What is geography?

The study of ohumans and environments in interactionoSpatial variationoHow and why things differ from place to place on the earthoHow observable spatial patterns evolved through time

GeographersoCollect data obtained from satellites. oSpace and location mattersoWant to know answers to:

§Where is it?§Why is it there?§Why is it important?

oLocation- precise positionoHuman-environment relationshipsoRegion identification

Epidemiologists (people who study the spread of diseases) oCollect data on the occurrence of diseases. oDr. J Snow

§“the most terrible outbreak of cholera which ever occurred in this kingdom, is probably that which took place in Broad Street, Golden Square, and the adjoining streets, a few week ago.” (Sept 1854)

§“within two hundred and fifty yards of the spot where the two streets meet, there were upwards of five hundred fatal attacks of cholera in ten days.”

§People left because the death count was rising very high.§The city was deserted by more than three-quarters of the

population. §What is the problem?

úDr. Snow thought that it could be the water. úHe wanted to check the water. úHe asked the people where they got their water from

and he found out that the people who were dying were getting their water from the same pump.

úHe mapped it out.On the Beach

oNeed for wateroBeaches as highwaysoLaunching point for discoveryoNearness to water requirements

CHAPTER 1 RCHAN747

HazardsoHumanity coming to terms with environmentoWhy do we live where we do even if we “know” there are hazards?

Evolution of the Discipline

BackgroundoGeo, “the earth” and graphein, “to write”

•oWriting focused both on the physical structure and on the nature

and activities of the people who inhabited the various lands of the known world.

oStrabooHerodotusoGreek and Romans geographers measured the earth, in a global

grid of parallels and meridians (latitudes and longitudes).oAncient Chinese were as involved in geography explanatory

viewpoint as were westerners, though there was no exchange between them.

oMuslim scholars took the knowledge that was lost in the middle ages, and described and analyzed their known world in its physical, cultural, and regional variation.

oModern geography beginning in the 17th century.oEarly 1800’s; organized interlinking researchoNational societies 19th C interest in exploration. Groups were

formed to tell stories about their adventures. People started writing papers about what they found.

§Royal Geographic Society: The American Geographical Society 1852

§National Geographic Society 1881§Institute of British Geographers 1933§Canadian Association of Geographers 1951

Subfields of GeographyoBy the end of the 19th century, geography had become a distinctive

and respected discipline in universities throughout Europe. oDevelopment of a whole series of increasingly specialized

disciplinary subdivisions: political geography, urban geography, and economic geography.

oAll subdivisions are characterized by three dominating interests:§Spatial variation

úExamines relationships between human societies and the natural environments that they occupy and modify.

§Focus on the systems that link physical phenomena and human activities in one area of the earth with other areas.

§Regional analysisúHuman-environmental relationships and spatial

systems in specific locational settings. úThis areal orientation pursued by some geographers is

called regional geography. oSystematic geographers: choose to identify particular classes of

things, rather than segments of the earth’s surface, for specialized study.

§Physical geography the natural environmental side of the human-environment structure.

úLandforms and their distributionúAtmospheric conditionsúClimatic patters

§Human geography the emphasis is on peopleúWhere they areúWhat they are likeúHow they interact over spaceúWhat kinds of landscapes of human use they erect on

the natural landscapes they occupy.

Why Geography MattersoThree reasons why people study geo.

§1) the only discipline concerned with understanding why and how both physical and cultural phenomena differs from place to place on the surface of the earth.

§2) a grasp of the broad concerns and topics of geo is vital to an understanding of the national and international problems that dominate daily news reports.

§3) a great diversity of job opportunities await those who pursue college training in the discipline.

Some Core Geographic Concepts

Recognizing spatial patterns is the essential starting point for understanding how people live on and shape the earth’s surface.

Spatial, carries the idea of the way things are distributed, the way movements occur, and the way processes operate over the whole or part of the surface of the earth.

Location, Direction and DistanceLocation:

oAbsolute and relative location

oAbsolute location: is the identification of place by a precise and accepted system of coordinates, sometimes called a mathematical location.

§Ex. Global grid of parallels and meridians. §Reference to its degrees, minuets, and seconds of latitude and

longitude.§Ex. Which hemisphere, north or south of the equator. §Ex. Survey systems

oRelative location: the position of a place or thing in relation to that of other places or things. It expresses interconnection and interdependence and may carry social and economic implications.

§Ex. Neighborhood character, assessed valuations of vacant land, where the school library is relative to the buildings around it (not by its address).

§Ex. Location tells us that people, things, and places exist in a world of physical and cultural characteristics that differ from place to place.

oSite: an absolute location concept, refers to the physical and cultural characteristics and attributes of the place itself. Tells us about the specific features of that place.

