Cultures, Environments, and
Regions
Culture
Culture closely identified with anthropology
– Has many definitions
– An all-encompassing term
Identifies tangible lifestyle of a people and
prevailing values and beliefs
– Examples of definitions??
– Culture consists of components
Components of Culture
Culture region:
– Area within which a particular culture system
prevails
Culture trait:
– A single attribute of a culture
Culture complex:
– Discrete combination of culture traits
Components of Culture
Culture system:
– Culture complexes grouped together because
they have culture traits in common
Geographic regions:
– Term preferred by many geographers instead of
culture region
Culture realm:
– Most highly generalized regionalization of culture
and geography
Cultural Geographies:
Past and Present
Colonization and Europeanization (and
Americanization?) of the world have
obliterated much of the world's earlier
cultural geography
Two Maps:
– Indigenous North American cultures
– “Modern” cultures in Africa
Cultural Homogenization???
Cultural Geographies:
Past and Present
The world is made up of constantly
changing, often overlapping mix of
traditional and modern regions
The Cultural Landscape
A distinctive cultural environment
Composite of artificial features
– Carl Sauer’s definition includes all identifiably humaninduced changes in the natural landscape
Sequent occupance
– Cultural imprints of successive societies on a place,
contributing to the cultural landscape
Can the whole of a cultural landscape be
represented on a map??
Map: U.S. CBD vs. Japanese city
Cultural Hearths
Sources of civilization
First large clusters of human population
Progress in farming techniques
Exploitation of local resources
Complex society = less subsistence time
New ideas, innovations, and ideologies
spread
Cultural Hearths
Cultural Diffusion
The spreading of culture
Independent invention
Expansion diffusion
Relocation diffusion
Expansion Diffusion
Three “types” of ED:
1. Contagious diffusion: nearly all adjacent
individuals are affected
2. Hierarchical diffusion: main channel of
diffusion lies through some segment of those
susceptible or adopting what is being diffused
(leapfrog)
3. Stimulus diffusion: ideas may not be adopted
but may result in local experimentation
– Hamburger sales in India
Spatial flows of
A) Expansion diffusion
B) Hierarchical diffusion
Relocation Diffusion
Acculturation: less technologically-advanced
culture is modified by contact with a
technologically-superior culture
Transculturation: cultural “borrowing” when
different cultures of (about) equal complexity
and technology come into close contact
Assimilation: adoption of cultural elements so
complete that the two cultures become one
Migrant diffusion
An innovation loses usage at its
source but is adopted farther away
Forces that work against the diffusion
process:
– Time-distance decay
– Cultural barriers
Cultural Perception
Perceptual Regions
– Based on our knowledge about regions and
cultures
– Sometimes difficult to put a culture region on
a map
– Example:
The Mid-Atlantic
Cultural Perception
Perceptual regions in the United States
– Regional identity example:
“The South”
Perceptual Region: Texas
Cultural Environments
Complex relationships
Societies modify their natural
environments from slight to severe
No society can completely escape the
forces of nature
– Ivan: before and after
Grenada, West Indies
Ravaged by
Hurricane Ivan
September 2004
Climate
10
100
9
90
8
80
7
6
70
5
60
4
3
35
100
50
2
40
1
30
90
25
80
20
70
15
60
10
50
5
40
0
30
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
Grand Etang National Reserve
D
0
30
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
St. George's, Grenada
Monsoon-ish climate
Wet & Dry Seasons
Wet Season…Dry Season
Climate
Hurricane belt: Grenada is just on the cusp
(~12 degrees N)
Ivan…
Ivan from above…
12o N
Hurricane Ivan…Before & After
Hurricane Ivan…Devastation
Environmental Determinism
Human behavior is strongly affected by
and even controlled or determined by
the environment that prevails
Not new: Aristotle
Believed by many until the middle of the
twentieth century
– Ellsworth Huntington
Environmental Determinism
Some geographers recognized exceptions
to the environmentalists’ hypotheses
S.F. Markham wrote a book based on
climatic changes and their effects on
cultural development
Now agreed (mostly) to be defunct
Possibilism
Natural environment limits choice
– Depend on the people’s needs and
technology
As a culture rises in affluence, influence of
environment declines
Other Cultural Environments
Political Ecology
– Studies the environmental consequences of
specific political-economic policies
Changeable weather seems to influence
significant numbers of people
Human will is powerful…
Resources
Dr. Sallie Marston, Univ. of Arizona
– Video: Semiotics of Landscape
– PowerPoint: Marston-LandscapeSemiotics
Discussion Question #1
A few years ago, several people in a small village
near a large East Asian city got the flu. Within
days, hundreds of people in the city came
down with the same flu, and it spread to the
surrounding countryside. Meanwhile, the Asian
Flu appeared in cities around the globe
(London, NYC, San Francisco, Moscow).
– What processes were at work in China and
worldwide spreading this malady? Do the
processes differ?
– If you were unable to get immunized, how would
you use your knowledge of geography to best
protect yourself (and family)?
Discussion Question #2
Our Perceptual Regions…
– Draw a map of North America
Draw in the international border(s)
Divide your map into regions and label them
– Why did you define the borders and regions
as you did?
– What underlies our different perceptions?