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Chapter 1
Vocab
Term | Definition |
---|---|
Human geography | One of the two major divisions of geography; the spatial analysis of human phenomena, including population, cultures, activities, and landscapes. |
Absolute location | Precise location of a place, usually defined by latitude and longitude |
Geography | The spatial study of people, place, space, and environment. |
Globalization | Processes heightening interactions, increasing interdependence, and deepening relations across country borders. |
Accessibility | Ease of flow between two places |
Activity spaces | Places within the rounds of daily activity |
Carrying capacity | The idea that land can hold a measurable amount of plant and animal life |
Cartography | The art and science of making maps |
Connectivity | Position of a place or area relative to others in a network. |
Contagious diffusion | Spread of an idea or innovation from one person or place to another person or place based on proximity. Specific type of expansion diffusion |
Context | The physical and human geographies creating the place, environment, and space in which events occur and people act. |
Cultural traits | A learned belief, norm, or value passed down through generations in a culture. |
Cultural ecology | Study of the historical interaction between humans and environment in a place, including ways humans have modified and adapted to environment. |
Cultural landscape | The visible human imprint on the landscape |
Culture | Group of belief systems, norms, and values practiced by a people |
Culture complex | A group of interrelated cultural traits, such as prevailing dress codes and cooking and eating utensils. |
Diffusion | Spread of an idea, innovation, or technology from its hearth to other people and places. |
Environmental determinism | Set of theories that use environmental differences to explain everything from intelligence to wealth |
Epidemic | Widespread, rapid diffusion of disease among a people in a particular location or region at a particular time. |
Expansion diffusion | The spread of an idea or innovation from its hearth across space without the aid of people moving |
Fieldwork | Observations researchers make of physical and cultural landscapes with a focus on seeing similarities and differences |
Formal region | Area of land with common cultural or physical traits. |
Functional region | Area of land defined as sharing a common purpose in society. |
Node | Connection point in a network, where goods and ideas flow in, out, and through the network. |
Movement | Mobility of people, goods, and services across Earth (one of the five themes of geography). |
Location | Position on Earth, including both absolute location and relative location (one of the five themes of geography). |
Location theory | Understanding the distribution of cities, industries, services, or consumers with the goal of explaining why places are chosen as sites of production or consumption. The von Thünen model is an example |
Geographic information system (GIS) | A system of computer hardware and software designed to show, analyze, and represent geographic data (data that have locations). |
Geographic concepts | Mental categories used to organize and analyze the world spatially. |
Global Positioning System (GPS) | Satellite-based system for determining the absolute location of places or geographic features. |
Hearth | Area or place where an idea, innovation, or technology originates. |
Hierarchical diffusion | Spread of an idea or innovation from one person or place to another person or place based on a hierarchy of connectedness. Specific type of expansion diffusion. |
Human-environment interactions | Reciprocal relationship between humans and environment (one of the five themes of geography). |
Mental maps | Maps of an area made from memory or experience by individuals or groups (also known as cognitive maps). |
Terra incognita | Areas on maps that are not well defined because they are off limits or unknown to the map maker. |
Thematic maps | A map that tells a story, typically showing the degree of some attribute or the movement of a geographic phenomenon using map symbols. |
Pandemic | An outbreak of a disease that spreads worldwide. |
Patterns | Description of the spatial distribution of a human or physical phenomenon (e.g., scattered or concentrated). |
Distance | The area between two points on earth |
Perceptual regions | Area of land that an individual perceives as being similar. |
Place | Uniqueness of a location (one of the five themes of geography). |
Perception of place | How a place is envisioned |
Physical geography | One of the two major divisions of geography; the spatial analysis of physical phenomena, including climate, environmental hazards, weather systems, animals, and topography. |
Possiblism | Theory in geography that humans, not environment, shape culture. |
Political ecology | An approach to studying human-environment interactions in the context of political, economic, and historical conditions operating at multiple scales. |
Reference maps | Maps showing absolute location of places and geographic features. |
Region | Area of Earth identified as sharing a formal, functional, or perceptual commonality that makes it different from regions around it (one of the five themes of geography). |
Remote sensing | A method of collecting data or information through the use of instruments (e.g., satellites) that are physically distant from the area of study. |
Relative location | The location of a place or attribute in reference to another place or attribute. |
Relocation diffusion | Spread of an idea or innovation from its hearth by the act of people moving and taking the idea or innovation with them. |
Rescale | Changing the geographical scope at which a problem is addressed by engaging decision makers and gatekeepers at another scale. |
Scale | Geographical scope (local, national, or global) in which we analyze and understand a phenomenon. |
Sense of place | Infusing a place with meaning as a result of experiences in a place. |
Sequent occupance | imprints left on the cultural landscape by a series of successive societies. Each society contributed to the cumulative cultural landscape. |
Spatial interaction | Degree of connectedness or contact among people or places. |
Spatial preference | Looking at where things occur, why they occur where they do, and how places are interconnected. |
Spatial distribution | Physical locations of geographic phenomena, usually shown on a map. |
Stimulus diffusion | A process of diffusion where two cultural traits blend to create a distinct trait. |