ABSTRACT
Durkheim gave great importance to the branch of sociology that he called social morphology. This field was described as studying the material, terrestrial aspects of social life. In fact, Durkheimian sociology always remained ambiguous about the importance of social morphology in explaining social structure and human behavior. The objectives of Vidalian human geographers were relatively similar, but their written work was regional, oriented toward case studies, historical, and landscape oriented. The conflict between Ratzel's anthropogeography and the social morphologists was carried on in often acerbic debates between the latter group and the French school of geography. Several themes of the debate are examined in this chapter with primary emphasis given to the importance of divergent underlying philosophies. The polemical nature of the debate indicates that more basic issues may have been at stake. Vidal, Durkheim, and their early disciples did not escape the influence of neo-Kantianism, which prevailed among French liberal republicans at the turn of the century.
