Geography is considered an Arts/Humanities subject in some
universities while in others it is considered a Science. Anyone considering
putting Geography down on their CAO is probably already aware of this. The
classification of Geography as either an Arts or a Science comes down solely to
the research interests of the staff (that’s what one of our lecturers told us
anyway). So if their areas of interest lie in physical geography, it is usually
classified as a Science (like in Trinity), while if they are more interested in
human geography it is usually classified as an Arts subject. In UCD, Geography
is part of the College of Human Sciences and is considered an Arts subject.
There are two different Geography degrees available in UCD.
The first is Geography as part of the BA Joint Honours degree, where you study
Geography alongside another Arts subject. The second is a BA in Planning,
Geography and Environment. This second degree is the one to study if you want
to become a town planner or something similar, as it trains you specifically
for such careers. I am studying Geography as part of the BA joint honours degree.
Studying Geography in college was much better than I expected. I thought it would be quite similar to the school curriculum, but it wasn’t as close as I had anticipated. Geography is a very diverse subject, and UCD’s course is much, much broader than the Leaving Cert syllabus. We had three core/compulsory modules over the three years – Geographic Research Techniques, which teaches basic skills like cartography and research methods; Ideas in Geography, which covers theories and the history of the discipline; and Geographical Analysis, which focuses on statistics. After this, the choice is entirely the students. You can focus on physical geography, human geography, environmental geography or a mix of all (a word of warning though – if you want to become a geography teacher you have to have a certain amount of credits in both physical and human geography; each module is usually worth 5 credits so make sure you look into what is required and take the correct number of classes). There is a huge choice even within these subsections. Physical geography can be broken down into things like glaciation, fluvial geomorphology and planetary geomorphology (you study the physical geography of the other planets in our solar system, it’s pretty cool); human geography into political geography, urban geography, economic geography, historical geography, social and population geography. Environmental geography deals with things like climate change and environmental management and protection. The first year classes are general and broad, and give you a taste of everything; in second and third year you can specialise and focus on what interests you most. Physical geography is much more scientific in college than it is in secondary school, and because science has never been my strong point, I found it much more difficult. Thus I ended up focusing on human geography. My favourite classes were Political Geography and Social & Population Geography. There were two political geography classes – US Foreign Policy, which covered things like the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the Arab Springs, and European Integration which was all about how the EU operates. For Social & Population Geography we did a research project on a topic of our choice (e.g. religion, migration, education). It was great because we got to choose the topic ourselves and make our own surveys etc.
One of the things I love most about Geography (and UCD in
general) is the huge choice of classes offered and the way the student has so
much control over the direction of his or her studies.
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