Geography

This course introduces students to the field of Human Geography, which is the study of the dynamic relations between people and places. Students gain an understanding of such complex processes as globalization and development, and the regional disparities in prosperity and inequality that result from these. The discussion evolves around the three main themes of economic, political, and social actions, all of which significantly shape the spatial organization of human activities. The course presents a general overview of the discipline, provides the opportunity to develop independent critical thinking skills, and offers insight into practical skills and tools that can be applied to a wide range of research settings. Overall, the course supplies the foundation for further, more topic specific, courses that focus on the spatial analysis of political and socio-economic phenomena at later stages.

The course introduces students to different types and sources of pollution and their distribution and control methods, and students explore risk assessment strategies and the source-pathway-receptor framework to assess their risks to human and environmental health.

This course develops an understanding of the theory and methods involved in the creation, storage, analysis, and presentation of geospatial data. Using industry standard software, the course provides the knowledge and skills to tackle advanced problem solving using Geographic Information Systems. This knowledge is fundamental not only to research in physical geography, environmental science, and many other disciplines, but provides a critical skill set used widely within a range of industries (including environmental management, local and national government, the utilities, and the insurance sector).

This course examines Socio-ecologies in 1491; Spanish colonialism and biological imperialism; contemporary coloniality and neoliberalism; and social movements.

This course introduces students to the basic principles of spatial analysis. Students learn how to use spatial analysis methods and fundamental spatial algorithms for a variety of applications in human and physical geography. The course is structured along the two spatial data representations, vector data, and raster data. Students learn to use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software to perform the analysis.

This course examines the urban fact in the state of Rio de Janeiro as a category for analyzing the organization of Rio de Janeiro's space. It discusses the city of Rio de Janeiro and its metropolization, the organization of the internal space of the city of Rio de Janeiro, the rural and the urban, the countryside and the metropolis: singularities in Rio de Janeiro. The course also highlights the structure of political, economic, cultural, and social powers in Rio de Janeiro today. It considers planning and management of the state's productive spaces; the dynamism of Rio de Janeiro: heyday, decline, and emergence; and environmental issues in Rio de Janeiro.

This course provides an introduction to the study of biogeography. Bridging the fields of ecology and geography, biogeography is the study of the spatial patterns of biological diversity and its causes. Students identify how historical, physical, and biological factors affect present and past distributions of individuals, species, populations, communities, and ecosystems. The actions of humans are a critical force impacting other species, and the human influence on past, present and future species distributions is a central topic in this module.

This course introduces the issues associated with demographic growth, which has accelerated very significantly over the last half century to soon reach eight billion individuals today. It covers the issues of population geography which vary around inequalities in the distribution and evolution of the population; the challenges of sometimes too rapid growth in the urban population; and the consequences of increased life expectancy. The course studies new societal behaviors to decipher the issues associated with the evolution of pronatalist and matrimonial behaviors. Population migrations, although they are no longer the source of new settlements, constitute a major aspect of this course, and are examined under demographic, societal, and political facets. Finally, the course examines the environmental consequences.

The course provide an introduction to concepts and principles of remote sensing. It will include 3 components: 1) radiometric principles underlying remote sensing: electromagnetic radiation; basic laws of electromagnetic radiation; absorption, reflection and emission; atmospheric effects; radiation interactions with the surface, radiative transfer; 2) assumptions and trade-offs for particular applications: orbital mechanics and choices; spatial, spectral, temporal, angular and radiometric resolution; data pre-processing; scanners; and 3) time- resolved remote sensing including: RADAR principles; the RADAR equation; RADAR resolution; phase information and SAR interferometry; and LIDAR remote sensing, the LIDAR equation and applications.

In this inter-disciplinary course, (designed for students of geography, environmental science, ecology, and international development who have an interest in biodiversity and its conservation), students focus on the interactions between biodiversity and human societies. The course adopts a rigorous evidence-based approach. Students first critically examine the human drivers of biodiversity loss and the importance of biodiversity to human society, to understand how underlying perspectives and motivations influence approaches to conservation. They then examine conflicts between human society and conservation and how these potentially can be resolved, reviewing institutions and potential instruments for biodiversity conservation in both Europe and developing countries.