Thinking Geographically
CHAPTER 1
Two Categories of Geography
 Human
 Physical
 Each ask “where” and “why”
Two basic concepts
 Why is every place unique?
 Place : Specific point on Earth distinguished by a
particular characteristic
 Region: An area of Earth distinguished by a
distinctive combination of cultural and physical
features.
Key Issue 1: Maps
 Scale model of the real world
 Two dimensional or flat-scale model of
Earth’s surface
 Two purposes:
 Reference tool: Find shortest route between two
places, where something is in relation to
something else
 Communication tool: distribution of human
activities or physical features.
The Early Years: Maps
 7th & 8th century Middle East (earliest)
 Thales: applied geometry to measuring land
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area
Aristotle: 1st to show Earth was spherical
Eratosthenes: 1st to use “geography”
Ptolemy: 8 volume “Guide to Geography”
17th century: maps accurately displayed the
outline of most continents and ocean
positions
Map Scale
 Ratio/Fraction: 1:24,000
 Written: 1 inch equals 1 mile
 Graphic: Bar Line
Projection
 Scientific method of transferring locations on
Earth’s surface to a flat map
 Drawing Earth on a flat piece of paper causes
some distortion.
 4 types of distortion
 Shape: can appear more elongated or squat
 Distance: increased or decreased
 Relative Size: can be altered, one area may be smaller
than shown
 Direction: can be distorted
Equal Area Projection
 Relative sizes of the land is same as in reality
 Areas around North/South poles become
distorted (not an issue since few inhabitants)
 Eastern and Western hemispheres are in 2
pieces (called interruption)
 Meridians that converge at North/South
poles in reality don’t on map; nor form right
angles with their parallels.
Uninterrupted Projections
 Robinson
 Good for ocean information
 Land tends to be smaller
 Mercator
 Little shape distortion
 Rectangular map
 More consistent direction
 Pole regions distorted, high latitudes appear
larger
US Land Ordinance of 1785
 Divided the country into a system of townships
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and ranges to facilitate the sale of land to
settlers in the West.
Township – 6 miles square on each side.
Principal Meridians-north/south lines
separating townships
Base Lines- east/west lines
Townships are in 36 sections, 1 mile by 1 mile.
Satellite-based Imagery
 GPS-Global Positioning System
 3 elements
 Satellites in predetermined orbits by military
 Tracking stations to monitor/control satellites
 Receiver to locate at least 4, know distance to each
and use info to pinpoint location
 Remote Sensing
 Acquisition of data about Earth’s surface from a
satellite orbiting Earth or from other long-distance
methods.
 Scans Earth like a television camera scans images for
TV.
Satellite-based Imagery
 GIS-geographic information system
 A computer system that can capture, store, query,
analyze, and display geographic data
 Key is geocoding: the position of any object on
Earth can be measured and recorded with
mathematical precision and stored in a computer
 Used to produce maps more accurate than handdrawn
 Uses layers to create the various parts of a map.
Key Issue 2: Why are points
unique?
 Location: position that something occupies
on Earth’s surface
 4 ways to identify location:
 Place Name
 Site
 Situation
 Mathematical Location
Place Name
 Toponym: Name given to a place on Earth
 Named for person: founder, famous person
 Settlers chose names connected with
religion, ancient history, or their homeland.
 Pioneers chose names based on their success
or failures.
 Physical environment names
 Names may change due to politics, offensive
words, or to honor a war hero
Site
 Physical character of a place
 Characteristics include: climate, water
sources, soil, elevation
 Combo of physical features make each place
distinctive
 Modifiable
Situation
 Location of a place relative to other places
 Helps to locate unfamiliar places and to
understand the locations importance
Mathematical Location
 Meridian-arc drawn between North/South
poles. Longitude
 Prime Meridian: 0 degrees longitude
 Parallel-circle drawn around the globe
parallel to the equator and at right angles to
the meridians. Latitude
 Designated by dividing each degree into 60
minutes (‘) and each minute into 60 seconds
(“)
Regions
 Area defined by one or more distinctive
characteristics
 Cultural Landscape: combo of cultural
features like language, religion, economical,
physical
 Three types of Regions
 Formal
 Functional
 Vernacular
Formal
 Uniform/homogeneous region
 All shares in common distinctive
characteristics
 Countries, government units, North American
Wheat Belt, Political parties (election time)
Functional
 Nodal Region
 Organized around a node or focal point
 The ‘thing’ chosen to define the region is the
focus or node.
 Region connected to node by
transportation/communications or economically
 TV station reception area, newspaper circulation
area
Vernacular
 Perceptual region
 Place that people believes exists as part of their
cultural identity.
 Mental maps help identify a perceptual region
Spatial Association
 Factors with similar distributions have spatial
association
 The degree that things are similarly arranged
over space.
 High cancer rates = distribution of cancer is
spatially associated with distribution of
factories.
Regional Integration of
Culture
 Geographers look at culture two ways:
 What people care about and What people
take care of.
 Language, Religion, and ethnicity are what
people care about.
 Food, clothing, shelter are human needs and
what people take care of.
