Coastal Letters

Newsletter of the coastal and marine geography specialty group of the association of American geographers

Vol. 12, No. 1 Website: http://www.homestead.com/aag_coma or http://aag_coma.homestead.com Feb, 2000

Richard Daniels, Chair
Shorelands/Dept of Ecology
P.O. Box 47690
Olympia, WA 98504
(360) 407-6427
E-mail: rdan461@ecy.wa.gov

Klaus J Meyer-Arendt, Vice Chair
Dept. of Environmental Studies
University of West Florida
11000 University Parkway
Pensacola, FL 32514
(850) 474-2746
E-mail: kjma@uwf.edu

Harry Jol, Secretary-Treasurer
Department of Geography
University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire
105 Garfield Avenue
Eau Claire, WI 54702-4004
(715) 836-3244
E-mail: jolhm@uwec.edu

Dawn Wright, Member of the Board of Directors
Department of Geosciences
104 Wilkinson Hall
Oregon State University
Corvallis, OR 97331-5506
(541) 737-1229
E-mail: dawn@dusk.geo.orst.edu

Wayne Engstrom, Member of the Board of Directors
Geography Department
California State University
Fullerton, CA 92634-9480
(714) 278-3384
E-mail: wengstrom@fullerton.edu

Diane Horn, Member of the Board of Directors
Department of Geography
Birkbeck College
7-15 Gresse St
London W1P 2LL
England (UK)
E-mail: d.horn@geog.bbk.ac.uk

Don't forget to renew your membership in the Coastal and Marine Geography Specialty Group when you renew your membership with the AAG. Please note if you have a yellow mark on your address label it means your membership has not been renewed.

Harry Jol, Secretary-Treasurer, Editor (jolhm@uwec.edu)

Dawn Wright’s term is coming up this April in Pittsburgh. We will be opening up nominations for a one Member of the Board of Directors. According to the bylaws the description for the duties include: judge for the Student Paper Merit Award, serving on that committee under the direction of the vice chair. Members of the board shall also evaluate nominees and select a recipient for the R.J. Russell Award. Each term on the Board of Directors is two years, determined according to the timing of AAG annual meetings.

If you want or know someone who would like to help out the Specialty Group please pass along your nominations to Harry Jol or Rich Daniels.

Nominations for the R.J. Russell Award should be directed to the Vice-Chair. Nominations for the current year should be made at least 2 weeks prior to the annual AAG meeting.

This specialty group award is presented in recognition of an individual's major contributions to the field of coastal or marine geography. These contributions may be in research, teaching, public service, and/or to the specialty group. Previous awardees include Jess Walker (1991), Fillmore Earney (1992), Norb Psuty (1993), Karl Nordstrom (1996), Doug Sherman (1997), and Bernard Bauer (1999).

Nominations are accepted from Coma members, but nominees do not have to be members of either the specialty group or the AAG. Two nominations are required for consideration for the Award. At least one of the nominations must include a complete letter of nomination which will include one paragraph describing the nominees contributions to the field of coastal or marine geography and/or to the special interest group and a list of the nominees relevant publications. The R. J. Russell Award is named in honor of Richard Joel Russell (1895-1971). He was Dean of the Graduate School at Louisiana State University for 12 years, an organizer of the Coastal Studies Institute (1954), president of both the Association of American Geographers (1948) and Geological Society of America (1957), and named to the National Academy of Sciences (1959).

In the nomination letter please include one paragraph describing the nominees contributions to the field of coastal or marine geography and/or to the special interest group and a list of the nominees relevant publications.

Klaus became our Vice-Chair at the Hawaii AAG meeting. He completed his BA at Portland State University and his MA and PHD at Louisiana State University. He recently (1998) became Professor and Chair of the Department of Environmental Studies at the University of West Florida. Previously, he was a Professor at Mississippi State University. Klaus specializes in coastal environments, with research interests ranging from physical geography (coastal processes and forms, shoreline erosion and land loss) to cultural geography (human impacts of coastal urbanization, recreation and tourism, and coastal landscape evolution). Recent fieldwork has been conducted mostly along Gulf of Mexico shorelines of the USA and Mexico.

Klaus is active in several regional and national organizations, including the Association of American Geographers (vice-chair of the Coastal/Marine specialty group), The Coastal Society, the Conference of Latin Americanist Geographers, the Florida Association of Environmental Professionals, and the U.S. EPA Gulf of Mexico Program. He serves on several editorial boards, including Tourism Geographies and the Journal of Cultural Geography, of which he guest-edited two volumes on the geography of tourism. Klaus received a Fulbright Senior Scholar research award to Yucatán in 1994 (where he investigated tourism development and shoreline erosion), and in 1998 he received the Roy Wolfe Award from the Recreation, Tourism, & Sport specialty group of the Association of American Geographers as well as a Distinguished Service Award from the National Geographic Society for contributions to geographic education.

