Special issues

Special issue information

Annals of the American Association of Geographers

2009: Peace and Armed Conflict
Volume 99, Issue 4, December 2009
Editor: Audrey Kobayashi

How can geographers contribute to world peace? The inaugural special issue gathers the insights of geographers in every branch of the discipline to discuss territory and geopolitics, the social effects of violence, resource issues, and postconflict initiatives. The issue provides an ideal reader for courses devoted to understanding the impact of violence and prospects of peace in virtually every part of the globe.


2010: Climate Change
Volume 100, Issue 4, October 2010
Editor: Richard Aspinall

The 2010 Special Issue of the Annalsaddresses environmental, human, social, political, and methodological issues focused on the geographical dimensions of climate change, including original research in areas such as the climate record, the human and environmental impacts of climate change, the role of GISciences and modeling in understanding climate change and sustainability, and other relevant areas.


2011: Energy
Volume 101, July 2011
Editor: Karl S. Zimmerer

The 2011 Special Issue of the Annalswill address any one or more of the following related themes: geophysical and biogeographic dynamics of energy systems, nature-society and human-environment interactions related to energy, and topics pertaining to the economic, human, social, political, cultural, historical, and methodological issues that are focused on the geographic dimensions of energy. Examples of potentially relevant topics include original research focused on geographic analysis of energy and resource production, use, and consumption; alternative energy sources and social-environmental dynamics and impacts; energy policy; energy conservation; and other relevant areas.

2012: Health
Volume 102, 2012
Editor: Mei-Po Kwan

The 2012 Special Issue of the Annalswill address social, cultural, political, environmental, theoretical, and methodological issues focused on the geography of health, including original research in areas such as access to healthcare, spatial disparities in health outcomes, the effect of geographic context on health outcomes, mobility and health, environment and health, development and health, space-time modeling and GIS-based analysis of health outcomes, and other relevant areas.

2013: Water
Volume 103, 2013
Editor: Mark Fonstad

The 2013 Special Issue of the Annals will address any one or more of the following related themes: water and conflict, spatial disparaties in access to water-related services, water and global environmental change, water and habitats, analysis and simulatiojn of water systems, water and risk, policy and law applied to water environments, and other relevant areas.

2014: Migration
Volume 104, 2014
Editor: Richard Wright

The 2014 Special Issue of the Annals will address any one or more of the following related themes: immigration, migration, transnationalism, forced migration, diaspora studies, and other relevant areas.

2015: Futures: Imagining Socio-Ecological Transformation

Volume 105, 2015

Editor: Bruce Braun

The 2015 Special Issues of the Annals will address social, cultural, political, environmental, economic, theoretical, and methodological issues related to imagining and enacting socio-ecological futures. These include geographical research in areas such as: knowledge production and possible socio-ecological futures; critical perspectives on climate futures; transformation, transition, revolution and resilience; spatial futures and climate justice; governing socio-ecological futures; eco-climatic, eco-hydrological and ecosystem dimensions of socio-ecological futures; the role of science-fiction, art and imaginative socio-ecological futures; utopias, dystopias and apocalypses.

2016: Geographies of Mobilities
Volume 106, 2016
Editor: Mei-Po Kwan

The 2016 Special Issue of the Annals will cover such areas as: (im)mobility and social differentiation and inequality; (im)mobility of the oppressed, subjugated and persecuted; (im)mobility and social exclusion; experience of (im)mobility; politics of (im)mobility; commuting; leisure travel; tourism; mobility by different transport modes; sustainable mobility; mobility and resilience; disasters, natural hazards, and mobility; mobility, wellbeing and health; mobility, energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions; space-time modeling and GIS-based analysis of mobility; mobility research methods; and other relevant areas.

2017: Mountains
Volume 107, 2017
Editor: Mark A. Fonstad

The 2017 Special Issue of the Annals will address a broad spectrum of social, cultural, political, environmental, physical, economic, theoretical, and methodological issues focused on the mountains. These might include original research in such areas as mountains as sites and corridors of cultural and environmental diversity and gradients, mountains as the "water towers of the world", mountain as regions highly sensitive to climate change, the critical nature of mountain regions as borders and as regions of conflict, mountain regions as barriers to migration yet also home to large numbers of refugees, mountains as sources of hazards and risk, mountains as sites of sacred importance, and as destinations for tourism and as cultural icons.

2018: Social Justice and the City
Volume 108, 2018
Editor: Nik Heynen

The 2018 Special Issue of the Annals will publish conceptual research drawing on now 40 years of cutting edge research in geography on ‘social justice and the city’. Topics will include: Racial/Gendered/Queer Justice and the City; Environmental Justice, Social Justice, and the City; Social Justice and Planetary Urbanization; Social Justice and the Post/anti-colonial City; Law, Social Justice and the City; Segregation and inequality; Mobility and immobility; Urban Austerity and Social Justice; Labor, Economic Justice and the City; Social Justice and the Youth/Children’s City; Marxism(s) and the City; Social Justice and the Secular/non-Secular City; Measuring Social Justice and the City; Neoliberal Urbanism and Social Justice; The Right to (Social Justice in) the City; Urban Movements for Social Justice.