Download Intro to HG (PPT)

Introduction to
Human Geography
AP Human Geography
Lacks
Questions that
Geography Addresses
• Where are things located?
• Why are they important?
• How are places related?
• How are places connected?
• How are humans affected by their locations?
Definition of Geography
• The scientific and systematic study of both the
physical and cultural features of the earth’s
surface. It is a spatial perspective looking at
patterns and distributions on the earth’s
surface.
• Invented by the Greek scholar Eratosthenes
• Based on two Greek words:
• Geo (Earth)
• Graphy (to write)
Physical vs Human
• Physical Geography: the study of the four
spheres
•
•
•
•
Lithosphere
Atmosphere
Hydrosphere
Biosphere
• Human (or Cultural) Geography: the study of
the spatial differentiation and organization of
human activity on the earth’s surface
Approaches to the study
• Regional (Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa,
Southeast Asia)
• Systematic (Human Geography, Physical
Geography, Historical Geography)
Different Disciplines in
Physical Geography
• Geomorphology: studies the form and structure of the surface of
the earth
• Climatology: involves the study of long term weather conditions
on the earth
• Hydrography: concerns the distribution of water (oceans, rivers,
lakes, and their uses)
• Biogeography: studies the flora (plant life) and the fauna (animal
life)
• Pedology: study of the soils
• Ecology: studies the interactions between life forms and the
environment
• Geology: study of rocks and the earth’s interior
5 Themes of Geography
• 1. Location
• 2. Region
• 3. Movement
• 4. Human-Environment Interaction
• 5. Place
1. LOCATION: Where is it?
ABSOLUTE LOCATION
(mathematical location)
•THE EXACT POINT WHERE A PLACE OR
PHYSICAL FEATURE IS LOCATED ON THE
EARTH’S SURFACE
•Examples: LATITUDE (parallels) &
LONGITUDE (meridians), MAP POINTS,
ADDRESS…..
Organizing the globe
• grid – made up of latitude and longitude lines
Latitude & Longitude
• Determines absolute location
• Latitude: imaginary lines that run east and
west and measure north and south
•
•
•
•
•
Measured from the equator
N = north
S = south
Also called parallels
Measured from 0 – 90 degrees
Important Lines of Latitude
• Arctic Circle – 66½º north
• during the summer solstice, the area to 90 º
north is in sun
• during winter solstice it is in total darkness
Important Lines of Latitude
• Tropic of Cancer – 23½º north
• sun is directly overhead on summer solstice
Important Lines of Latitude
• Equator – lies at 0 degrees
• Longest circle of latitude
• Sun is directly over it at both spring and fall
equinox
• The circumference of the earth
is 24,901.55 miles
Important Lines of Latitude
• Tropic of Capricorn – 23½º south
• sun is directly overhead on winter solstice
Top left: Tropic of Cancer marker in Namibia
Bottom left: Tropic of Capricorn marker in Australia
Important Lines of Latitude
• Antarctic Circle – 66½º south
• during the winter solstice, the area to 90 º south
is in sun
• during summer solstice it is in total darkness
Latitude & Longitude
• Longitude: imaginary lines that run north
south and measure east and west
•
•
•
•
•
E = east
W = west
Meet at north and south poles
Also called meridians
Measured from 0 to 180 degrees (runs through
Greenwich, England)
Prime Meridian
Right: The Royal Observatory
Greenwich, England
International
Dateline
Organizing the globe
• Hemisphere: half of the globe
• Separated by the equator and the prime
meridian
• What
hemisphere(s)
we live in?
do
Organizing the globe
• Continent: large land mass
• How many continents are there?
• Seven: North America, South America, Europe,
Asia, Africa, Australia, and Antarctica
• Largest island = Greenland
• How many oceans are there?
• Five: Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Southern, Arctic
• “Continent exercise”
Organizing the globe
• There are also bays, seas, gulfs, lakes
• determined by
• Size
• Salt
• Largest lake: Caspian Sea
LOCATION: Where is it?