§Ex. London is two hours away from the hwy.oSituation: refers to the external relations of the place and

particular reference to items of significance to the place in question.

§Ex. What other places are to that place. The site of London Ontario was at the forks of the Tan River.

§Ex. Ottawa was picked for it being French and English picked by Queen Victoria.

Direction:oAbsolute and relative directionoAbsolute: is based on the cardinal points of north, south, east and

west. These appear in all cultures. oRelative: or relational, going “out west” or “back east”. These

directional references are culturally based on locational variable. §Ex. Two blocks east of the library.

Distance: oAbsolute and relative distance. oAbsolute: the spatial separation between two points on the earth’s

surface measured by an accepted standard unit, such as miles or km.

oRelative: transforms those linear measurements into other units more meaningful for the space relationship

§Ex. Money (10 dollars to bus to this point)§Ex. Time (1 hour to Toronto)

§Ex. Fear (travelling somewhere you don’t want to go could take longer because you a scared to go there)

Size and ScaleScale: tells us the relationship between the size of an area on a map and

the actual size of the mapped area on the surface of the earth.Types of Scales:

oMacroscopic Process: covers large areas of the earth.§isostatic rebound; energy movement (removing a weight

from the earth: ex. Taking a glacier off the land, the land will lift up and respond to that removal.)

§in general we don’t have much control over macroscopic processes by humans. Humans are too powerless to affect something this big.

oMicroscopic Process: covers small areas.§Ex. Puddle in your back yard.§Technology allows humans to control microscopic processes.

oMesoscopic process: in between scale. §Newly scale features that in the past were macroscopic but

we have some control over some things. Generalization: concepts, relationships, may not have meaning when scale changes. Have to be selective and simplify the real world.

Physical and Cultural Attributes

All places have individual physical and cultural attributes that distinguish them from other places and give them character, potential and meaning.

Natural Landscape: climate, soil, water supplies, mineral resources, terrain feature etc. These provide the setting within which human action occurs.

Cultural Landscape: the visible imprint of human activity. Exists at different scales and different levels of visibility.

Attributes of Place Are Always Changing

Interrelations between Places

Spatial Interaction: places are interrelated with other places in structured and comprehensible ways. This adds accessibility and connectivity to the ideas of location and distance.

Tobler’s First Law of Geography: in a spatial sense, everything is related to everything else but relationships are stronger when things are near on another. Interaction between places diminished in intensity and frequency as distance increases.

Interactions Amoung PlacesoDistance decayoGravity modeloNewtons law of gravity

§F= (G M1M2)/(D^2)oSpatial interaction

§I=(K Pi Pj) / (D^2 ij)§The number of phone calls btwn cities is an interaction btwn

those two cities. §The interaction btwn two places (I and J) would be related to

how big I and J are, divided by the distance between I and J.

§This model is telling us that interaction is greater between two places that are closer together.

§

Accessibility: how easy or difficult is it to overcome to barrier of the time and space separation of places? Accessibility suggests the idea of connectivity: a concept implying all the tangible and intangible ways in which places are connected. (Ex. Telephone lines, street and road systems, pipelines, and sewers)

Spatial Diffusion: process of dispersion of an idea or a thing from a center of origin to more distant points. The rate is affected by distance. Rates are affected by factors such as population densities, means of communication, advantages of the innovation, and importance or prestige of the originating note.

Globalization: the increasing interconnection of more and more peoples and parts of the world as the full range of social, cultural. Political, economic, and environmental processes becomes international in scale and effect.

Place Similarity and Regions

Distinctive characteristics suggest that:oNo two places on the surface of the earth can be exactly the sameoThe natural and cultural characteristic of places show patterns of

similarity in some areas.

Spatial regularities exist and permit us to recognize and define regions: earth areas that display significant elements of internal uniformity and external differences from surrounding territories. Geographers unify regions by elements or similarities to determine the boundaries of a region.

Spatial Distributions§Regions are devised §Regions are spatial summaries that are designed to bring

order to the infinite diversity of the earth’s surface. §Regions are based on spatial distributions (the spatial

arrangement of environmental, human, or organizational features selected for study.)

oDensity§Number of objects per unit of area

oDispersion§How near or far objects are from each other

oPattern§Descriptive term that we attach to an organization of objects,

theme

                     

Types of RegionsoCan be either formal, functional, or perceptualoAre conceptual constructsoAreas of spatial similarityoBring order from diversityoHave location, boundaries.oFormal region: an area of essential uniformity regarding a single

physical or cultural feature or a limited combination of physical or cultural features.

