Picture of Guntram Herb
Office
McCardell Bicen Hall 633
Tel
(802) 443-5714
Email
herb@middlebury.edu
Office Hours
Spring '24: Wed. 12:15-2:15pm & Fri. 12:15-1:15pm, and by appointment

Research project website: www.border-rites.org

Courses Taught

Course Description

Place and Society: Local to Global
This course is an introduction to how geographers view the world and contribute to our understanding of it. Where do the phenomena of human experience occur? Why are they there? What is the significance? These questions are fundamental for explaining the world at different scales from the global to the local. Throughout, we will focus on the spatial basis of society, its continual reorganization through time, and how various human and environmental problems can be usefully analyzed from a geographic perspective. (Open only to first-year students and sophomores) 3 hrs. lect./1.5 hr. lab

Terms Taught

Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Spring 2021, Fall 2021, Spring 2022, Spring 2024

Requirements

DED, SOC

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Course Description

Border Geographies
We live in an age of intense globalization with near instantaneous transfers of information and unprecedented movements of goods and people across the world. At the same time, there are more walls constructed between countries today than ever before. How do we explain this paradox of increasingly restrictive borders in an age of globalizing flows? In this course we will trace the history of political borders, critically evaluate theories in the scholarly literature about borders and flows, and investigate strategies, experiences, and imaginaries that produce different border-scapes and representations. Students will be actively engaged in unraveling the paradox of walls and flows through group research projects on specific border regimes around the world. 3 hrs. lect.

Terms Taught

Fall 2020, Spring 2022, Spring 2024

Requirements

CMP, HIS, SOC

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Course Description

Geopolitics of Europe
The course examines the arguably most influential region in the world from a geopolitical perspective. First, we chart the complex geographic dimensions of Europe. Next, we critically evaluate the legacy of European power and Europe's main political body, the EU. Then we analyze geopolitical challenges and flashpoints that threaten to destabilize Europe. Finally, we assess the current state of “Europeanization” at the grassroots level and investigate transborder initiatives and activities. Students will be actively engaged in this study through a research project that contributes to an end of semester conference on the Future of Europe. 3 hrs. lect.

Terms Taught

Spring 2021

Requirements

EUR, SOC

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Course Description

Seminar in Political Geography: Radical Geographies
Geography has always been associated with the exercise of power and came into being as an academic discipline because it supported imperialism, nationalism, and war. However, the field of geography also has a lesser-known emancipatory tradition that emphasizes social justice, empowerment, and resistance to oppression. Early radical voices—anarchists, socialists, and pacifists—were silenced and often forced into exile. It was only in the context of the protest culture of the 1960s that radical geographies started to find an audience. In this seminar we will examine how geography and geographers have engaged in revolutionary activism, education for justice, social mobilization, and theorizations of alternative models of society. (Open to senior majors only; others by waiver) 3 hrs. sem.

Terms Taught

Spring 2020, Fall 2021

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Course Description

Independent Study
A one-credit intensive research project developed under the direction of a faculty member. Junior majors only. (Approval Required)

Terms Taught

Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Winter 2021, Spring 2021, Fall 2021, Winter 2022, Spring 2022, Winter 2023, Winter 2024, Winter 2025

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Course Description

Senior Research
A one-credit intensive research project developed under the direction of a faculty member. Senior majors only. (Approval Required)

Terms Taught

Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Winter 2021, Spring 2021, Fall 2021, Winter 2022, Spring 2022, Winter 2023, Winter 2024, Winter 2025

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Course Description

Senior Thesis
Students with a departmental GPA of 3.3 or higher are eligible to complete a two-credit senior thesis. In order to complete a senior thesis, students must have a proposal approved by a primary thesis advisor and a secondary departmental reader prior to registering for the first 0701 credit. Upon completion of the thesis, thesis students will present their work in a public seminar and defend the thesis in front of the departmental faculty. Thesis presentations and defenses will typically take place during the final week of classes or the examination period. Upon completion of the presentation and defense, the primary advisor and secondary departmental reader will be responsible for evaluating and grading the thesis. It is strongly encouraged that students considering a thesis discuss their ideas with an advisor during the semester prior to registering for formal thesis credits. (Approval only)

