Barrows, Harlan (1877–1960)

Harlan H. Barrows was an American geographer best known for his interpretation of geography as human ecology. He expressed this view in his 1922 presidential address to the Association of American Geographers. In Barrows's opinion, simply describing what exists in the landscape was not enough. He believed geography should focus on the actions people take and the adjustments they make to live in their environments. In other words, Barrows thought it was important to focus on what people do to survive and thrive in their environments rather than looking for how the environment influences them.

In Barrows's day, many believed that cultures were influenced almost entirely by the environment. This belief, called environmental determinism, does not consider the fact that people make decisions and adapt to their environments. Instead, determinists look for environmental factors that influence or “determine” culture. Barrows held that geographers should study the interactions people have with the environment rather than looking for influences. He thought environmental determinists searched for simple answers, seeking influences in the environment that do not really exist. His colleague, Ellen Churchill Semple, was a well-known environmental determinist and one of the first female geographers.

In Barrows's view, geography was largely about the relationships people had with their environments. He believed that this approach would help geographers discover the complexity of human-environmental relationships. Achieving this goal of discovering human and environmental relationships required geographers to balance knowledge of the natural world with knowledge of the social world, especially history and economics. Barrows differentiated history and historical geography. In his view, history starts at the past for the purpose of learning about the past, but historical geography starts with the present and should study how relationships with the environment progressed. Barrows was more concerned with the present than the past.

Born in Armada, Michigan, he earned his BS degree from the University of Chicago in 1903. That same year, the University of Chicago established the first university geography department in the United States. In 1907, Barrows was hired as a geography instructor and became a professor in 1914. He was promoted to chair of the department of geography in 1919 and maintained that position until stepping down and becoming an emeritus professor in 1942. Barrows also worked on numerous natural resource projects for the federal government. A common theme for much of this work concerned the conservation of water resources, which he included in reports to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. National Resources Committee.