§(Ex. Home state, a formal political region) (Ex. “Columbia Plateau” or “The Corn Belt” or “The Rocky Mountains”)

§oFunctional( or nodal) region: may be visualized as a spatial

system. Its parts are interdependent and throughout its extent the functional region operates as a dynamic, organizational unit. Has unity in the manner of its operational connectivity.

§ (ex. Trade areas of towns, national “spheres of influence). §(Ex. Transportation routes)§(ex. Scales of retail- btw Wal-Mart and all its stores around

the world)

§

oPerceptual (or vernacular or popular) regions: less rigorously structured than the formal and functional regions. They are regions that exist and have reality in the perceptions of their inhabitants and the general society. They reflect feelings and images rather than objective data.

Geography’s Themes and Standards

Location: the meaning of relative and absolute position on the earth’s surface

Place: the distinctive and distinguishing physical and human characteristics of locales

Relationships with places: the development and consequences of human-environmental interactions

movement: patterns and change in human spatial interaction on the earthRegions: how they form and change.

September 28th, 2010

Environment determines what you are. These people believed this: Ellen Semple, Ellsworth Huntington, and Griffith Taylor

Possibilism- aspects of human culture are determined by us, not the environment. People determine and choose. Human beings are in control of their future. This idea was promoted by Paul Vidal de la Blache.

Probabilisim- stresses that human beings, technology, and the environment are all together.

The Four Tradition of Geography

Earth Science Tradition •First part of textbook •Study of the physical earth•Lithosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere, and the energy and material that

flow between them•Physical geography as represented by geomorphology, meteorology, and

climatology, hydrology, and oceanography. Culture-Environment Tradition

•Influence of environment on humans•Humans as agent to environmental destruction/change (human impact)

Location Tradition•Why things are the way they are

•Western European position, there is a separation of the happening of things such as aspects as distance, form, direction, and position.

•Immanuel Kant-a philosopher, the notion of space.•Ancient records of Greece- sailing distances coastline and landmark

maps to locate position in the world and move through the world.Area Analysis Tradition

•Strabo-Greek geographer. Described all the known world not only where people and things where but the nature of places and people, what they did and how they lived

•Regional Geography both formal and functional. (Geography of Canada or Geography of Ontario)

The Scientific Method•Objective method of investigation •Search for ‘Laws’•Approach to problem solving•Rational method of thinking, exploring•Prediction-gives us somewhat control over the future•First credited to Sir Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

Advantages of the Scientific Method•Logical, objective•Can re reproduced •Mathematical precision

Two Methods of the Scientific Method:Inductive

1.Perceptual experiences 2.Unordered facts3.Definition classification measurement4.Ordered facts5.Analysis generalization (make statements about the things we are

interested in looking at)6.Laws and Theories (to explain how the world operates or the

problem that we are looking at)7.Explanation (explain how the world works)

*The key step in the inductive method is the definition classification measurement because without it there is nothing else.

Deductive1.Perceptual experiences2.Image of the real world (how the universe operates. We gain these

ideas form our experiences)3.A priori model (model from an experience) 4.Hypothesis (a testable statement about reality) 5.Design an experiment 6.Data (taken from the results of the experiment) (we record this

data)7.Verification (does the data support our hypothesis?)8.Laws and Theories (if the verification process says yes, it does

support the hypothesis, then the hypothesis could be generated into a law or theory. If the verification doesn’t support hypothesis, you will have to go back and do another experience or alter your hypothesis)

Models

Chapter 2-The Scientific Method and the Nature of Geographic Data

Representation of the object under study. 3 basic types, 2 different flavors. In order of increasing abstraction.

Building Models1.Real World

2.Iconic Model- represents the world. Changing the scale. taking the big world and shrinking it to something more manageable.

Ex. Wave tank modeling wave erosion

3.Analogue Model- take the properties that we are observing and we change them into something else that we are measuring or looking at. One property is represented by another.

Ex. Contour lines for elevation.

4.Symbolic model- uses symbol to represent the real world. Ex. Usually in mathematical form. Ex. Gravity model

Static and Dynamic Model

Static- those concerned with one period of time. Time doesn’t play a role. Dynamic- those which predict future patterns and those which change

over time. Most problems fall in dynamic.

Data Collection

Experimental oWe have Control on variables, collect data, watch one variable.

Yields good data in that we limit the possible things that we are interested in. Many of the physical sciences rely on this principal.

NormativeoDon’t have control. oObservation and measurement without controls. oObserve events with a view of establishing constant relationships.

HistoricaloDon’t have control. oNo control but involves sequences over time.

oRelies heavily on accurate observations in time.