During the past three years members of the Coastal & Marine Specialty Group have participated in a successful project to collect, document, and scan over 200 slides and photographs. These digital images have been assembled into nine individual slide sets that exemplify the continuum of research that is being conducted within the coastal zone.

These digital slide sets are fully documented and have been compiled onto a CD-ROM along with all necessary files to view each slide show interactively on your computer via Microsoft Internet Explorer^TM or Netscape^TM. This CD-ROM compilation comes ready for use and may be suitable for both classroom and computer laboratory settings. In addition, individual photographs contained in the compilation may be reproduced and used for research and educational purposes. A preview of the interface for this CD is available at http://www.homestead.com/aag_coma.

To order or reserve your copy of the CD-ROM, fill out the attached order form and return to the address shown below. Price per CD-ROM is $9.00. Orders of ten or more are eligible for a $1 discount ($8.00 each).

Coastal and Marine Slide Compilation (CD-ROM) Order Form

I would like to order _______ copies of the Coastal and Marine

Slide Compilation (CD-ROM), Volume 1, at $9.00 each

($8.00 each if ordering ten or more).

Return this form to:


Richard Daniels, Chair, COMA
1976 McDonald Avenue
DuPont, WA 98327

The deadline for applying for consideration for the COMA Student Paper Merit Award has been extended to March 15, 2000. Since the deadline for submitting abstracts to the AAG for the annual meeting in Pittsburgh has passed; applicants under this extended deadline must have submitted an abstract and be currently registered for the annual meeting. To apply for this award please complete the registration form located at http://www.homestead.com/aag_coma and forward it, along with a copy of your abstract, to the address shown below. Electronic submissions are encouraged.

Shorelands & Environmental Assistance Program
Department of Ecology
P.O. Box 47600
Olympia, Washington 98504-7600

8:00 – 9:40 am

Gay M. Gomez of McNeese State University (ggomez@mail.mcneese.edu ) reviews a video that is used every semester to help students become more aware of the inter- connectedness and historical depth of issues in the coastal zone:

HAUNTED WATERS, FRAGILE LANDS

by Glen Pitre, for the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program (Louisiana), c. 1995 length: approx. 57 minutes

In the central part of Louisiana's southern fringe of marshes, swamps, bayous, beaches, and barrier islands lies the Barataria-Terrebonne estuary, subject of this excellent video that details natural and human-induced change in a fragile coastal region. Its strengths include the use of interviews that express a variety of perspectives--both past and present--on topics such as coastal land loss, wildlife use and management, hurricanes, and human adaptation to and impact on the coastal zone. The video is well organized, with an introduction that details how the Mississippi River's shifting deltas formed the region, followed by sections on bayou frontlands and swampy backlands, marshes or "trembling prairies," and a Gulf shore that is both abundant and threatened. Few negatives mar this production. Instructors wishing to use the video during 50-minute classes will find its length excessive, and the rather singsong voice of the narrator may irritate some viewers. Neither should prevent viewers from enjoying the video and enhancing their understanding of human-land interactions in this extensive wetland region. Neither should the price deter you: the video has been available FREE of charge from the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program at 1-800-259-0869.

Do you use any videos when teaching coastal or marine geography? (e.g. Beach: A River of Sand). On Don Ziegler's suggestion, the next time you show or view a coastal or marine video, take a moment to jot down its title, brief summary, strengths and weaknesses. Send this information to the Newsletter editors. We will include a column in upcoming newsletters as well as have it posted on the COMA web site.

The Department of Geography and Geology (Eastern Michigan University) has been awarded two grants from the US Army Corps of Engineers Detroit District to determine and evaluate digital mapping data of the Lake Michigan shoreline. Included are the availability of digitized coastal orthophoto quads, property lines, riparian land use and topographic mapping. The data will be used to determine future potential economic losses along the shoreline of the lake. C, Nicholas Raphael is the project director of the two-year study which began in 1998.

New book now available: MARINE AND COASTAL GEOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS, Dawn J. Wright & Darius J. Bartlett (eds.), London: Taylor & Francis Publishers, 320 pp., 1999.

1) Klaus Meyer-Arendt's coastal morphology class at the Univ. of West Florida is having at least a couple of guest speakers this semester. Dr. Ervin Otvos discussed beach ridges and coastal evolution along the gulf Coast. At the end of February, Dr. Norb Psuty will visit as a Sea Grant lecturer and discuss beaches and dunes. In April, the class will attend parts of the EPA Gulf of Mexico Symposium in Mobile.

2) Klaus Meyer-Arendt and students are conducting periodic topographic surveys of Quietwater Beach, a soundside embayment on Santa Rosa Island (Pensacola Beach)where 11,000 yds3 of nourishment sand was deposited. The surveys will determine movement of the sand.

