Geography acquired imperial and civilizational prestige across Western powers.

Evidence

The transformation of geography from “dull and pedantic”—Curzon’s phrase for what had now dropped out of geography as an academic subject—into “the most cosmopolitan of all sciences” argued exactly that new Western and widespread predilection. … Nowadays we regard geographical knowledge as an essential part of knowledge in general. By the aid of geography, and in no other way, do we understand the action of great natural forces, the distribution of population, the growth of commerce, the expansion of frontiers, the development of States, the splendid achievements of human energy in its various manifestations. — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 536

Categorization

• XREF: The rise of geography as imperial science scaffolds the module’s treatment of how academic disciplines were complicit in colonial knowledge production.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 536