Thinking Geographically An Introduction to An Introduction to AP Human Geography

1. Thinking Geographically An Introduction to An Introduction to AP Human Geography

2. The Basis of Human Geography • Human Geography entails all of the scientific practices taken in to account when thinking geographically. Geographers ask the questions Who?, What?, When?, Where?, How? and Why? In relation to a situation affecting Earth’s surface, whether being the migration of a people’s religion, language, and food preferences (culture), the annual rainfall within a given area (climate), or the transportation of goods from one place to another (economic).

3. Geographical Arrangements • One of the most important parts of Geography is the Where?, which includes the Density (arithmetic, physiological, and agricultural), concentration, and pattern, which all give details to the location of people spread across the surface of the earth and their tendency to cluster in certain areas.

4. Maps and Mapmaking • A map is the most important tool to geographers. It is a tool of reference and a tool for communicating geographical information. Mapmaking, or cartography, began around 2300 B.C. by Babylonians. Maps were used mainly by sailors. Now we have satellites to help with accurate mapmaking, called remote sensing. Then we use GIS to put all the data together. It layers the data (hydrology and soils). A GPS gives us our exact location in longitude and latitude.

5. Projections • Projection is taking a globe such as Earth and putting it on a 2D display. Since you can’t put a globe on a map accurately you will have some distorts to the image: the shape, distance, relative size, and direction can all get distorted. The shape can make it look elongated or short. The distance can become shorter or longer. The size can also change. The direction will change. The Robinson Projection and the Mercator Projection are the best projections to use.

6. Location • Location includes a sites geographical position on the earth’s surface. A relative location can be given, or an exact location using a system of mathematical cartographical tools known as longitude and latitude. A place’s toponym is included in its location.

7. Site • The physical characteristics of a location are known as site. These characteristics include all dominant landforms including rivers, lakes, oceans, and even mountains. Sometimes the location of a place can determine how the toponym of an area is decided upon.

8. Situation • The situation of a place is its location in relation to another place. This gives people an easier way to describe a place if they do not exactly know its location but know of the area around it.

9. Telling Time • The system we use to tell time, is used across the entire globe. Its is processed through the use of our mathematical location descriptions (longitude and latitude). Each place falls into one of twenty four time zones, starting at the zero degree meridian found at Greenwich, London, and this time is known as Greenwich Mean Time.

10. Regions • Regions help to give an area its defining characteristics and include the following: • Formal Region • Functional Region • Vernacular Region • Regions are determined by how people spread themselves across space, alter there environment, and interact with each other.

11. Culture • Culture always falls into two categories, what people care about, and what people take care of. • The first category falls into the belief system of a people including their government, language, and religion. • The second category includes the extra things that people need and also want, including material possessions (wealth), food, shelter, and clothing.

12. Becoming Global • One of the biggest cultural modifiers is globalization. Globalization includes all of the beliefs, material goods, and trends that aim to become global and mask the local customs that tend to define homogonous areas. Some people are very excepting to globalization and believe it is necessary to proceed in development and improve the economic status of an area, while others believe that is a very disastrous occurrence. Those that are opposed to globalization wish to maintain the FOLK culture that they have always portrayed and block the POPULAR culture that is brought on with globalization. An example of globalization is McDonalds success at taking over the global food market.

13. As a result… • As a result of globalization, there are new phenomena brought into play across the globe. One of these phenomena is space time compression, which expresses the time it takes for an idea to travel from one area to another. With the globalization of radio and even television, messages can be transferred in a fraction of the amount of time that it used to take to send them. During the colonization of America, it could take months to send one message to the homeland, and then months more to receive a response. Now with the integration of technology, information can be sent from anywhere on the globe to any other location within seconds.

14. Diffusion • Diffusion is when a characteristic or an idea spreads from one place to another over a period of time. This characteristic originates around a hearth. One of these emerges when a group wants to try something new or they have to. There’s Relocation, Expansion, Hierarchical, Contagious, and Stimulus diffusion.

15. Diffusion (2) • Relocation diffusion is the spread of idea through the actual movement of people from one place to another. Expansion is just the spread of something through a snowballing process. Then hierarchical is the spread of an idea through nodes of authority. Also, Contagious diffusion is the fast spread of something through the people, like a disease. Stimulus is the spread of an underlying idea even if it does not become popular.

16. Review • 1. Describe in detail the scientific process that is used to make maps.

17. 1. The Answer • Cartography is the scientific process that is used to make maps. The process includes the transfer of geographic data from the globe to a flat surface, using both scale and projection.

18. Review (cont.) • What are some of the effects of globalization?

19. 2. The Answer • Some effects of globalization are a more intertwined global economy, including acts created for free trade, the induction of countries into global powers- such as The United Nations, the destruction of small homogenous (folk) cultures, and the immediate integration of Large heterogeneous (popular) culture.

20. Review (cont.) • 3.What is a region? What are the different types of –region-? What are the different terms that are included to help define region?

21. 3. The Answer • Region is defined as, a distinct characteristic defines one area from all others. The different types of region are vernacular, functional, and formal. Region can be further defined by site, situation, and location.

22. Review (cont.) • 4. What are the subcategories of culture? What do the two specifically include?

23. 4. The Answer • Culture includes what people care for and what people care about. • People care about their ideas and beliefs, including religion and politics. People care about their material possessions, including food, shelter, and entertainment.

24. Review (cont.) • 5. What are the different types of diffusion and how are they defined?

25. 5. The Answer • Relocation- The spread of an idea through the movement of people from one place to another. • Contagious- The rapid spread of something, such as a disease, through people. • Hierarchal- The spread of an idea through governing rule or nodes of authority. • Expansion- The expansion of something through the -snowball effect-. • Stimulus- The spread of an underlying principal, even if it is not popular at the time.