MDCs and LDCs
 World divided into:
 More developed countries MDC
 North America
 Europe
 Japan
 Less developed countries LDC
 Sub-Saharan Africa
 Middle East
 East and South Asia
 Southeast Asia
 Latin America
Culture and Environment
 Cultural Ecology: study of human-environment
relationships
 Environmental determinism: physical
environment CAUSED social development
 Possibilism: physical environment may LIMIT
some human actions, but people are able to
ADJUST to their environment.
Opposite
Physical Processes: Climate
 Geographers use physical processes to
understand human distribution
 Vlad Koppen classifed climates into 5 main
regions:
 A. Tropical Climates
 B. Dry Climates
 C. Warm Mid-Latitude Climates
 D. Cold Mid-Latitude Climates
 E. Polar Climates
Climate…
 Humans have limited tolerance
 Avoid places: too hot, too cold, too wet, or
too dry
 Climate influences human activities, esp.
food production.
Physical Processes:
Vegetation
 Biomes
 Forest-Trees form continuous canopy; grass/shrubs
on floor. Covers large % of Earth’s surface
 Savanna-Trees not continuous, lack of shade/grass.
Africa, South America, Southeast Asia
 Grassland-grass; few trees; low rain. American
prairies
 Desert-dispersed patches of plants; vegetation
suitable for small numbers of animals.
Physical Processes: Soil
 Used mainly in agricultural settings
 MDC farmers will plant non-cash crops just to
replenish soil nutrients for cash crops
 LDC farmers lack knowledge and economic
ability to have proper soil management
Physical Processes:
Landforms
 Geomorphology: study of Earth’s landforms
 People prefer to live on flatter land, ease of
farming
 Topographical maps help to show landforms
and some cultural features (roads, farms)
 Contour lines help to show steepness and
elevation.
Modifying the Environment
 Humans modify; can deplete resources
 Netherlands:
 Polder: piece of land created by draining water from
an area
 Dikes-used to prevent the North Sea from flooding
the country
 South Florida : Unsensitive Modifying
 Levee built around Lake Okeechobee, drained 1/3 of
the Everglades, constructed dikes and levees near
Miami.
 Caused polluted water from cattle to drain into fresh
drinking water for Florida’s citizens
Key Issue 3: Different
Places are Similar
 Geography can help explain human actions on
the local and global scale.
 “Where is the population growing rapidly?”
 “Why can population growth exceed available
food supply?”
Globalization
 Force or process that involves the entire
world and results in making something
worldwide in scope
 Scale of world is shrinking.
 Transnational Corporations: conducts
research, operates facilities, and sells
products in many countries, not just @ HQ
Culture and Globalization
 Globalization can and does threaten local
culture’s beliefs and customs.
 The more people are aware of global culture
the more they want; yet many beliefs still
stand strong.
 Determination to retain beliefs can lead to
intolerance of those that embrace the new.
Space: Distribution
 Spatial thinking is the most fundamental skill
to understand the arrangement of objects
across surfaces.
 Geographers think of arrangement of people
and objects found in space and work to
understand why they are distributed across
the space in the manner they are.
 Immanuel Kant: Geography’s concern for
space to history’s concern for time.
Distribution
 Arrangement of features in space
 3 properties:
 Density
 Concentration
 pattern
Density
 Frequency with which something occurs in space
 Arithmetic density
 Total # of objects in an area
 Large population does not = high density
 Physiological density
 # of persons per unit of area suitable for agriculture
 Agricultural density
 # of farmers per unit area of farmland
Concentration
 Extent of a feature’s spread over space
 Objects in area are close together = clustered
 Objects far apart = dispersed
 To compare: 2 areas must have same # of
objects and same size area
 Not the same as density.
 Use to describe changes in distribution.
Pattern
 Geometric arrangement of objects in space
 Some features in geometric pattern, some
irregular
 Frequently arranged in a square or rectangle,
or in a linear distribution
 Homes on a street, a cities street pattern
Connections
 Space-time compression: reduction of time it
takes for something to reach another place
 Distance places less remote and more
accessible in modern times.
 S/T compression promotes rapid change
Spatial Interaction
 Places connected to each other through
networks have spatial interaction
 Distance Decay: farther away one group is
from another the less likely the 2 groups are
to interact.
 Contact diminishes and eventually disappears
Diffusion
 Process by which a characteristic spreads
across space from one place to another over
time.
 Hearth: place where innovation originates
 For a person, object, or idea to have interaction
with other persons, objects, or ideas in other
regions diffusion must occur
Relocation Diffusion
 Spread of an idea through PHYSICAL
movement of people from one place to
another
 People take their culture with them when
they move: language, religion, ethnicity
Expansion Diffusion
 Spread of a feature from one place to another in a
snowball effect
 Hierarchical diffusion
 Spread of an idea from person of authority to other
persons/places. Political leaders, elites, large cities
 Contagious diffusion
 Rapid, widespread of a characteristic through
population. Disregard of hierarchy or w/out perm.
Location of people.
 Stimulus diffusion
 Spread of an underlying principle, even though
characteristic doesn’t diffuse. Encouraged by new tech.
Diffusion of Culture and
Economy
 Global culture and economy allows rapid
diffusion of goods, services, etc.
 Centered on 3 hearths: North America,
Western Europe, and Japan
 Command centers: New York, London, Tokyo
 Uneven development: increasing gap in
economic conditions between regions in the
core and periphery that results from the
globalization of the economy.