ch 1 geography – Flashcards
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contemporary geography
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The scientific study of the location of people and activities across earth and the reasons for their distribution
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What questions do geographers ask?
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They ask where things are like what is a specific feature's location. Why a certain feature is there like what force(human or physical) caused a feature to be located where they are.
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How do geographers organize their subject matter?
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They organize by place, geographers understand that something happening at one place can result from something happened elsewhere and can affect conditions at other place, location, and distribution.
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Compare and contrast the term globalization and local diversity. How do they relate to geography?
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They both deal with culture and the spread of culture. Globalization spreads a cultural characteristic across the globe and local diversity keeps a cultural characteristic in one place. They relate to geography because they are both talking about distribution of a characteristic across space.
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Explain the origins of the word geography.
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Invented by the ancient Greek scholar Eratosthenes. Its based on two Greek words, geo, meaning earth and graphy, meaning to write.
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Explain the different categories of geography.
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Human geography is the study of where and why human activities are located where they are. It shows the interaction between people and their environment, like religions, businesses, and cities. Physical geography is where and why natural forces occur as they do. For example, climates, landforms, and types of vegetation.
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What distinguishes geography from other disciplines?
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It relies on maps to display and analyze information.
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What is a place to geographers?
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A specific point on earth distinguished by a particular characteristic. It has a unique location. There are many ways to identify a location.
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What is a region to geographers?
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An area of Earth distinguished by a combination of cultural and physical features. They look at what humans have in common.
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Explain GIS.
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A computer system that can capture, store, analyze, and display geographic data. Each position of an object is recorded with mathematical precision and stored in a computer.
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How is GIS used for map making?
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The map is made by asking the computer to retrieve stored objects and then combine them to form a image. Maps are more accurate and attractive using this system.
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What is remote sensing?
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The acquisition of data about Earth's surface from a satellite or other long distance methods. The satellites scan the surface and then sends information to.
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What is remote sensing used for in geography?
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These images are used in mapping the environment and distribution of human activities.
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Explain GPS
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Accurately determines the precise position of something on Earth. Satellites orbit earth and receivers compute position velocity and time from the signals. Information can later be entered as a layer in a GIS.
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What is GPS used for?
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It used in coding the precise location of objects
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4 ways geographers describe location of a place?
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Place name, site, situation, and mathematical location.
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What is a site? What can humans do to a site?
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Site is the physical character of a place and humans can change the characteristics of the site. For example, climate, water types, and soil.
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Explain situation.
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The location of a place relative to another.
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Explain concept of time zones.
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Each timezone is 15 degrees longitude. It is -1 hour or + 1 hour from the next time zone.There are 24 time zones on earth.
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Cultural landscape
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combination of cultural and physical features of a region. Each region is unique.
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Which characteristics hold a region together and make them unique?
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human and environmental characteristics
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How are regions different from eachother?
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people, activities, and environment
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Whats the fundamental principle underlying the cultural landscape?
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People are the most important agents of change to Earth's surface.
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What are the 3 types of regions?
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Formal(uniform, homogeneous), functional(nodal), vernacular(perceptual)
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Formal region
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everyone shares in common distinctive characteristics. You know because of clear boundaries.
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functional region
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An area organized by a node or focal point. The characteristic chosen to define region dominates at a central focus and diminishes its important outwards. Example is radio station.
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Vernacular region
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A place that people believe exists as part of their cultural identity. It comes from peoples sense instead of geographical models. It has no clear boundaries.
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Whats the concept of a mental map?
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What and individual knows about a place, and it contains personal impressions of what is in a place. Two people will have differences based on where they work and live. It shows what you know about a place and where places are located.
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Spatial association
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The description of the relationship between a region, scale and characteristic. Can be small or large scale.
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origin of the word culture
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latin word cultus meaning to care for
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Why is the concept of culture complex?
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It is complex because to care for has two different meanings. Geographers can study what people care about, like their ideas, beliefs, and customs, or they can study what people take care of, like their ways of making money, getting food, clothing, and shelter.
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Popular culture
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what majority of people value
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Two cultural elements of interest to geographers are
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What people care about and take care of. All people consume clothing, build shelter, and create art, but different cultural groups obtain wealth in different ways.
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Intangible cultural items geographers study
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ethnicity, religion, and language and they study them because you can put groups in location and compare principle means of how cultural value became distributed around the world
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The different indicators of production of material wealth?
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most developed countries and least developed countries
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cultural ecology
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the study of human environmental relationships
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Environmental determinism
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the physical environment caused social developement
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Possibilism
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physical environment may limit some human actions but people can adjust to their environment
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to understand distribution of activities across earth, what physical processes should a human geo need to be familiar with
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climate, vegetation, and soil
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Example of sensitive environmental modification
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netherlands
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example of not so sensitive environmental modification
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florida
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what did Ellsworth Huntington say
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climate is a major determinant of civilization
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economic specialization
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a country focuses on producing one or a few products
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modern technology
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makes it easy to move money, materials, products, and technology
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transnational corporations
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businesses that have other factories in different locations across the world
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Does globalization still permit diversity
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yes because of local diiversity
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local and global scale
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local scale- geographers see unique features. global scale- geographers tend to see broad patterns
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Globalization of economy and the effects
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people produce a world that is more uniform, integrated, and interdependent. The effects are economic decline, economic specialization, greater economic differences among places.
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Globalization of culture
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spread of cultural beliefs and forms, like religion and language. Results in uniform cultural preferences.
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The effects of globalization of culture?
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local cultural beliefs and differences among places diminish as more people become aware of global culture and want to posses them
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distribution
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arrangement of features in space
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3 elements of distribution
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density, concentration, and pattern
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density
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frequency with which something occurs in space
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concentration
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extent of features spread over space
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pattern
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arrangement of objects in space
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space-time compression and effects
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reduction of time it takes something to reach another place. Effects are distant places are more accessible to us, promotes rapid change because people are exposed to constant cultural traits from people in other regions
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spacial interaction
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places are connected to each other through networks, such as television and other forms of communication
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distance decay
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diminishing of contact between groups because they are further apart from each other and eventually disappears. Happens less because of communication networks.
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diffusion
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characteristics spreading across space from one place to another over time through communication and transportation networks.
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3 different types of diffusion
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relocation diffusion, expansion diffusion, and diffusion of culture and economy
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Relocation diffusion
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spread of an idea through physical movement of people from one place to another
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expansion diffusion
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spread of and idea from one place to another in a snow balling process
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3 types of expansion diffusion
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Hierarchical- spread through people of authority or power to other people or places. Contagious- spread of a characteristic throughout population(influenza). Stimulus- spread of idea but in a changed way.
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what are the hearths of global culture
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North America, Europe, and Japan
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Effects of diffusion of culture and economy
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Uneven distribution of wealth, uneven development, increasing similarities, loss of culture, economic specialization
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how does the concept of space factor into geography?
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they think of the arrangement of people and activities found in space and try to understand why they are distributed across space as they are. What happens at one place can effect another place.
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how does ethnicity factor into patterns in space
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People of the same ethnicity tend to live in the same locations because people want to reinforce their cultural identity. These factors explain why they sort themselves out in space.
