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How People Change Their Geography
Part 1: Changing Geography
More of this Feature
When you hear the word geography, you tend to think of mountains
and streams and maps and compasses. But geography is bigger than
that. Geography is the world around you, wherever you are.
• Part 2: What Does It All
Mean?
And the more people live in a place, the more they want to change it
to suit their needs.
• How Geography Influences
Economy
• Geography Links
On This Site
The more people that live in one place, the bigger the settlement
tends to get. A town becomes a city, which becomes a big city. Soon, smaller cities (called
suburbs) are forming on the outskirts of the big city. Before you know it, you have a
metropolitan area, with a total population of hundreds of thousands of people.
How do these people change their geography? Here are several ways:
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They build more places for people to live. All those people have to live somewhere.
Many live in houses. Many live in apartment buildings. Others live in mobile homes.
They build more buildings that house stores and markets. Just about everything you
need can be found in either a store or a market. Food comes from a market. Clothing
and cars come from stores. More people means more stores and markets. And with
those more stores and markets come more jobs, so people can afford to buy food,
clothing, and cars.
They build roads to carry cars and trucks, so people can drive
from place to place.
They build dams to create reservoirs, which store water from
rainfall and nearby rivers and streams. More people means more
water needs.
They plant more crops, assuming that enough farmland is left.
When a population grows quickly, farmland is often turned into
land for housing and for stores and markets. It is sometimes
difficult for a city's supply of food to keep up with a growing demand.
Part 2: What Does It All Mean?
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What does all this mean? People want their surroundings to suit their way of life, so
they build more and more and more, until areas formerly dominated by open spaces
are now dominated by tall buildings.
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This is true in countries in which people have the money to do this
kind of building. In other countries, people make do with they have. In the
desert countries of Africa and Asia, however, people change their geography
by building dams and reservoirs and also by setting up markets for food and
clothing. You won't see too many tall buildings in the middle of the Sahara
Desert, however.
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But even in the countries that have the poorest people, these people
are constantly changing their geography to suit their needs. They are cutting
down trees or setting traps to catch animals or building roofed huts on high ground
as shelter from storms or wild animals. They are setting up boundaries for their
settlements.
You don't really need a whole lot of money to be able to change the geography
around you. You just need the desire to do so.
http://www.socialstudiesforkids.com/articles/geography/howpeoplechangegeography1.htm