Notes on a geographical canon? Measures, models and scholarly enterprise

This paper provides an introduction to the theme issue by placing recent discussions about the geographical canon within scholarly debates about canonicity. Geographers have been generally silent about canon but, to the contrary, possess a sophisticated grasp of related concepts such as tradition and paradigm. It is argued that there is no clear canonical conception that geographers should adopt, but that further attention towards the canonical is nevertheless merited. Engagement with the geographical canon is not prescriptive. Rather, its construction will be a personal choice that involves engagement with a broader community of scholarship. In doing so, though, productive avenues are created for consideration of the texts, habits and practices that identify geography. It is concluded that debates about canonicity provide much for considerations of historiography and pedagogy by geographers.