I had a related paper appear in November (ref below). My current involvement with Lake Bonneville and Great Salt Lake research is through quadrangle mapping for the Utah Geological Survey, and with a comparative study of the Bonneville and Provo shorelines of Lake Bonneville.

Sack, D. 1999. The composite nature of the Provo level of Lake Bonneville, Great Basin, western North America. Quaternary Research 52:316-327.

Bruce Hooper (formerly University of Queens land, Brisbane, Australia) has established a natural resources management consulting firm, Integrated Resource Management Research Pty Ltd., also in Brisbane. He recently finished a project to facilitate information exchange between researchers, farmers, Local and State Government agencies and catchment management organizations to improve watershed management. See the demo at www.catchment.com He is actively pursuing the development of a new framework to integrate estuary, coastal zone and watershed management, to develop a transparent process applicable across different Australian states. Selected watershed and water resources management documents about IRMR work are available at www.catchment.com.

The Hazards Specialty Group encourages all students writing PhD dissertations and Masters' theses on a hazards related topic to consider applying for the Gilbert F. White Award. This award is presented each year to the author of an outstanding hazards thesis or dissertation completed in the past 2 years. Recipients of the White Award receive $100, a plaque, and an autographed copy of Dr. White's two-volume Geography, Resources, and Environment. Individuals who have completed their dissertation or thesis and wish to be considered for the Gilbert F. White should contact Kirstin Dow of the University of South Carolina, Hazards Specialty Group Chair. Phone (803) 777-2482 or E-mail: Kirstin-Dow@sc.edu.

If you know of any related conferences coming up in 2000/2001 or if you have announcements or newsworthy items concerning you, your department, or agency, please take a moment to send them to the newsletter co-editors: Harry Jol (jolhm@uwec.edu) Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, 105 Garfield Ave, Eau Claire, WI 54702 or Rich Daniels (rdan461@ecy.wa.gov) Shorelands/Dept of Ecology, P.O. Box 47690, Olympia, WA 98504. Thanks!

Recognition of the importance of the ocean came early to the Association of American Geographers (AAG). The first organized meeting of the Marine Geography Committee (MGC) of the AAG was held in 1970 in San Francisco, where it sponsored a single session. Although committee membership was limited to a handful of geographers who were appointed by the AAG, participation in MGC sponsored sessions at the annual meetings of the AAG increased, and by 1978 a marine geography directory listed eight-four persons with coastal or marine expertise (Psuty et al. In press).

When specialty groups were created by the AAG in 1979, the MGC was dissolved and the board membership was reconstituted as the Marine Geography Specialty Group. In 1981 the group was renamed the Coastal & Marine Specialty Group (COMA). COMA sponsored five special sessions in Honolulu at the 1999 Annual Meeting; in comparison to the one session sponsored by the MGC in 1970. In 1999 the group had a paid membership of 180, down from a high of about 197 in 1996 when the annual meeting was held in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Within the U.S. our membership is distributed as expected, with it being higher in coastal states. However, the low number of members in Alaska, Georgia, Washington, and Maine is of concern. Review of the on-line descriptions of the Sea Grant Program in each state found that the programs in these four states were centered in Oceanography Departments. Indicating that increased efforts need to be taken by our membership, and geography in general, to bridge the gap between the study of the coastal zone, by geographers, and the offshore, by oceanographers.

The specialty group has gone through a number of changes in focus throughout the years. These changes in emphasis mirror the interests of the current specialty group officers. For example, at the 1989 annual meeting of the AAG the sessions were equally split between geomorphology and coastal hazards/social interactions with the coastal zone. By the 1998 meeting in Boston, four out of five sponsored sessions were physical geography based. The increased prevalence of physical geography in the group’s sessions may have had the unintended impact of discouraging those interested in the study of the economic and social aspects of the hydrosphere from participating in COMA’s activities.

As ever-greater numbers of people move to the ocean’s edge, research conducted by human geographers that deals with the coastal zone is of ever increasing importance. The need for further research on the potential impacts of socioeconomic development on or within the coastal and ocean environment is well known. This need has been magnified by the growing demand for the development of integrated coastal zone management programs at the state, federal, and international level.

The coastal zone management and socioeconomic arena provides a growth opportunity for the group. I feel that human geographers (disguised as coastal planners perhaps?) need and deserve greater representation at our annual business meeting. Through the years the specialty group has successfully promoted communication between geographers interested in the coastal and marine environment. We need to continue to encourage open dialog with our friends next door, as well as those down the hall in the next Department. In conclusion, while in Pittsburgh I challenge you to invite a student, friend, or colleague to one of our special sessions as well as to our annual business meeting (which will be held Thursday, April 6, at 6 pm).