Paper short abstract:

Relations between anthropology and geography are much closer in the USA than they have been in Commonwealth countries, with at least a dozen joint departments. Combined programs leverage shared concerns in methods and the integration of unusually broad disciplines.

Paper long abstract:

The history of relations between anthropology and geography are quite different and apparently much closer in the USA than they have been in Commonwealth countries. My department is far from the only joint department of geography and anthropology in the US; there are at least a dozen granting bachelors' and in many cases masters' degrees. Nor are these all marriages of convenience between small programs; at least one - Louisiana State - is a top research-oriented department.

Historically, this tradition of collaboration owes much to the affinity between cultural geographer Carl Sauer at Berkeley and the iconoclastic cultural anthropologist Franz Boas. While not a formal cultural relativist, Sauer was influenced by Boas to reject environmental determinism and insist that cultures be evaluated on their own terms. In turn, Sauer's notion of cultural landscapes and his work on agricultural diffusion have influenced generations of U.S. anthropologists.

On the administrative side, combining these programs in a single department makes sense for three reasons: the first is the shared tradition of fieldwork, which has shaped the cultures of both disciplines by attracting more intrepid intellects. The second is the fact that both traditions integrate aspects of the physical and social sciences into coherent programs and disciplinary world views. Finally, there is a longstanding methodological overlap between archaeology - which is always a branch of anthropology in the U.S. - and physical geography. New remote sensing techniques and GIS continue to bring these fields closer methodologically.