Social Justice. Global Issues. Sustainable Development. These issues are at the core of the discipline of human geography.

Human geography focuses on the distribution of humans and their activities across space, how local and global economic forces impact people and places, and the various ways in which people create and draw identity from cultural landscapes. Human geographers at ECU are particularly interested in the theme of social justice and understanding broader struggles for racial/ethnic, gender, and class equality. This research is carried out here in eastern North Carolina and across the American South as well as internationally, in the Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

According to the United Nations, over half of the world's population lives on less than two dollars a day. While poverty and hunger are most pronounced in developing nations, no region of the world is immune, including the U.S. where 32.9 million people live in poverty. Faculty and students at ECU are engaged in a variety of research and development projects focused on understanding the social, economic and environmental factors contributing to poverty as well as developing innovative approaches to improve the quality of life for communities in both the U.S. and internationally.

Research themes at ECU Geography include

 
    People, places and environments
    The global economy
    World regions
    Asia
    Latin America
    Historical geography of the United States
    Geography of recreation
    Transportation and trade
    Geographic images
    Geography of tourism
    Gender and development
    Resources, population, and development
    Human migration and global restructuring

Human geographers are in high demand in government, business and industry, and the non-profit sector. Graduates with a specialization in human geography can work in the following fields: