AP Human Geography: Culture, Cultural Landscapes, Patterns, and Diffusion

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering introductory cultural concepts, cultural landscapes, cultural patterns, and types of cultural diffusion.

Culture

The shared practices, technologies, attitudes, and behaviors of a group of people, learned and passed down through socialization rather than genetics.

Culture Trait

A single, individual feature or element of a culture, such as greeting with a bow, using chopsticks, or wearing a turban.

Culture Complex

A cluster of interrelated culture traits that form a complete practice or lifestyle, such as American automobile culture.

Culture Realm

A large geographic area where several culture complexes share broad cultural similarities, such as Anglo-America, Latin America, or East Asia.

Cultural Identity

How individuals or groups define themselves based on shared traits such as ethnicity, language, or religion.

Cultural Hearth

The original center or birthplace where a cultural trait, innovation, or ideology first develops.

Material Culture

Physical, tangible objects that people create, use, or modify within a society, such as clothing, buildings, tools, machinery, and traditional foods.

Nonmaterial Culture

Intangible beliefs, values, ideas, societal norms, and structures, such as religious doctrines, language, customs, laws, and gender roles.

Ethnocentrism

Judging another culture strictly through the lens, standards, and values of your own culture, viewing your own culture as superior or the correct baseline.

Cultural Relativism

Understanding and evaluating a culture within its own context, beliefs, and local circumstances rather than imposing outside judgment.

Cultural Landscape

The visible human imprint on the physical environment, a concept coined by geographer Carl Sauer.

Built Environment

Man-made physical structures that form the setting for human activity, including skyscrapers, roads, bridges, irrigation canals, and places of worship.

Traditional Architecture

An architectural style that reflects local customs, available natural materials, and climate adaptations, such as adobe bricks, wooden logs, or thatched roofs.

Postmodern Architecture

An architectural style that combines diverse historical styles, unique geometric designs, and modern technology.

Land-Use Patterns

How land is organized and modified for human use, such as terraced agriculture, suburban housing developments, high-density urban cores, and industrial zones.

Symbolic Landscapes

Landscapes explicitly designed to convey specific cultural meaning, political power, or core values, such as monuments, grand cathedrals, and city central plazas.

Sense of Place

The strong personal, emotional connection and meaning that individuals or groups attach to a specific location based on their experiences and identity.

Placelessness

The loss of unique cultural landscape identity due to globalization, making distinct locations look uniform or identical.

Sequent Occupance

The cumulative, layer-by-layer imprint left on a cultural landscape by successive groups of inhabitants over time.

Folk (Traditional) Culture

Culture practiced by small, homogeneous groups living in isolated, rural areas; it originates from anonymous hearths and spreads slowly via relocation diffusion.

Popular Culture

Culture practiced by large, heterogeneous societies sharing common habits, originating from known urban hearths and spreading rapidly via expansion diffusion.

Ethnic Enclave

A distinct neighborhood or area with a high concentration of a particular ethnic group that remains culturally distinct from the surrounding region.

Centripetal Force

A cultural trait or factor that unites and pulls people together, such as a shared national language, unifying religion, or shared historic pride.

Centrifugal Force

A cultural trait or factor that divides and pushes people apart, such as regional language disputes, ethnic rivalries, or religious divisions.

Cultural Diffusion

The spatial spread of an idea, innovation, trait, or technology from its hearth to other geographic locations.

Globalization

The increasing interconnectedness and interdependence of world economies, cultures, and technologies.

Homogenization

The process of local cultures becoming uniform under the influence of global popular culture.

Glocalization

Adapting a global product or idea to fit local cultural customs, representing an application of stimulus diffusion.

Time-Space Compression

The reduction in the time it takes for something to reach another place due to advances in transportation and digital communication technology.

Friction of Distance / Distance Decay

The concept that interaction between two places decreases as the geographic distance between them increases.

Relocation Diffusion

The spread of a cultural trait through the physical movement and migration of people from one place to another.

Expansion Diffusion

The outward spread of a trait from its hearth to new places while remaining strong or growing at its origin.

Contagious Diffusion

A form of expansion diffusion that spreads rapidly and widely throughout a population through direct person-to-person contact, regardless of hierarchy or rank.

Hierarchical Diffusion

A form of expansion diffusion that spreads top-down through an established chain of power, influence, key leaders, or urban hierarchies.

Reverse Hierarchical Diffusion

A form of expansion diffusion that spreads bottom-up from small, rural, or low-status groups to major urban nodes or higher-status groups.

Stimulus Diffusion

A form of expansion diffusion where the core idea or underlying concept spreads, but the specific trait is modified to fit local cultural traditions, laws, or preferences.