Terms Taught

Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Winter 2021, Spring 2021, Fall 2021, Winter 2022, Spring 2022, Winter 2023, Spring 2023, Winter 2024, Spring 2024, Winter 2025, Spring 2025

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Course Description

Senior Work
(Approval Required)

Terms Taught

Spring 2021

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Course Description

European Studies Senior Thesis
(Approval Required)

Terms Taught

Spring 2020, Winter 2021, Spring 2021, Winter 2022, Spring 2022, Winter 2023, Spring 2023, Winter 2024, Spring 2024, Winter 2025, Spring 2025

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Academic Degrees

Vordiplom, Diplom, Eberhard-Karls-Universitat, Tubingen, Germany

Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, Madison

Publications

Digital Research

www.border-rites.org

Video Interview

Conversation with a Geographer: Dr. Guntram Herb  https://youtu.be/DZ9bgyqZAHA

Books and edited volumes

Herb, Guntram and David H. Kaplan, eds. 2018. Scaling Identities: Nationalism and Territoriality, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

Herb, Guntram, David H. Kaplan, and Mark Monmonier, eds. 2009. Cambridge World Atlas, Cambridge University Press.

Herb, Guntram and David H. Kaplan, eds. 2008.  Nations and Nationalism: A Global Historical Overview (4 vols).  Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-Clio.

Herb, Guntram, David H. Kaplan, and Mark Monmonier, eds. 2007. Perthes World Atlas. Gotha, Germany: Klett-Perthes Verlag.

Herb, Guntram and David H. Kaplan, eds. 1999. Nested Identities: Nationalism, Territory, and Scale. Lanham,MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

Herb, Guntram. 1997. Under the Map of Germany: Nationalism and Propaganda 1918-1945. London: Routledge.

Articles and book chapters

Herb, Guntram, Vincent Falardeau, and Kathryn Talano. 2023. “Erasing the Line: Mapping Indigenous Community across the US–Canada Border”. Borders in Globalization Review 4 (2). Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, 145-47. https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/bigreview/article/view/20645

Herb, Guntram. “Persuasive Cartography: Maps, Power, and Politics. In Routledge Handbook of Mapping and Cartography, ed. A. Kent and P. Vojakovic, London: Routledge, ch. 34 (forthcoming).

Herb, Guntram. “Geopolitics and Cartography.” In The History of Cartography, Vol. 6 (Cartography in the Twentieth Century), ed. Mark Monmonier. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015: 539-48.

Herb, Guntram. “Das größte Deutschland soll es sein! Suggestive Karten in der Weimarer Republik,” in: Kampf der Karten. Propaganda- und Geschichtskarten als politische Instrumente und Identitätstexte, ed. Peter Haslinger andVadim Oswalt, Marburg 2012, S. 140-151.

Herb, Guntram.  “How Geography Shapes National Identities.” (with David H. Kaplan). National Identities 13 (2011): 349-360.

Herb, Guntram.  “Fostering learning through problem-based collaboration” in: “Interventions in teaching political geography in the USA,” (multi-authored forum). Political Geography 29 (2010): 196-199.

Herb, Guntram, forthcoming. Geopolitics and Cartography. In The History of Cartography, Vol. 6 (Cartography in the Twentieth Century), ed. Mark Monmonier. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Herb, Guntram, 2009. Intervention: Mapping is Critical. (Guest editor and contributor to multi-authored forum). Political Geography 28 (2009): 332-342.

Herb, Guntram. 2008. The politics of political geography. In The Sage Handbook of Political Geography, ed. Kevin Cox, Murray Low, and Jennifer Robinson., 21-40. London: Sage.

Herb, Guntram. 2005. Von der Grenzrevision zur Expansion: Territorialkonzepte in der Weimarer Republik. In Welt-Räume: Geschichte, Geographie und Globalisierung seit 1900, eds. Iris Schröder und Sabine Höhler, 175-203. Frankfurt: Campus Verlag.

Herb, Guntram. 2005. The Geography of Peace Movements. In The Geography of War and Peace, ed. Colin Flint, 347-368. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Herb, Guntram. 2004. Double Vision: Territorial Strategies in the Construction of National Identities in Germany 1949-1979. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 94.1: 140-164.