Problems of Sampling

How do I do it?How many samples do I need?Points LinesAreas

If our feature is a point.. we should sample by areas (grids) on a map.IF our feature is a line.. we should sample by other lines on a map or areas. If our feature was an area.. we should sample by points, lines, or areas to sample it.

The shape of the curve: helpful. It is saying that as the number of samples increases, our confidence that those samples represent the whole population rises very fast. The flat line, reaches a slow slope. At a certain point, before it starts to flatten out, the + or – of a sample doesn’t affect the confidence. Maps As the Tools of Geography

Maps oMaps are geographer’s primary tools of spatial analysis oThey show spatial distributions, patterns, and relations of interest

oOnly through a map can spatial distributions and interactions of whatever nature be reduced to an observable scale isolated for individual study, and combined or recombined to reveal relationships not directly measurable in the landscape itself.

oCartography is the art of making a graph.

Locating Points on a Sphere

The Geographic Grid oWe use the geographic grid, a set of imaginary lines that intersect

at right angles to form a system of reference for locating points on the surface of the earth.

oNorth and South Poles are key references§End points of the axis about which the earth spins

oThe Equator and prime meridian are also key references §The equator encircles the globe halfway between the poles.§The prime meridian is a starting point for east-west

measurement, cartographers in most countries use it as an imaginary line passing through the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, England. Selected in 1884.

oLatitude is the angular distance north or south of the equator, measured in degrees ranging from 0-90.

oLongitude is the angular distance east or west of the prime meridian ranging from 0-180 degrees.

§Time depends on longitude oEarth makes a 360 degree rotation every 24 hours.oThe Earth is divided into 24 time zones, each 15 degree interval.

§These time zones were developed when train travel became popular.

oInternational Date Line is where each new day begins. o

Land Survey Systems Three other ways of land-identification:

oLong-lot§Used by French settlers in North America.

oMetes and Bounds§English settlers in the colonies used this. §This system utilized physical features of the local geography,

along with directions and distances, to define and describe in sequence the boundaries of a parcel of land.

§Prominent trees, unusual rocks, streams that might dry up or change course, and human-made features such as roads and fences, the metes and bounds system led to boundary uncertainty and dispute.

§Led to road patterns, where routes are often controlled by the contours of the land rather than the regularity of a geometric survey.

oTownship and Range §The Land Ordinance of 1785 established it. §It was based on survey lines oriented in the cardinal

directions: base lines that run east-west and meridians that run north-south.

§A township consisted of a square 6 miles on a side, further divided into 36 sections 1 mile on every side.

§This system was adopted by the United States§This system is similar to the Canada Land Survey System.

Map Projections

Map:oLatin mappa- to coveroScale: direction: symbolsoTool to understandingoTo make observableoLimits of mappingomaps get things doneoneed title, legend, scale, direction indication (where N,S,E,W)obegin with air photos-provides the base for our map

Globe properties are:oAll lines of longitude (meridians) are of equal length; each is one-

half the length of the equator. oAll meridians meet at the North and South Poles and are true

north-south linesoAll lines of latitude (parallels) are parallel to the equator and to

each otheroParallels decrease in length with distance from the equatoroMeridians and parallels intersect at right anglesoThe scale on the surface of the globe is everywhere the same in all

directions. Only on a globe do are all these characteristics represented.. they cannot

all be fully true on a map because when you lay a globe flat it is somewhat distorted.

Map Projection designates the way the curved surface of the globe is represented on a flat map.

All maps have distortions. Area, shape, distance, direction all get distorted.

We can project by: a Cylinder, plane, or cone.Great circle-shortest distance between two places on the earth’s surfaceSmall circle-

Gnomonic projection-great circle is a straight line. Rhumb line-line of constant direction, is a curved line.

Mercator projection-great circle is a curved line. Rhumb line is a straight line. Commonly used for ship navigation.

o

Conic projectionEqual Area projection-different areas of the world are true.Equidistant projection-distances on the map are true.Homolosine projection- Dymaxion map or fuller map projection-cuts world into triangles. creates

image of one connecting land.

Conformal-true shape and equivalent-equal area map, areas on the map are equal. No map can be both.

All flat maps distort in different ways and to different degrees, some or all of the four main properties of actual earth surface relationships:

oArea§A square on the earth may become a rectangle on the map,

but that rectangle has to correct area. §These projections are called equal-area or equivalent

projections. §A map that shows correct areal relationships always distorts

the shapes of regions. §Equal area projections are used when a map is intended to

show the actual areal extent of a phenomenon on the earth’s surface.

oShape§No projection can provide correct shapes for large areas,

some accurately portray the shapes of small areas by preserving correct angular relationships.

