Location, Place & Regions
Central
Europe
Western
Europe
Latin
America
• Geographers use many
methods to study and teach
about human activities on
earth..…one method is to use
“The 5 Themes of Geography”
– Location
– Place
– Region
– Movement
– Human Environment Interaction
Location
• Geographers consider
four ways to identify
location…or the position
that something occupies
on earth:
– Place
– Site
– Situation
– (Relative location)
– Mathematical location
– (Absolute location)
Place
• What do you think when you imagine
China?
Japan?
Russia? Saudi Arabia?
• Place is unique collection of features that contribute to
a locations distinctiveness.
Place Names (Toponyms)
• Nearly every place, both inhabited
and uninhabited have names.
• Named for a person
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–
–
–
George Washington – 1 state, 31 counties, dozens of cities – including capital
V.I. Lenin – Leningrad
Queen Victoria – Victoria Falls, Lake Victoria, Victoria BC
James Monroe – Monrovia, Liberia
• Associated with religion
– St. Louis, St. Paul, San Diego
Vatican City, Mecca, Jerusalem
• Indicate the origin of the settlers
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–
–
–
N. America & Australia  British
Brazil  Portuguese
Latin America  Spanish
South Africa  Dutch & British
• Represent the physical environment
– Virginia Beach, Salt Lake City, Interlaken, Volgograd, Amsterdam
Place Names
• Places can change names.
•
•
•
•
New Amsterdam New York
St. Petersburg Leningrad St. Petersburg
Byzantium Constantinople Istanbul
Bombay Mumbai
• Longest community name in the world
– Welsh town of
– Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
– 58 letter name that means “the Church of St. Mary’s
in the grove of the white hazelnut tree near the
rapid whirlpool and the Church of St. Tisilio near the
red cave”
SITE - Sight
• Site – The physical (internal) character of a place.
• Important Site characteristics
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Climate
Water Sources
Topography
Soil
Vegetation
Latitude
Elevation
• The combination of physical
features gives each place a
distinctive character.
SITE
• Site factors have always been essential
in selecting locations for settlements.
– Hilltop site – Athens, Jerusalem, Rome
– River site – Paris, London, Pittsburgh
– Harbor site – Hong Kong, Norfolk, Sydney
– Island site –Singapore, Manhattan
• Humans have the ability to modify
the characteristics of a site.
– New York City – twice as large today
as in 1626
– Boston & Tokyo have also expanded
Site:
Lower Manhattan
Island
Fig. 1-6: Site of lower Manhattan Island,
New York City. There have
been many changes to the area
over the last 200 years.
Situation-(relative location)
• Situation is the location of a place
relative to other places.
• The more interconnected a place is
to other powerful places, the better its
situation.
• Situation is a valuable way to indicate
location, for two reasons:
• Finding an unfamiliar place
» Directions:
» Bayside HS is W of Independence
• Understanding that place’s importance
– Singapore – situated near the Strait of
Malacca which is a the major passageway
for ships traveling between the South
China Sea and the Indian Ocean
Mathematical Location
Latitude
--Lines of latitude measure distances
north-south between the poles.
--The equator is defined as 0 degrees
--The North Pole is 90 degrees north
--The South Pole is 90 degrees south
--Lines of latitude are all parallel to each
other, thus they are often referred to as
parallels.
They look like rungs on a ladder.
Remember LA for ladder and latitude.
Longitude
--Lines of longitude, or meridians, run
between the North and South Poles.
--They measure distances east-west from
the Prime Meridian.
--The prime meridian is assigned the value
of 0 degrees, and runs through Greenwich,
England.
Time Zones
• 360° Longitude – 0-180 ° W & 0-180 ° E
• Approx. every 15 degrees longitude is a different time zone
• The Prime Meridian (0 ° longitude) is
Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) or Universal Time (UT).
Regions
• The “Sense of Place” that humans
possess usually apply to a large area
rather than a specific point.
• An area of Earth defined by one or more
distinctive characteristics is a region.
• A region can apply to any area larger
than a point and smaller than the entire
planet.
• Regions are natural phenomena or
human constructs that can be mapped
and analyzed.
• Geographers identify three types of
Regions
Three Basic types of Regions
1. Formal— (uniform/homogeneous)
governmental boundaries (USA, Virginia,
Brazil), physical regions (The Rockies, Great
Lakes, Wheat belt), cultural (religion, language)
Three Basic types of Regions
2. Functional— (nodal)
defined by a function.
-newspaper service
-public schools
-pizza delivery
-river drainage basin
-railroad system
Three Basic types of Regions
3. Vernacular— (perceptual)
loosely defined by people’s perception
(The South, The Middle East)
Which is “the South”??
