Place and Society: Local to Global This course is an introduction to how geographers view the world and contribute to our understanding of it. Where do the phenomena of human experience occur? Why are they there? What is the significance? These questions are fundamental for explaining the world at different scales from the global to the local. Throughout, we will focus on the spatial basis of society, its continual reorganization through time, and how various human and environmental problems can be usefully analyzed from a geographic perspective.

Seminar in Population Geography: Migration in the Twenty-first Century On average, 20 percent of the U.S. population changes residence in any given year, yet the scale, geography, motivations, and impacts of these movements are highly variable, making migration an incredibly pervasive and complex phenomenon. Furthermore, international immigration continues to attract considerable academic, political, and media attention. This course will explore contemporary approaches to migration studies emphasizing the important insights and contributions of geographers. How have geographers examined migration, and how have geographical approaches changed over time? In what ways has technology influenced the motivations, frequency, and implications of migration behavior? What are the different impacts of migration on individuals, households, and communities? And, what are the new innovations in scholarly approaches to migration? Through a combination of readings from contemporary migration literature, discussions, and analyses, students in this seminar will gain an appreciation for and understanding of this incredibly rich and complex phenomena of migration.

Population Geography Through a combination of lectures, readings, and exercises, this course provides background and analytical experience in the spatial dimensions of population dynamics. Students will theoretically and empirically examine geographic variations in natural increase, domestic and international migration, infant mortality, disease, and hunger. Topics will include the intersection of settlement-environment-disease, circular migration systems, cultural influences on demographic processes, and linkages between international and domestic migration flows. We will also assess various policy options and their effectiveness in addressing important demographic issues. The exercises will expose students to the vast amount of population data publicly available and introduce them to techniques used to examine and assess population related issues.

Practicing Human Geography Whether you are planning to do your own research or want to be a more savvy consumer of research produced by others, it is useful to develop an understanding of the process of creating, discovering, and interpreting information about the world. In this course, students will explore quantitative and qualitative methodologies and the ways they can be used in human geography research. Through examples, exercises, and readings, students will learn the types of questions different techniques are designed to answer, how they work, and how to interpret the results. Students will gain hands on experience conducting surveys, generating and interpreting qualitative data, selecting and implementing statistical analyses, and writing research reports, to build competence and critical awareness in the practice and communication of research.

Peter Nelson

Population Geography was open to non-majors even if you haven't taken Place and Society. It's a course with a lot of reading, but most of the emphasis was on projects using ArcGIS Online. It's a very beginner-friendly way to visualize data using maps, so don't worry about experience with GIS or anything.

Pete is one of the best profs at Middlebury, but this class in particular is eh (nothing to do with his teaching, he made it much more interesting than it would have been otherwise.) This course is great for freshmen trying to figure out what they want to do because it is a great survey course in geography but it is a LOT of busywork. If you're an upperclassmen who wants to try geog take Population, Urban, or Rural with Pete instead! 

Nelson is the man.  One of my favorite professors at Middlebury.  Lectures can be a little dry at times but I find the content super interesting.  Fairly moderate amount of reading, but it's pretty easy to skim and easy to understand.  Lectures were essential to understanding material, readings certainly helped but weren't completely necessary to do.  The assignments were honestly really interesting but they did take a considerable amount of time.  Not an easy A, but an A is certainly doable if you put in a little bit of effort!