§These true shape projections are called conformal projections and the importance of conformality is that regions and features “look right” and have the same directional relationships.

§A map cannot be both equivalent and conformal. oDistance

§Equidistant projections show true distance in all directions, but only from one or two central points.

§distances between all other locations are incorrect and, quite likely, greatly distorted.

§A map cannot be both equidistant and equal-area. oDirection

§Azimuthal projections true directions are shown from one central point to all other points.

§ An azimuth is the angle formed at the beginning point of a straight line, in relation to a meridian.

§Azimuths or directions from points other than the central point to other points are not accurate.

§An azimutal property of a projection is not exclusive, it may also be equivalent, conformal, or equidistant.

§A map that is not all equal-area, conformal, or equidistant are compromises.

§An example of a compromise is the Robinson projection. úIt was designed to show the whole world in a visually

satisfactory manner and which is used for most of the world maps in this textbook. It does not show the true distances or directions and is neither equal-area nor conformal.

úIt permits some exaggeration of size in the high latitude in order to improve the shapes of land masses.

úSize and shape ore most accurate in the temperate and tropical zones, where most people live.

oCreating a map1.Selection of the map grid2.Selection of a scale at which the map is to be drawn.

Scale

The scale of a map is the ratio between the measurement of something on the map and the corresponding measurement on the earth.

Scale can be represented: oVerbally

§Given in words§Ex. 1 inch to 1 mile or 10 cm to 1 km

oGraphically§Sometimes called a bar scale§A line or bar placed on the map that has been subdivided to

show the map length of units of earth distance.oRepresentative fraction (RF) scale g

§gives two numbers, the first representing them map distance and the second indicating the ground distance.

o Numerically§the most accurate of all scale statements and can be

understood in any language.

A large-scale map, such as a plan of a city, shows an area in considerable detail. The ratio if map to ground distance is relatively large. Features such as buildings and highways can be drawn to scale. large scale (1:1,000)

A small-scale map, such as those of countries or continents, have a much smaller ratio. Buildings, roads and other small features cannot be drawn to scale and must be magnifies and represented by symbols to be seen. Small scale maps have been said to be generalized.

small scale (1:1,000,000).

When scale changes, generalization occurs.

Projection•Represents the earth’s curved surface as a flat surface

Types of Maps

General-purpose, reference or location maps make up one major class of maps familiar to everyone. Their purpose is simply to display one or more natural and/or cultural features of an area or of the world as a whole.

oExamples of natural features§Water features (coastlines, rivers, lakes etc.)§Shape and elevation of terrain.§Transportation routes§Populated areas§Property-ownership lines§Political boundaries§names

thematic or spherical-purpose maps show a specific spatial distribution or category of data. Things that may be mapped on this type of map could be physical (climate, vegetation, soils, and so on) and/or cultural (distribution of populations, religions, diseases or crime). Unlike reference maps, the features on thematic maps are limited to just those that communicate the specific spatial distribution. Symbols used can be qualitative (distribution of where something is) or quantitative(shows distribution and how much is being mapped). Interest is where things are found not the amount of object being mapped.

Remote Sensing

Remote Sensing- a science of deriving information about the earth’s surface from images acquired at a distance (not touching it )(gathering information by looking at it).

•Spatial-area on the ground•Spectral-wave length characteristics•Spatial resolution- the size of a pixel that is recorded in a raster image

(how many pixels may correspond to square areas on the ground).•Spectral resolution- the number of different wavelength bands recorded•Vertical air photo- images taken straight down and overlap. Can see

elevation.

•Everything has a temp.•The quality and quantity emitted depends on the temp.•Resolution

•Active remote sensingo

•Passive remote sendingoReceiving information from space and reflecting the info

somewhere else.

•SatellitesoGeostationary- in high earth orbit, don’t move relative to the

ground ex. Satellite tv, communication satellites oPolar- orbit from north to south pole.

•Question: how long in time would one orbit of a geostationary satellite take?

o23 hrs and 56 mins

•remote sensing problemsoavailabilityotruthosampling

GPS-•gives us altitude•U.S. plan put in place to serve military

Computers in Geography

•GIS- geographic information system•Raster vs. vector

oRaster- series of grids, each square in a grid has certain properties. Series of layers that represent data. Mathematically it is easy to work out what is at a certain place.downside- side of a raster determines the size of data.

oVector-lines or arcs where one the two sides of a line are different properties. Storing data is very compact because you are storing an eqn of a line. Downside, if intersecting arcs, it is more difficult to equate.