Sunbelt
Gulf Coast
Southwest
SOUTH
Let’s take a quick
look at
Climate
Regions
World Climate Regions
Low Latitudes
World Climate Regions
• Tropical wet: hot all year with high yearly
precipitation—100 inches
• Tropical wet & dry: hot all year with about 50 inches
of precipitation
• Arid: hot days, cold nights, with very low yearly
precipitation—5 inches
• Semiarid: hot summers, mild-to-cold winters, with low
yearly precipitation
• Highland: wide variety of temperatures and
precipitations depending on the elevation and wind
direction
Mid Latitudes
Mid Latitudes
• Arid: hot days, cold nights, very low yearly
precipitation—5 inches
• Semiarid: hot summers, mild-to-cold winters, with low
yearly precipitation
• Mediterranean: hot summers, cool winters, with
moderate precipitation—23 inches
• Humid continental: warm summers, cold winters,
with moderate precipitation—27 inches
• Marine west coast: warm summers, cool winters,
with high precipitation—45 inches
• Highland: varies due to elevation and wind
High Latitudes
High Latitudes
• Sub-arctic: cold winters, short warm summers,
with low yearly precipitation
• Tundra (sub-polar): cold summers, very cold
winters with low yearly precipitation
• Icecap: cold all year, with very low yearly
precipitation
Natural Vegetation Regions
Vegetation
Regions are
classified into
four general
types:
• Rain forest: tropical region
with heavy concentration of
broadleaf trees
• Savanna: also tropical, but
with grassy, treeless plains
• Desert: only plants that can
stand dry conditions such as
cacti and sagebrush, survive
• Steppe: grasslands in the
middle latitudes
• Middle latitude forests:
trees that shed their leaves
(deciduous trees) are mixed
with tree with cones
(coniferous trees)
• Taiga: a cold-climate belt of
coniferous forest
• Tundra: colder than taiga,
treeless, and barren
Cultural Regions
• Origin of culture is Latin “cultus” which means
“to care for.”
To care about – Ideas (language, religion)
To take care of –Possessions (food, clothing, shelter)
Central
Europe
Northe
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Africa
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So
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Latin
America
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Western
Europe
SW
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East
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Cultural Regions
• Culture, although a man-made phenomena,
occurs in coordination with the natural
world as humans interact with their
environment.
– We’ll study more about cultural Regions
throughout the year and specifically in Unit #3.
Human-Environment Interactions
• The geographic study of humanenvironment relationships is known
as cultural ecology.
• This is often referred to as HEI
(Remember human environment interaction from the
Five themes of Geography???)
Does the
environment impact
human actions?
Environmental Determinists
Think So!
• German Geographers Alexander von Humboldt
(1769-1859) & Carl Ritter (1779-1859) promoters of
environmental determinism
They theorized that geography was the
study of how the physical environment
caused human activities.
Much like Social Darwinism
….somewhat racist
….Eurocentric
…not as applicable today due to technology!
Do human actions
impact the
environment?
Possiblists Think…“Yes”!
• Carl Sauer’s theory that states ……
……….the physical environment may set
limits on human actions, but people have
the ability to adjust to the physical
environment.
Human-Environmental Interactions
• How do humans and the environment
affect each other?
• Three key concepts:
1. Humans adapt to the
environment.
2. Humans modify the
environment.
3. Humans depend on the
environment.
Environmental Impacts on Humans
• Settlement Patterns
• (why don’t more people live in the
Sahara Desert, or in Antarctica?)
• Humans cannot live in the five toos:
• Too hot, too cold, too wet, too dry, too steep
Environmental Impacts on Humans
• Housing Materials
(bricks, bamboo, lumber, ice, dirt & mud)
Environmental Impacts on Humans
• Agricultural Activity
(rice, wheat, potatoes, corn, coffee)
Environmental Impacts on Humans
• Types of Recreation
(camping, sunbathing, fishing, skiing)
Environmental Impacts on Humans
• Transportation Patterns
(car, boat, train, airplane)
Now let’s flip-flop…..
Human Impacts on the Environment
•
•
•
•
Canals (Suez, Panama)
Dams (Aswan, Hoover)
Reservoirs (Nasser, Mead)
Irrigation (Aral Sea)
Human Impacts on the Environment
• Agricultural terracing (China, SE Asia)
• Polders (Netherlands)
• Deforestation (Brazil, D.R.C., Malaysia)
• Desertification
(Africa, Asia)
GREEN WALL OF CHINA
Human Impacts on the Environment
• Acid Rain (Germany,
China, Eastern U.S.A.)
• Pollution (Mexico City,
Chernobyl, oil spills)
Chernobyl
Environmental
Determinism or
Possiblism?
Either way…
the environment and human
actions shape the regions
that exist on earth!