‘The uses of biography’: Life writing and geography

Abstract

Geographers have regularly employed biography as a means to an end, that is, as a useful method for the investigation of some other phenomenon. But writing, reading, and collecting biographical memoirs has an inherent and not just an instrumental value. Linked to memory, biography becomes a way of recalling lives, including those not personally known to the reader, and remembering how one's own life and work is connected to those of predecessors and, by implication, those of successors. This article examines how biography can be used to foster an inclusive and diverse picture of the discipline which more fully appreciates the difficulties many geographers have overcome to pursue their geographical work, and the unnamed collaborators – colleagues, friends, and family – who supported them in their work. Portraiture is introduced as a complement to written memoir, as a subject which would bear further scrutiny.