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Call for papers: Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting 9th to 13th April, 2013, Los Angeles Critical Geographies of Children, Nature and Cities Organisers: Ann Marie Murnaghan, Department of Environmental and Geography, University of Manitoba: [log in to unmask] Laura Shillington, Department of Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia University: [log in to unmask] Description Children and nature are both complex concepts that have a precarious place in urban landscapes. Simultaneously excluded and revered, their material and symbolic presence often reminds urban adults of loss (of childhood, or of wilderness) and regulation (of wild nature, and of wild children). As numerous scholars have noted, both children and nature stand in for moral panics about the decline of modern urban life. This session will examine the changing relationships between children, nature, and the city. We are interested in papers that examine these relationships across space and time, through case studies, theoretical examinations, and methodological forays. Some questions that this session seeks to address are: · How do recent re-theorisations of urban nature affect conceptions of urban children? · How can exploring urban nature and urban children together illuminate the power relations that produce both of these agents of change? · How can the diversity of urban children's views of nature help us to see these webs of domination? · How can including children in urban political ecological approaches help to rethink environmental and social justice in cities differently? We are particularly interested in papers that examine children, nature, and the city in both the urban global south and global north. Research that extends, alters, and is critical of the categories of ‘urban nature’ and ‘urban children’ is particularly encouraged! Possible paper explorations: · Home ecologies and children · Environmental justice and children in the city · Urban planning and children (and children’s spaces) · Gender, children and nature · Schools, education and urban nature · Children and animals · Children and parks or playgrounds · Zoos as commodifications of urban nature in relation to children · Wilderness and childhood · Differential access to natural resources across age categories · Productivity and livelihoods Please email a 250 word abstract to Laura Shillington ([log in to unmask]) and Ann Marie Murnaghan ([log in to unmask]) by Friday 12th October 2012. Successful submissions will be confirmed by Wednesday 17th October 2012. The deadline to register and submit abstracts online at the AAG website is Wednesday 24th October 2012 (www.aag.org/cs/annualmeeting).