From the Editor
- From the Editor
Happy Birthday CLAG!
As some readers will remember I noted in an e-mail message earlier, the fact that on 5 June, 2009, CLAG celebrated its 40th birthday. In 1963, the Association of American Geographers inaugurated the Committee on Latin American Geography to encourage interaction among these regional specialists. To further this effort, a group of geographers attending the IX General Assembly of the Pan American Institute of Geography and History met on June 5, 1969, at the Cosmos Club in Washington, D.C. at the invitation of Preston E. James. This group, consisting of John P. Augelli, Arthur L. Burt, Allen Bushong, Robert L. Carmin, Wolfram Drewes, Howard L. Gauthier, Don R. Hoy, Preston E. James, Barry Lentnek, Clarence W. Minkel, Robert E. Nunley, Ross N. Pearson, David E. Snyder, and Robert N. Thomas, concluded that the time was ripe for a national conference to share information and stimulate geographical research, teaching, and planning activities.
The group received the support of three influential Latin Americanist geographers, Preston E. James (a member of the US National Academy of Sciences Committee on Geography), Arch C. Gerlach (president of the United States National Section of the Pan American Institute of Geography and History), and John P. Augelli (president of the new Latin American Studies Association) in their plans to organize a new professional association.
The rest is history!
It is a pleasure to report that JLAG continues to receive many interesting submissions from an international group of authors. As can be seen from the contents of this issue the themes investigated by Latin Americanist geographers continue to expand. Here one can read of the landscape elements in Guatemala that perpetrate fear of past events, of the inadequacy of water provision among poor residents of the urban fringe of Mexico City, and of the diffusion of that new key technology, the Internet, that progressively links Latin Americans to the rest of the world, and in many ways thus transforms the behavior and knowledge of millions. We are also provided with details of how surveying—especially the measurement of landholdings—developed in colonial New Spain, and how the position researchers adopt may affect their analyses, in the specific case of the early environmental history of Central Mexico. In Dominica we get a glimpse of Carib territoriality and identity and issues of land titles, and in Mexico we can appreciate the difficulties that are involved in that most complex and vast process of shifting from communal to individual landholdings. We are shown how applying GIS may be a most powerful new tool in rural development, but also of the socio-political ramifications of such innovative interventions. We are also shown how different maize landraces share opportunities and obstacles in entering central Mexican markets, crucial developments for many small-scale farmers. Finally, in the Forum section, Denevan provides us with an important historiographic footnote—a translation of Nordenskiöld's key 1916 article that first noted major aboriginal landscape modifications in the Mojos region—a pioneering set of observations that initiated major reorientations of ecological interpretations that continue to this day. [End Page 5]
Del Editor
¡Felíz cumpleaños CLAG!
Como algunos lectores recordarán envié un mensaje electrónico a los miembros de la CLAG para señalar que el 5 de junio de este año, CLAG cumplió 40 años. En 1963 la Asociación de Geógrafos Americanos inauguró el Comité sobre la Geografía Latinoamericana para incentivar la interacción entre especialistas regionales. Para estimular aquel esfuerzo, un grupo de geógrafos se encontraron el 5 de junio de 1969 en el Club Cosmos en Washington, D. C., invitados por Preston E. James. Este grupo, constituido por John Augelli, Arthur Burt, Allen Bushong, Robert Carmin, Wolfram Drewes, Howard Gauthier, Don Hoy, Preston James, Barry Lentnek, Clarence Minkel, Robert Nunley, Ross Pearson, David Snyder, y Robert Thomas, concluyeron que había llegado el momento de formar una conferencia nacional para estimular la investigación, enseñanza y las actividades de planificación sobre América Latina.
El grupo buscó y recibió el apoyo de tres influyentes geógrafos latinoamericanistas: Preston E. James (miembro de...
