之间关系时所秉持的理念。现实中,自然海洋、实践性的人工海洋和关系海洋与构想性的观念海洋相互作用,形成了丰富多样的海洋世界。随着人类海洋实践的深化,关系海洋和观念海洋与自然海洋和人工海洋一并成为了研究与实践的重点。     

Co‐inhabiting public spaces: diversity and playful encounters in Darwin,Australia

When fear and anxiety circulate in public spaces of diverse western cities, heightened surveillance can provide a sense of safety and comfort. These measures of surveillance that target bodies that are ‘out of place’, however, are limited in animating public spaces. This paper focuses on Darwin, a small but rapidly growing north Australian city where the visibility of Aboriginal people from Greater Darwin/regional communities and migrant newcomers from countries in Africa, South Asia and the Middle East often circulates fear and anxiety and deadens public spaces. I argue that playful events or spontaneous multisensory encounters of humans, non‐humans and material things, however, have the potential to animate these public spaces. The paper focuses on these events in a Drop‐in open‐air café‐community garden‐Op shop in a culturally diverse northern suburb of Darwin. It suggests that the vibrancy of matter and the vitality of non‐human forms of life can inform how we co‐inhabit cities of difference and unsettle policies of social cohesion that focus on integration into a dominant white majority culture.