Edward Karabenick, Ph.D.

24 August 1931 - 3 January 2021

The Department of Geography at California State University, Long Beach, grieves the loss of our colleague and friend, Dr. Edward Karabenick, to COVID-19. Dr. Karabenick joined our faculty in 1959, earning tenure and then full professorship. He entered the Faculty Early Retirement Program (FERP) in 1998, completing it and fully retiring in 2003.

Dr. Karabenick came to us from Michigan, where he had completed his M.A. in geography at Wayne State University in 1957 and was working on his Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Michigan. His dissertation, completed in 1962, was about the population growth patterns of modern Rome from 1871 to 1959 and developed his interest in urban geography, which became a core part of his teaching for us. His master's thesis was about agriculture as practiced in the Toulon region of France and in the European colonized area of Algiers in Algeria. This tension between the rural and the urban and the lands on either side of the Mediterranean dominated his research and teaching throughout his career.

Urban demographics were the basis of his dissertation and early publications. He was interested in the large influx of refugees fleeing Southeast Asia after the end of the Vietnam War as a new element in the demography of California, both urban and rural. He later collaborated with Dr. John Jung in Psychology and Drs. Jacqueline Aames and Ronald Aames from CSU Fullerton on a study of their settlement and acculturation processes and needs.

In many ways, his heart seemed to lie in the geographies of agriculture and the impacts of colonialism, technological development, and post-colonial policies in the agriculture of North Africa and the Middle East, judging from the bulk of his publications over the course of his career. These interests supported his regional teaching expertise in the geographies of Africa, the Middle East, and Europe.

Dr. Karabenick was an active mentor in our graduate program, serving on twenty master's thesis committees, chairing eight of these. Themes in those he chaired include hazards and urban development, water resource management, historical geography, industrial location, and urban housing.

In addition to his service in the Department of Geography, Dr. Karabenick was also affiliated with the then-new Jewish Studies Program at CSULB, and his course, GEOG 309I (The Middle East and North Africa), was an elective in the Jewish Studies minor.

Dr. Karabenick and his widow, Florine, were active donors in the community, supporting such organizations as the Jewish Federation and Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Long Beach and West Orange County and the Long Beach Playhouse, as well as CSULB.