RELATIVE LOCATION
(situation)
• DESCRIBES THE LOCATION OF A PLACE
IN RELATIONSHIP TO ANOTHER PLACE
• Examples: Cardinal/Intermediate
directions, landmarks, words like “near
the….”, or turn right at, left
2. Regions
• Grouping of places that have something in common and
can be given a name based on similar features.
• Which region of the world do we live in…
• Hemisphere?
• Continent?
• Country?
• Region of country?
• State?
• Region of state?
• County?
• Town?
Types of Regions
• Formal (uniform) regions
• Montana; German-speaking region of
Europe
• Functional (nodal) regions
• the circulation area of a newspaper; an
urban area (New York City); a radio station
• Perceptual (vernacular/cultural) regions
• the American South; Gulf Coast
The meanings of regions are often contested. In Montgomery,
Alabama, streets named after Confederate President Jefferson Davis
and Civil Rights leader Rosa Parks intersect.
Photo credit: Jonathan Leib
Other Examples of
Regions
• Climate zones: Tropical countries, Arctic
• Geographic Region: Gulf Coast states; Middle East
• Political Regions: countries, states
• Economic Regions: OPEC; Sun Belt
• Cultural Regions: based on religion, ethnicity, custom i.e., Latin America, Arab world
3. Movement
How and why do people, ideas,
products, and events such as
disease move from one place to
another?
Movement
• 1) Culture Hearths – sources of civilization from
which an idea, innovation, or ideology originates
(e.g. Mesopotamia, Nile Valley), viewed in the
context of time as well as space
Movement
• 2) Cultural diffusion – spread of an innovation, or ideology from its source
area to another culture
• a) Expansion diffusion – an innovation, or ideology develops in a source
area and remains strong there while also spreading outward
• 1) Contagious diffusion – nearly all adjacent individuals are affected
(e.g. spread of Islam, disease)
• 2) Hierarchical diffusion – the main channel of diffusion some
segment of those who are susceptible to (or adopting) what is being
diffused (e.g. spread of AIDS, use of fax machines)
• 3) Stimulus diffusion – spread of an underlying principle (e.g. idea of
industrialization)
Movement
• 2) Cultural diffusion (cont…)
• b) Relocation diffusion – spread of an innovation, or ideology through physical
movement of individuals
• 1) Migrant diffusion – when an innovation originates somewhere and
enjoys strong-but brief-adoption, loses strength at origin by the time it
reaches another area (e.g. mild pandemics)
• 2) Acculturation – when a culture is substantially changed through
interaction with another culture
• 3) Transculturation – a near equal exchange between culture
complexes
• c) Forces that work against diffusion:
• 1) Time-distance decay – the longer and farther it has to go, the less likely
it will get there
• 2) Cultural barriers – prevailing attitudes or taboo
Space–Time
Compression
Refers to any phenomenon that
alters the qualities and relationship
between time and space
Examples:
New technologies (phones, fax)
Travel (cars, planes, space shuttles)
Economics (need for new markets)
Has occurred throughout man’s
history, but most theorists specify
two time periods as best examples:
mid-19th century to WWI
End of the 20th century
Spatial Interaction
• Transportation networks
• Electronic communications and the “death” of
geography?
• Distance decay
After
Before
4. Human-Environment
Interaction
How do people adapt to and/ or
change their environment?
This includes the impact of physical
processes like hurricanes, floods,
drought…
Human-Environment
Interaction
• 1) Cultural landscape
• includes all human-induced changes that involve the surface and the biosphere.
• Carl Sauer: “… the forms superimposed on the physical landscape by the
activities of man.”
• 2) Cultural ecology - the multiple interactions and relationships between a
culture and the natural environment.
