Geography of Ethiopia and the Horn

Flashcards containing vocabulary terms and definitions from the lecture notes.

Geography

The scientific study of the Earth that describes and analyses spatial and temporal variations of physical, biological and human phenomena, and their interrelationships and dynamism over the surface of the Earth.

Location

A particular place or position.

Place

The physical and human aspects of a location

Human-Environment Interaction

Involves three distinct aspects: dependency, adaptation, and modification.

Movement

Entails to the translocation of human beings, their goods, and their ideas from one end of the planet to another.

Region

A geographic area having distinctive characteristics that distinguishes itself from adjacent unit(s) of space.

Astronomical location

States location of places using the lines of latitudes and longitudes.

Relative location

Expresses the location of countries or places with reference to the location of other countries (vicinal), landmasses or water bodies.

Compact shape countries

The distance from the geographic centre of the state to any of the borders does not vary greatly. It is easier for defence, socioeconomic and cultural integration.

Fragmented shape countries

They are divided from their other parts by either water, land or other countries.

Elongated shape countries

They are geographically long and relatively narrow.

Perforated shape countries

A country that completely surrounds another country.

Protrude shape countries

Countries that have one portion that is much more elongated than the rest of the country.

Map

A two-dimensional scaled representation of part or whole of the Earth surface on a flat body such as piece of paper, black board, wood or cloth.

Title

Is the heading of the given map which tells what the map is all about.

Key (legend)

Is the list of all convectional symbols and signs shown on the map with their interpretation.

Scale

Is the ratio between the distance on the map and the actual ground distance.

North arrow

It is indicated with the north direction on a map; used to know the other important directions of the mapped area like east, west, south, and west.

Drainage

The flow of water through well-defined channel.

Drainage basin

The topographic region from which a river and its tributaries collect both the surface runoff and subsurface flow.