American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting. San Francisco, California, March 16-20, 2026. Over 250 people attended the Cultural Geography Keynote address delivered by Rebecca Solnit. Cultural Geography Specialty Group (CGSG) program included twenty paper sessions, several field visits, two workshops, three panel discussions, a photograph exhibition, and two plenary sessions. Nearly 5000 joined the conference in-person, though most sessions were live-streamed.
2026 Cultural Geography Keynote, Rebecca Solnit
Thursday March 19th 12:50-2:00PM
Hilton Union Square, Imperial Ballroom
Rebecca Solnit is beloved for her inspirational essays and books on the environment, feminism, human rights, anti-imperialism, and social activism published by Harper’s, The Guardian, Haymarket Books, and others. The critically acclaimed Hope in the Dark (2004) and Men Explain Things to Me (2014) have empowered people to reconsider their place in the world and ability to change it for the better. Lesser known, but no less powerful are her award-winning series of urban cultural atlases published by the University of California Press. In these volumes, Solnit explores the intersection of social, historical, spatial, and environmental phenomena in and around San Francisco (2010), New Orleans (2013), and New York City (2016), in collaboration with geographers, cartographers, artists, and other local and academic partners.
Rebecca Solnit reflected upon her recent and past research and its relevance to human geographers who seek to generate, delineate, and disseminate knowledge about people, space, and place. In these chaotic times, when many people feel anxious about the future, Solnit reminds us of the long arc of progressive gains in society achieved by groups and individuals who identified injustices and worked toward solutions. This is the message of The Beginning Comes after the End, published on the eve of the conference and immediately appeared on the New York Times best-seller list! What an opportune moment it was for us to hear insights from this great writer as we visited her hometown.
“No writer has weighed the complexities of sustaining hope in our times of readily available despair more thoughtfully and beautifully, nor with greater nuance.” —Maria Popova
A book signing occurred immediately following the keynote, 2-3PM in the the Grand Ballroom (AAG’s Exhibit Hall), at the University of California Press booth.
Cultural Geography Specialty Group Business Meeting!
11:40AM – 12:40PM
Imperial B, Ballroom Level
(Just prior to the Keynote & in the same room!)
Get involved with the Cultural Geography Specialty Group, build connections within our community, and celebrate recent accomplishments and awardees! We invite you to join our diverse and creative community of cultural geographers.
The Cultural Geography Photo Exhibition!
March 17 – March 21, in the Grand Ballroom Exhibit Hall
Featuring photographs from the 2026 Cultural Geography Specialty Group Photo competition!
CGSG was proud to sponsor an array of fascinating field visits, workshops, and paper sessions in 2026. See details below.
Cultural Geography – Field Visits & Workshops
Monday, March 16
11:00AM – 3:00PM Field Visit (FV 0-1)
Following in the Footsteps of San Francisco’s Arctic and Alaskan Connections
This immersive half-day field trip combines urban geography, historical geography, and environmental history to reveal enduring connections with the Arctic and North Pacific.
Tuesday, March 17th
2:00 – 5:00PM Field Visit (FV 1-3)
Bay Model and North Golden Gate Bridge
Visited the Bay Model, a 1.5-acre hydraulic model of San Francisco Bay and Delta areas built the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the 1950s to simulate tides and flows and study potential effects of proposed civil engineering works. We passed through a significant musical landscape, where Otis Redding penned “dock of a bay,” Fleetwood Mack recorded Rumors, and Tupac went to high school.
Wednesday March 18th
8:30 – 9:50AM Workshop (WS 2-1)
Mapping and Measuring Structural Racism and Discrimination in the US: Advancing Place-Based GIScience for Health Equity
Yosemite Room A, Ballroom Level, Hilton Union Square
1:10 – 4:15PM Field Visit (FV 2-4)
Smells like San Francisco: Vapors and Volatility in the City of Explosivity
This 2.6-mile mostly flat walking tour uses attention to aroma to map a slice of modernity’s march around San Francisco.
4:00 – 6:00 PM Field Visit (FV 2-5)
Radical History, Site of Power: A Walking Tour of San Francisco Chinatown
Friday, March 20th
2:00-4:00PM Field Visit (FV 4-5)
Tenderloin History Walking Tour
The Tenderloin is a complex and sometimes contradictory tapestry of labor history, LGBTQ history, tenant activism, social services, immigration stories, urban resilience, and the vice that earned the neighborhood its suggestive name.