•Pixel•Computer mapping•Data driven social science

Topographic Maps and Terrain RepresentationTopographic maps are general-purpose maps that depict the shape and

elevation of the terrain. They usually portray the surface features of relatively small areas, often with great accuracy. They not only show natural features, but also show things that people have added to the natural landscape (transportation routes, buildings, and such land uses as orchards, vineyards, and cemeteries). Boundaries from state borders to field or airport limits are also depicted on topographic maps.

Topographic maps are split into smaller series. One of these series is called a quadrangle.

Tools of the Trade

Tides- earth’s oceans go up and down, influenced by the moon and the sun, which causes the tides to move up and down. High tide is when the ocean is closest to the moon. We have two high tides in roughly a day. The high tide on the other side of the earth, the water is a mobile surface is attracted to the moon, the earth is also attracted to the moon, and the water furthest away, is left behind when the earth is pulled towards the moon.

Tides vary day-to-day because of the moon, the sun, and the physical area.

Culture is the specialized behavioral patterns, understandings, and adaptations that summarize the way of life of a group of people.

Components of Culture

As members of a social group, individuals acquire integrated sets of behavioral patterns, environmental and social perceptions, and knowledge of existing technologies. Age, sex, status, and occupation dictate the aspects of the cultural whole in which we become fully indoctrinated.

A culture is not homogeneous. A culture is a complexly interlocked web of behaviors and attitudes. Culture is something learnt Culture is everything your are minus your biologyCultural things create artifacts in the landscape

Ways to read landscape: landscapes are examples of:•Nature, habitat•Wealth, economic system•History, social problems

Because you can read landscape the more you can see and the more questions you can ask/more answers, clues to culture, change in human landscape, means a change in doing and thinking, PERSONAL BIAS.

People-produce, reproduce, sustain and modify culture.

Cultural traits are units of learned behavior ranging from the language spoken to the tools used or to the games played. (object, techniques, or attitudes). Traits are the most elementary expressions of culture, the building blocks of the complex behavioral patterns of distinctive groups of people.

•Ex. Objects•Belief system•Techniques•attitude

Culture complex are individual culture traits that are functionally interrelated constitute a culture complex. (ex. Keeping cattle in Masai of Kenya is a cultural complex). Religious complexes, business behavior complexes, sports complexes, and others can easily be recognized in American or any other society.

•Ex. Suburban lifeoUse of a car (minivan), children, house, lawns, pets

•

Chapter 7 11-09-22 2:33 PM

Cultural system is a larger spatial reality and generalization. Multiethnic societies, perhaps further subdivided by linguistic differences, varied food preferences, and a host of other internal differentiations, may nonetheless share enough joining characteristics to be recognizably distinctive cultural entities to themselves and others.

Cultural region a portion of the earth’s surface occupied by people sharing recognizable and distinctive cultural characteristics. (Ex. Political organizations societies devise, their religions, their form of economy, and even their clothing, eating utensils, and housing).

•Ex. Political organizations of societies•Their form of economy•Housing forms

Cultural realm a set of culture regions showing related culture complexes and landscapes. They are culture regions at the broadest scale of generalization. The scale is so broad and the diversity within the recognized realms so great that the very concept of the realm may mislead more that it informs. (ex. North American, “latin” American, euorpean, Islamic, sub-sharan African, Slavic, sino-japanese, indic, southeast asian, austral European).

•Ex. Interaction of People and Environment

Cultural ecology the study of the relationship between a culture group and the natural environment it occupies.

Environments as Controls

Environmental determinism is the belief that the physical environment by itself shapes humans, their actions, and their thoughts.

Possibilism is the viewpoint that people, not environments, are the dynamic forces of cultural development. The needs, traditions, and technological level of a culture affect how that culture both assesses the possibilities of an area and shapes the choices that it makes regarding them.

Human Impact

Cultural landscape is the earth’s surface as modified by human action, is the tangible, physical record of a given culture. (ex. House types, transportation networks, parks and cemeteries, and the size and distribution of settlements are among the indicators of the use that humans have made of the land).

As more technologically advanced and complex the culture, the greater its impact on the environment, although preindustrial societies can and frequently do exert destructive pressures on the lands they occupy.

Subsystems of Culture

Leslie White groups culture into 3 parts:

Technological subsystem is composed of the material objects and the techniques of their use by means of which people are able to live. Such objects are the tools of other instruments that enable us to feed, clothe, house defend, transport, and amuse ourselves.

Because not all cultures passed through all stages of growth at the same time, or even at all, cultural divergence between human groups became evident.

Cultural convergence is the sharing of technologies, organizational structures, and even culture traits and artifacts that is so evident among widely separated societies in a modern world united by instantaneous communication and efficient transportation.

