Human Geography Study Guide: Chapter One

What is geography?

  1. What does having factual knowledge of the world permit us to do?
  2. What is considerably more important than just where something occurred?
  3. Geography is much more than place names and locations. It is the study of ______variation.
  4. Geographers focus on the interaction of people and social groups with their ______.
  5. Although space is central to geography, what else is important to the subject?

Evolution of the Discipline

  1. “areal differentiation”:
  2. In Greek what did geo mean? Graphien?

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Geography and Human Geography

Human Geography

  1. What is human geography’s emphasis?
  2. Human geography helps us to understand the world we occupy and to appreciate the circumstances affecting ______and ______other than our own.
  3. Our study of human geography can help make us better-informed citizens, more able to understand the important issues facing our countries and better prepared to contribute to their ______.

Core Geographic Concepts

  1. Explain how geography is a spatial science. It is concerned with spatial behavior of people with the spatial processes that create and maintain those behaviors and relationships.

Geographic Features skip

Location

  1. The identification of place by some precise system of coordinates:
  2. Using Figure 1.4 What are the coordinates of Hanoi?
  3. The position of a place in relation to that of other places or activities:
  4. Describe the relative location of my classroom.
  5. The physical and cultural characteristics and attributes of the place itself:
  6. According to figure 1.6 what makes New Orleans’ site “hardly ideal”?
  7. According to figure 1.7 what makes New Orleans’ situation ideal for building a city?

Direction skim

Distance

  1. When we talk about how long it takes to get somewhere is that absolute or relative distance?

Size and Scale skip

Physical and Cultural Attributes

  1. The physical environment unaffected by human activities:
  2. What is the EPA (the three words)?
  3. The visible expression of human activity:

The Changing Attributes of Place skip

Interrelations Between Places

  1. The movement of people, goods, and information between different places:
  2. What is Tobler’s First Law of Geography?
  3. Relative ease with which a destination may be reached from other locations:
  4. The process of dispersion of an idea or an item from a center of origin:
  5. The increasing interconnection of peoples and societies in all parts of the world:

The Structured Content of Place

  1. The arrangement of items on the Earth’s surface:
  2. What kind of diagram is used in figure 1.13?

Density read

Dispersion

  1. The opposite of concentration:
  2. Another word for agglomerated:
  3. According to Figure 1.15 does San Bernardino County have a dispersed or concentrated population distribution?

Pattern

  1. The design or shape of feature locations rather than just their spacing:
  2. Most American cities display what type of pattern?

Spatial Association

  1. When two distributions of features spatially correspond with each other:
  2. Give an example of spatial association:

Place Similarity and Regions read

Type of Regions

  1. Geographic region created by law, treaty, or regulation:
  2. Name 3 administrative regions your home is in:
  3. Explain uniform membership functions.
  4. Another name for formal or uniform regions:
  5. According to Figure 1.18, what agricultural region does Adelaide fall into?
  6. What does it mean that thematic regions have “fuzzy” boundaries?
  7. Geographic region emerging from patterns of interaction over space and time that connect places:
  8. Give an example of a functional region.
  9. What’s another name for a functional region?
  10. Geographic region created informally to reflect the subjective beliefs and feelings of individuals:
  11. Within Southern California, what vernacular region does Walnut fall in?

Maps read

Map Scale

  1. What size of area do small scale maps cover?
  2. Since an absolutely accurate representation of the Earth’s curved surface is impossible, all projections inevitably______.

The Globe Grid read

How Maps Show Data

  1. The art and science of map making:
  2. A general-purpose map that attempts to show geographic features in detail:
  3. What type of map answers the question: “what is the pattern of this variable?”
  4. What do quantitative thematic maps show?
  5. What types of maps are graduated circle, dot, isoline and choropleth maps?
  6. Looking at Figure 1.24, which map do you think is most accurate in showing the population of LA County (the biggest red county in d)? Why?
  7. What is the difference between a graduated circle map and a dot map?
  8. What does iso mean?
  9. Maps that feature lines that connect points of equal values: isoline
  10. A map showing average value of the data per preexisting areal unit (political boundary):
  11. Look at the choropleth map on p. 24. How is it misleading?
  12. Uses statistical data to transform space so that the largest areal unit (political boundary) on the map is the one showing the greatest statistical value.
  13. Why is California shown larger than Texas in the cartogram on p. 25 when it is actually a smaller state?

Contemporary GeospatialTechnologies

  1. What are the 3 words in GPS? GIS?
  2. What 3 technologies have revolutionized geography?
  3. How many orbiting satellites does GPS rely on?

Remote Sensing skip

Geographic Information Systems

  1. A GIS is both an integrated ______package for analyzing geographical data and a computer database in which every item is tied to a precise geographic ______.
  2. According to figure 1.27, what are the three primary components a GIS incorporates?
  3. List the 6 layers used in the example shown in figure 1.27.

Mental Maps

  1. Representations people hold in their mind that expresses their beliefs and knowledge about the layout of the world:

Systems, Maps, and Models

  1. The arrangement of integrated phenomena produced by spatial processes on the earth’s surface:
  2. A simplification of reality, designed to clarify relationships between its elements:
  3. Are maps a type of model?
  4. Techniques scientists us to simplify complex situations and to eliminate unimportant details:
  5. Trying to understand how people occupy, organize,and utilize the Earth as well as interact with each other.