2:30-3:50PM. Preregistration not required
Workshop: Imagining the Other – The Empathic Power of Music Geography
Continental 9, Ballroom Level
Chair:Michael Solem, Texas State University
Cultural Geography Specialty Group – Sponsored Sessions
Thanks to all of the session organizers and chairs for their continued commitment and support of our community of cultural geographers! (All are paper sessions unless otherwise noted)
Tuesday, March 17th
12:50-2:10 PM
Scheming as a Spatiotemporal Secret: Behind the Scenes of the Conjuncture
Continental 7, Ballroom Level Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Emily Holloway, University of Pennsylvania
2:30-3:50 PM
Frontier, Brig, School, Screen: Geographies of “Star Trek” at Sixty
Continental 7, Ballroom Level
Chair:David Seitz
4:10-5:30PM
Ethics, Creativity, and Refusal in Storytelling and Scholarship
Golden Gate 7, Lobby Level Hybrid, Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Katrina Stack, University of Tennessee
Archive as territory: Historical methods in Black geographies
Continental 7, Ballroom Level
Chair:Emily Holloway, University of Pennsylvania
Wednesday, March 18th
8:30-9:50AM
Contested Heritage in the Era of Trumpism 2.0
Franciscan A, Ballroom Level Hybrid, Streamed & Recorded
Chair: Katrina Stack, University of Tennessee
10:10-11:30AM
Contested Heritage in the Era of Trumpism 2.0
Franciscan A, Ballroom Level Hybrid, Streamed & Recorded
Chair: Katrina Stack, University of Tennessee
12:50 PM – 2:10 PM
Geographies of Care in the Age of AI: Mapping and Modeling Homelessness and Public Health with Big Data Session II
Union Square 24, 4th Floor, Tower 3
Chair: Ming-Hsiang Tsou, San Diego State
4:10-5:30 PM
Author Meets Critic: “Displacing Territory: Syrian and Palestinian Refugees in Jordan” by Karen Culcasi (Panel)
Continental 9, Ballroom Level Hybrid & Streamed
Chair: Karen Culcasi, West Virginia University
Thursday, March 19th
8:30-9:50AM
Mapping New Collectives: Ethnographic Approaches to Reconfiguring the Urban Household
Union Square 13, 4th Floor, Tower 3 Chair:Teresa Caldeira, UC Berkeley
10:10-11:30 AM
Author Meets Critics: ‘Spinoza’s Geographical Ethics’ by Joe Gerlach (Panel)
Nob Hill 4 & 5, 6th Floor, Tower 3 Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Thomas Jellis, University of Bristol
What are we doing here? Transdisciplinary and Geographical Methodologies in Global Studies II
Union Square 14, 4th Flr, Tower 3 Hybrid, Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Jake Atienza, University of California, Irvine
11:40AM – 12:40PM
Cultural Geography Specialty Group Business Meeting (Networking)
Imperial B, Ballroom Level Tower 1, 2, 3. Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Christabel Devadoss, Middle Tennessee State
12:50-2:10PM
AAG 2026 Cultural Geography Keynote: Rebecca Solnit (Plenary)
Imperial B, Ballroom Level Hybrid & Streamed
Chair: Dan Bonenberger, Eastern Michigan University
2:30-3:50PM
Next-Generation Methods for Accurate and Timely Population Estimation
Nob Hill 6 & 7, 6th Floor, Tower 3 Hybrid, Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Marie Urban
Burner Geographies I: Spirituality
Franciscan A, Ballroom Level Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Elizabeth Bennett
4:10-5:30 PM
Burner Geographies II: Neopolis
Franciscan A, Ballroom Level, Tower 123 Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Elizabeth Bennett
Friday March 20th
8:30-9:50AM
Researching Across Dualistic & Dichotomous Disciplinary Boundaries (Pt 1 of 2)
Nob Hill 10, 6th Floor, Tower 3 Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Anjan Sen, University of Delhi – India
International Migration and Mobility in an East Asian context (Pt 1)
Golden Gate 3, Lobby Level Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Kylie Yuet Ning Poon, UCLA
10:10 AM – 11:30 AM
Researching Across Dualistic & Dichotomous Disciplinary Boundaries (Pt 2 of 2)
Nob Hill 10, 6th Floor, Tower 3 Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Anjan Sen, University of Delhi – India
International Migration and Mobility in an East Asian context (Pt 2)
Golden Gate 3, Lobby Level Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Yali He-Schafer, UCLA
Cultural geographies Annual Lecture, Dydia DeLyser, “Just say ‘Yes!’ Love, devotion, and learning public geography” (Plenary)
Imperial B, Ballroom Level Hybrid, Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Matthew Wilson, University of Kentucky
Beyond Liberal Emergencies: Rethinking Emergency Governance in this postliberal present
Franciscan B, Ballroom Level Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Nathaniel O’Grady, University of Manchester
12:50 PM – 2:10 PM
Beyond Liberal Emergencies: Rethinking practices of emergency governance in this postliberal moment 1
Nob Hill 4 & 5, 6th Floor, Tower 3 Streamed & Recorded
Chair:Ruth Trumble
International Migration and Mobility in an East Asian context (Pt 3)
Golden Gate 3, Lobby Level Hybrid & Streamed
Chair:Yali He-Schafer, UCLA
Reclaiming Narratives, Rooting Connections, and Healing Memory Amidst Dispossession (Panel Discussion)
Nob Hill 6 & 7, 6th Floor, Tower 3 Chair:Sherine Ebadi, UC Berkeley
2:30-3:50PM
Workshop: Imagining the Other – The Empathic Power of Music Geography
Continental 9, Ballroom Level
Chair:Michael Solem, Texas State University
Cultural Geography Specialty Group 