Sociological subsystem of a culture is the sum of those expected and accepted patterns of interpersonal relations that find their outlet in economic, political, military, religious, kinship, and other associations. ‘

Sociofacts define the social organizations of a culture. They regulate how the individual functions relative to the group, whether it be family, church , or state.

Systems of land and property ownership and control, for example, are institutional expressions of the sociological subsystem.

Ideological subsystem consists of the ideas, beliefs, and knowledge of a culture and of the ways in which they are expressed in speech or other forms of communication.

Mythologies, theologies, legend, literature, philosophy, folk wisdom, and commonsense knowledge make up this category. Passed on from generation to generation, these abstract belief systems, or mentifacts, tell us what we ought to believe, what we should value, and how we ought to act.

The interlocking nature of all aspects of a culture in termed cultural integration. Means that any cultural objet or act may have a number of meanings.

Cultural Change

No culture is, or has been, characterized by a permanently fixed set of material objects, systems of organization, or even ideologies. Cultures are always in a state of flux. Change, both major and minor, within cultures is induced by innovation, spatial diffusion, and acculturation.

Innovation

Innovation implies changes to a culture that result from ideas created within the social group itself and adopted by the culture. May involve the development of nonmaterial forms of social structure and interaction; feudalism or Christianity, for example.

Premodern and traditional societies characteristically are not innovative or receptive to change. All societies have an innate resistance to change, since innovation inevitably creates tensions between the new reality and other established socioeconomic conditions. Cultural lag is that gap that may develop between, for example, a newly adopted technology and other, slower-paced social traits.

Agricultural revolution affected every aspect of society and created irreconcilable conflict between preagricultural hunter-gatherers and sedentary farming cultures.

Culture hearth is used to describe those restricted areas of innovation from which key culture elements diffused to exert an influence on surrounding regions.

Diffusion

Spatial diffusion is the process by which a concept, a practice, an innovation, or a substance spreads from its point of origin to new territories. Two processes are usually involved: either people move to a new area and take their culture with them, or information about an innovation can spread throughout a culture.

Barriers to diffusion do exist. The closer and the more similar two cultural areas are to one another, the lower those barriers are and the greater is the likelihood of the adoption of an innovation, because diffusion is a selective process.

The decision to adopt is governed by the receiving group’s own culture. (ex. Political restrictions, religious taboos, and other social customs are cultural barriers to diffusion).

Diffused ideas and artifacts commonly undergo some alteration of meaning or form that makes them acceptable to a borrowing group. The process of the fusion of the old and new, called syncretism, is a major feature of cultural change.

Acculturation

Acculturation is the process by which one culture group undergoes a major modification by adopting many of the characteristics of another, usually dominant, culture group. Can include changes in the original cultural patterns of either or both of two groups involved in prolonged firsthand contact. Many times when a culture is taken over by a force, they are sometimes forced to acculturate or do so voluntarily.

The amalgamation theory is the “melting pot” theory. The view of immigrant integration into a country suggests that the receiving society and the varied arriving newcomer groups eventually merge into a composite mainstream culture incorporating the many traits of its collective components.

Acculturation for newcomers means that they must adopt values, attitudes, ways of behavior, and speech of the receiving society.

Assimilation occurs when the integration process is completed. Assimilation doesn’t fully mean that culture is lost. The competition theory suggests that, as cultural minorities begin to achieve success and enter into mainstream social and economic life, awreness of cultural differences may be heightened, transforming the strengthening immigrant group into a self-assertive minority, pursuing goals and interests that defend and protect its position within the larger society.

Cultural Diversity

Ethnicity is a cultural summary rather than a single trait. It is based on the firm understanding by members of a group that are, in some fundamental ways, different from other who do not share their distinguishing composite characteristics, which may include language, religion, national origin, ethnicity has spatial identification.

Like language and religion, ethnicity has spatial identification. Like them, to, it may serve as an element of diversity and division within culturally complex societies and states.

Language

Language is spoken or written form makes possible the cooperative efforts, the group understandings, and the shared behavioral patterns that distinguish culture groups. It is defined: an organized system of speech by which people communicate with each other with mutual comprehension, is the most important medium by which culture is transmitted.

Language is said to be able to determine the attitudes, the understandings, and the responses of the society.

Language therefore, can be a cause and a symbol of cultural differentiation.

A language family is a group of languages though to have a common origin in a single, earlier tongue.

Subfamilies are branches in a language I which they are similar through sounds of words, grammatical structure, and vocabulary.

Language Spread and Change

Languages may spread when their speakers occupy new territory. Languages may spread when they acquire new speakers.

