Chapter 1: Geography and Human Geography

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Chapter 1Geography and Human Geography
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I. The Nature and Importance Geographic Inquiry

• Change over time should include change across
  space
• Immanuel Kant must study time and space in order
  to understand certain events

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• Core questions of geographic inquiry
• 1. Why and how do things come together in
  certain places to produce certain outcomes?
• 2. Why are some things found in some places
  and not in others?
• 3. To what extent do things in one place
  influence those in another?

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Notable Early Geographers

• Aristotle
• 1st to show the earth was round based
• Erastosthenes
• 1st to use the word geography
• 1st to accept the earth was round and calculated
  its circumference
• Prepared one of the worlds earliest maps which
  divided the earth into 5 climatic zones
• Ptolemy
• Wrote the Guide to Geography
• Set basic principles of mapmaking

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II. Geographys Themes and Perspectives

• Location how the distribution of people and
  things on Earth affects what happens and why
• -distribution various locations of a
  collection of people or objects
• -establishes the context in which events and
  processes are situated

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Ways to indicate location (position)

• Maps-best way to show location
• Serve 2 purposes
• Tool for storing reference material
• Tool for communicating geographic info
• Place- name given to a portion of the Earths
  surface
• Site-physical characteristics of a place
• Absolute location-longitude and latitude,
  mathematical measurements used in determining
  distances and directions
• Relative location-location of a place relative to
  other places
• Valuable for 2 reasons
• Finding an unfamiliar place
• Centrality, understanding its importance

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• Distribution-arrangement of something across
  Earths surface
• Density-frequency with which something occurs in
  an area
• Arithmetic density total of objects (people)
  in an area
• Physiologic density of people per unit area of
  agriculturally productive land
• Concentration-extent of a features spread over
  an area
• -clustered relatively close
• -dispersed relatively far apart
• Pattern-geometric arrangement of objects

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• 2. Human-environment interactions relationship
  between a societys culture and its environment
• Cultural landscape includesall human-induced
  changes that involve the surface and the
  biosphere
• Environmental determinism human behavior is
  strongly affected by, and even controlled or
  determined by the environment
• Possibilism the natural environment merely
  serves to limit the range of choices available to
  the culture
• Environmental modification positive and negative
  environmental alterations

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• 3. Regions-areas of unique characteristics,
• ways of organizing people geographically
• -4 Distinctive characteristics
• a.) area defined spatial extent
• b.) location lies somewhere on Earths surface
• c.) boundaries sometimes evident on the ground,
  often based on specifically chosen criteria
• d.) other cultural, economic, physical

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• 3 types of regions
• A. Formal region (uniform/homogeneous)
• -area in which everyone shares one or more
  distinctive characteristic
• -some are easy to identify, others identified
  by predominant characteristic rather than a
  universal characteristic
• -used to explain broad global or national
  patterns
• -must recognize the diversity of factors

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• B. Functional region (aka nodal)
• -an area organized around a node or focal
  point
• -characteristic chosen to define the region
  dominates at a central focus and diminishes in
  importance outward
• -used to display info about regions economic
  areas
• -ex. television reception

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• C. Vernacular region (aka perceptual)
• -a place people believe exists as a part of
  their cultural identity
• -developed from an informal sense of place
• -identified through a mental map
• -ex. the South
• Regions can be seen in a hierarchy (vertical
  order or scale)

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• 4. Place associations among phenomena in an area
  (why each region is distinctive)
• -culture peoples lifestyles, values, belief
  and traits
• inc. what people care about (language,
  religion, ethnicity)
• -helps identify the location and principle
  means by which values are spread throughout
  the world
• what they take care of (necessities to
  survive, leisure activities)
• -world divided into economically developed and
  less economically developed
• -also interested in political institutions b/c a
  major
• source of a groups cultural identity is
  citizenship

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• -physical processes environmental processes
• which explain the distribution of human
  activities
• 1. climate-long-term avg. weather conditions at
  a certain location
• classified according to system created by
  German climatologist Vladimir Koppen
• A Tropical climate
• B. Dry Climates
• C. Warm Mid-Latitude Climates
• D. Cold Mid-Latitude Climates
• E. Polar Climates

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• 2. Vegetation-plant life
• four major forms of plant communities call
  biomes
• a.) forest biome trees form a continuous
  canopy over the ground
• b.) savanna biome mixture of trees and
  grasses
• c.) grassland biome land covered in grasses
• d.) desert biome essentially no vegetation,
  but not completely barren
• 3. Soil-the material that forms on the Earths
  surface
• erosion and the depletion of nutrients are 2
  basic problems concerning the destruction of
  soil
• How is this problem solved?

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• 4. Landforms earths surface features
  (geomorphology-geographers that study the
  Earths landforms)
• Topographic maps used in this study
• used to study relief and slope of
  localities
• -relief difference in elevation b/t 2 points
• -slope-steepness of hills

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Why are different places similar?

• Scale from local to global
• Locally to identify unique features
• Globally to see broad patterns

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What is globalization?

• A set of processes that are increasing
  interactions, deepening relationships and
  heightening interdependence w/o regard to a
  countrys borders.
• Set of outcomes that are felt from these global
  processes
• Unevenly distributed and differently manifested
  across the world
• How does geography fit with globalization?

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• Think about the following statement
• Globalization is not a natural evolution in
  humanity.
• Do you agree or disagree? Why? Why not?

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• It is a set of processes and outcomes created by
  people
• It is not limited to state-to-state interactions
• It occurs regardless of scale
• The backbone of globalization
• TRADE

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• Globalization creates networks-set of
  interconnected nodes w/o a center
• Change due to an increase in technology
• Some places are more connected than others
• As a result, spatial unevenness and uneven
  outcomes of globalization occurs
• What are global cities? What are some?
• Operate worldwide because of time zones
• somewhere is always open!

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• Globalization has been led by transnational
  corporations
• previously, moving money has been very difficult
• this has been solveds through technology
• How has globalization affected the local levels?
• transnational corps. are successful b/c they
  identify optimal locations

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Question

• On a separate sheet of paper, explain how
  globalization affects culture. What are the pros
  and cons of globalization, in your opinion? Can
  some of the issues anti-globalizationists have be
  solved? Why? Why not?
• This assignment is due on
• Friday September 7th

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Pros and Cons of Globalization

• Pros
• It raises the well-being of all countries by
  forcing them to specialize and use their
  resources wisely
• Trade competition raises long-term growth rate by
  expanding access to global technologies
• aka The Washington Consensus

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• Cons
• Push to privatize state-owned entities
• Open financial markets
• Liberalize trade by removing restrictions on the
  flow of goods
• Encourage foreign direct investment
• World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF),
  and the World Trade Organization exist to benefit
  the countries/cities of the global economic core

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• Cities at the core protect themselves while
  forcing other countries to open themselves up
  to foreign investment and trade
• Is that so bad? Why? Why not?
• They also argue that trade is not free