• 3) Environmental Determinism – human behavior, individually and
collectively, is strongly affected by, and even controlled or determined by
the environment
• 3) Possibilism – the natural environment merely serves to limit the range of
choices available to a culture
• 4) Environmental Modification – positive and negative environmental
alterations
Environment
• We depend on our
environment
• We adapt to the
environment
• We modify the
environment
Examples:
• Wearing cool clothing in hot weather (adapt)
• Building the ship channel to connect Houston to
the Gulf of Mexico (modify)
• Dams and bayou flood control projects (modify)
• Using adobe bricks in the dry, desert areas of
Texas (adapt)
• Air-conditioning (modify)....
5. PLACE: What is it like?
What are the physical and human/cultural
characteristics of this place?
Three main ideas define place…
Place
• 1) Culture – people’s lifestyles, values, beliefs, and
traits
• a) What people care about: language, religion,
ethnicity
• b) What people take care of: 1) daily necessities of
survival (food, clothing, shelter) and 2) leisure activities
(artistic expressions, recreation)
• c) Cultural institutions: political institutions (a country,
its laws and rights), religions
Place
• 2) Components of culture:
• a) Culture region – the area within which a particular culture
system prevails (dress, building styles, farms and fields, material
manifestations,…)
• b) Culture trait – a single attribute of culture
• c) Culture complex – a discrete combination of traits
• d) Culture system – grouping of certain complexes, may be
based on ethnicity, language, religion,…
• e) Culture realm – an assemblage of culture (or geographic)
regions, the most highly generalized regionalization of culture
and geography (e.g. sub-Saharan Africa)
Place
• 3) Physical Processes – environmental processes, which explain the
distribution of human activities
• a) Climate – long-term average weather condition at a particular
location. Vladimir Koppen’s five main climate regions (expresses
humans’ limited tolerance for extreme temperature and precipitation
levels)
• b) Vegetation – plant life.
• c) Soil – the material that forms Earth’s surface, in the thin interface
between the air and the rocks. Erosion and the depletion of nutrients are
two basic problems concerning the destruction of the soil.
• d) Landforms – Earth’s surface features (geomorphology), limited
population near poles and at high altitudes
Longest Place Names:
rd
3 Place
• WALES boasts a village called Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (58 letters),
which in English means "Saint Mary's Church in the
hollow of white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the
Church of Saint Tysilio near the red cave.”
Longest Place Names:
nd
2 Place
• NEW ZEALAND has a hill called Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukaka pikimaunga horonukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu (85 letters) by
the Maori.
• taumata (brow of a hill),
whakatangihanga (music making), koauau
(flute), o (of), tamatea (name of a famous
chief), turi pukaka (bony knees), piki
maunga (climbing a mountain), horo
(slip), nuku (move), pokai whenua (widely
travelled), ki (to), tana (his), tahu
(beloved).
Longest Place Names:
st
1 Place
•
THAILAND: "Bangkok is a city of extremes and superlatives, a city you do not react to indifferently," says
Thailand at a Glance. "Recently declared the world's hottest city by the World Meteorological Organization, it
also boasts the world's longest name: Krung-thep-maha-nakorn-boworn-ratana-kosin-mahintar-ayudhyaamaha-dilok-pop-nopa-ratana-rajthani-burirom-udom-rajniwes-mahasat-arn-amorn-pimarn-avatar-satitsakattiya-visanukam. (163 letters)
•
Meaning:
• krungthep mahanakorn
The great city of angels,
• amorn rattanakosin mahintara yutthaya mahadilok phop
the supreme unconquerable land of the great immortal divinity (Indra),
• noparat rajathani burirom
the royal capital of nine noble gems, the pleasant city,
• udomrajaniwes mahasatharn
with plenty of grand royal palaces,
• amorn phimarn avatarnsathit
and divine paradises for the reincarnated deity (Vishnu),
• sakkatattiya visanukam prasit
given by Indra and created by the god of crafting (Visnukarma).