Through segregation and isolation, a new language that is a mix between other languages may be formed. Comparable changed occur normally and naturally within a single language in word meaning, pronunciation, vocabulary, and syntax.

Standard and Variant languages

People who speak a common language such as English are members of a speech community. A speech community usually possesses both a standard language comprising the accepted community norms of syntax, vocab, and pronunciation and a number of more less distinctive dialects, the ordinary speech of areal, social and professional, or other subdivisions of the general population.

Social dialects in some countries or societies denote social class and educational levels, with speakers of higher socioeconomic status or educational achievement most likely to follow the norms of their standard of language.

Lower class citizens or less educated people use the vernacular- nonstandard language or dialect adopted by the social group.

A pidgin is an combination of languages, usually a simplified form of one of them, such as English or French, with borrowings from another, perhaps, non-European local language. In its original form, a pidgin is not the other tongue of any of its speakers, it’s a second language for everyone who uses it, one generally restricted to such specific functions as commerce, administration, or work supervision.

If a pidgin becomes the first language of a group of speakers- who may have lost their former native tongue through disuse- a Creole has evolved. Creoles invariably acquire a more complex grammatical structure and enhanced vocabulary. They provide useful integrative tools in linguistically diverse areas; several have become symbols of nationhood. (ex. Afrikaans)

A lingua franca is an established language used habitually for communication by people whose native tongues are mutually incomprehensible.

Language and Culture

a common language fosters unity among people. It promotes a feeling for region; if it is spoken throughout a country, it fosters nationalism. For this reason, languages often gain political significance and serve as a focus of opposition to what is perceived as foreign domination.

Toponyms are place names, that are language on the land, the record of past and present cultures whose namings endure as reminders of their passing and their existence. Toponymy, the study of place-names, therefore is a revealing tool of historical cultural geography, because place-names become a part of the cultural landscape that remains long after the name givers have passed from the scene.

Religion

Unlike language, religion varies in its cultural role-dominating in some societies, unimportant or rejected n others.

Religion is a value system when it involves systems of formal or informal worship and faith in the sacred and divine. Religion may intimately affect all facets of a culture. Religious belief is by definition, an element of the ideological subsystem; formalized and organized religion is an institutional expression of the sociological subsystem. Religious beliefs strongly influence attitudes toward the tools and rewards of the technological subsystem. even societies that reject religion, are strongly influenced by traditional values and customs set by predecessor religions, in days of work and rest or in legal principals, for example.

Classification and Distribution of Religions

Religions are cultural innovations.

Universalizing religions: include Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism. They are faiths that claim applicability to all humans and that seek to transmit their beliefs to all lands through missionary work and conversion. Membership is open to anyone. No one is excluded because of nationality, ethnicity, or previous religious belief.

Ethnic Religions: have strong territorial and cultural group identification. One usually becomes a member by birth or by adoption of a complex lifestyle and cultural identity, not by a simple declaration of faith. Examples include Judaism, Indian Hinduism or Japanese Shinto. To be apart of the religion is to be immersed in the totality of the culture.

Tribal(or traditional) Religions: are special forms of ethnic religions distinguished by their small size, their unique identity with localized culture groups not yet fully absorbed into modern society, and their close ties to nature.

Animism is the name given to their belief that life exists in all objects, form rocks and trees to lakes and mountains, or things are spirits of god.

Shamanism is a form of tribal religion that involves community acceptance of a shaman who, through special powers, can intercede with and interpret the spirit world.

Universalizing religions tend to be expansionary, carrying their message to new peoples and areas.

Ethnic religions, unless their adherents are dispersed, tend to be regionally confined or to expand only slowly and over long periods of time.

Tribal religions tend to contract spatially as their adherents are incorporated increasingly into modern society and converted by proselytizing faiths.

Ethnicity

Any discussion of cultural diversity would be incomplete without the mention of ethnicity. Ethnicity refers to the ancestry of a particular people who have in common distinguishing characteristics associated with their heritage. Ethnic groups may strive to preserve their special shared ancestry and cultural heritage though the collective retention of language, religion, festivals, cuisines, traditions, and in-group work relationships, friendships and marriages. This is called ethnocentrism, the feeling that one’s own ethnic group is superior.

Territorial segregation is a strong and sustaining trait of ethnic identity, one that assists groups to retain their distinction.

Gender and Culture

Gender refers to socially created-not biologically based-distinctions between feminity and masculinity. Gender relationships and role assignments differ among societies, the status of women is a cultural spatial variable and becomes, therefore a topic of geographic interest and inquiry.

Other aspects of Diversity

-architectural styles in public and private buildings -music, food, games, and other evidence of the joys of life, are cultural indicators associated with particular world or national areas.