AP Human - Ch. 1 Geography Concepts

Abiotic

Composed of nonliving or inorganic matter.

Absolute location

Description of the position of a place in a way that never changes, such as geographic conditions of latitude and longitude.

Acculturation

The process of changes in culture that result from the meeting of two groups, each of which retains distinct cultural features.

Assimilation

The process by which a group’s cultural features are altered to resemble those of another group.

Atmosphere

The thin layer of gases surrounding Earth.

Behavioral geography

An approach to human geography that emphasizes the importance of understanding the psychological basis for individual human actions in space.

Biosphere

All living organisms on Earth, including plants and animals, as well as microorganisms.

Biotic

Composed of living organisms.

Cartogram

A map in which the size of an area is proportional to the value of the variable.

Cartography

The science of making maps.

Chroropleth map

A map in which areas are shaded or patterned in proportion to the measurement of the variable.

Citizen science

Scientific research by amateur scientists.

Climate

The long-term average weather condition at a particular location.

Concentration

The extent of a feature’s spread over a given area.

Connection

The relationships among people and objects across the barrier of space.

Conservation

The sustainable management of a natural resource to meet human needs.

Contagious diffusion

The rapid, widespread diffusion of a feature or trend throughout a population.

Coordinated Universal Time (UTC)

The time in the zone encompassing the prime meridian, or 0 degrees longitude.

Cultural ecology

A geographic approach that emphasizes the human-environment relationships.

Cultural landscape

A geographic approach that emphasizes the relationships among social and physical phenomena in a particular study area.

Culture

The body of customary beliefs, material traits, and social norms that together constitutes the distinct tradition of a group of people.

Density

The frequency with which something exists within a given unit of area.

Diffusion

The process by which a feature spreads from one place to another over time.

Distance decay

The diminished importance and eventual disappearance of a phenomenon with increasing distance from its origin.

Distribution

The arrangement of something across Earth’s surface.

Dot distribution map

A map that depicts data that consists of discrete observations. Each dot represents a predetermined number of observations, which could be one or many.

Ecology

The scientific study of ecosystems.

Ecosystem

A group of living organisms and the abiotic spheres with which they interact.

Environmental determinism

A 19th and early 20th century approach to the study of geography which argued that the general laws sought by human geographers could be found in the physical sciences. Geography was therefore the study of how the physical environment caused human activities.

Expansion diffusion

The spread of a feature or trend among people from one area to another in an additive process.

Formal (Uniform) region

An area in which most people share in at least one distinctive characteristic.

Functional (Nodal) region

An area organized around a node or focal point.

Geographic information science (GIS)

Analysis of data about Earth acquired through satellite and other electronic information technologies.

Geographic information system (GIS)

A computer system that captures, stores, queries, and displays geographic data.

Geotagging

Identification and storage of a piece of information by its precise latitude and longitude coordinates.

Global positioning system (GPS)

A system that determines the precise position of something on Earth through a series of satellites, tracking stations, and receivers.

Globalization

Actions or process that involve the entire world and result in making something worldwide in scope.

Graduated symbol map

A map that displays symbols that change in size according to the value of the variable.

Hearth

A place from which an innovation originates.

Hierarchical diffusion

The spread of a feature or trend from one key person or node of authority or power to other persons or places.

Humanistic geography

An approach to human geography that emphasizes the different ways that individuals form ideas about place and give those places symbolic meanings.

Hydrosphere

All of the water on or near Earth’s surface.

International date line

An arc that for the most part follows 180 longitude. When the international date line is crossed heading east (toward America), the clock moves back 24 hours, or one entire day. When it is crossed heading west (toward Asia), the calendar moves ahead one day.

Isoline map

A map that connects places of a particular value by lines.

Latitude

The numbering system used to indicated the location of parallels drawn on a globe and measuring distance north or south of the equator.

Lithosphere

Earth’s crust and a portion of the upper mantle directly below the crust.

Location

The position of anything on Earth’s surface.

Longitude

The numbering system used to indicate the location of meridians drawn on a globe and measuring distance east and west of the prime meridian.

Map

A two-dimensional, or flat, representation of Earth’s surface or a portion of it.

Map scale

The relationship between the size of an object on a map and the size of the actual feature on Earth’s surface.

Mashup

A map that overlays data from one source on top of a map provided by a mapping service.

Meme

Contagious diffusion through the Internet or social media.

Mental map

A representation of a portion of Earth’s surface based on what an individual knows about a place that contains personal impressions of what is in the place and where the place is located.

Meridian

An arc drawn on a map between the North and South poles.

Network

A chain of communication that connects places.

Parallel

A circle drawn around the globe parallel to the equator and at right angles to the meridians.

Participatory GIS

Community-based mapping, representing local knowledge and information.

Pattern

The geometric or regular arrangement of something in a particular area.

Photogrammetry

The science of taking measurements of Earth’s surface from photographs.

Place

A specific point on Earth, distinguished by a particular characteristic.

Polder

Land that is created by draining water from an area.

Political ecology

An approach to sustainability that focuses on how politics and economic power shape the ability to manage resources.

Possibilism

The theory that the physical environment may set limits on human actions, but people have the ability to adjust to the physical environment and choose a course of action from many alternatives.

Post-structuralist geography

Geographic approach that examines how the powerful in a society dominate, or seek control, less powerful groups, how the dominated groups occupy space, and confrontations that result from the domination.

Prime meridian

The meridian, designated at 0 longitude, that passes through the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England.

Projection

A system used to transfer locations from Earth’s surface to a flat map.

Region

An area distinguished by one or more distinctive charactersitics.

Relocation diffusion

The spread of a feature or trend through physical movement of people from one place to another.

Remote sensing

The acquisition of data about Earth’s surface from a satellite orbiting the planet or from other long-distance methods.

Resource

A substance in the environment that is useful to people, is economically and technologically feasible to access, and is socially acceptable to use.

Scale

The relationship between the portion of the Earth being studied and Earth as a whole.

Site

The physical character of a place.

Situation (relative location)

The location of a place relative to another place.

Social construction

An idea or a meaning that is widely accepted as natural by a society but may not represent a reality shared by those outside the society.

Space

The physical gap or interval between two objects.

Space-time compression

The reduction in the time it takes to diffuse something to a distant place as a result of improved communications and transportation systems.

Spatial association

The relationship between the distribution of one feature and the distribution of another feature.

Stimulus diffusion

The spread of an underlying principle.

Sustainability

The use of Earth’s renewable and nonrenewable natural resources in ways that do not constrain resource use in the future.

Syncretism

The combining of elements of two groups into a new cultural feature.

Toponym

The name given to a portion of Earth’s surface.

Transnational corporation

A company that conducts research, operates factories, and sells products in many countries, not just where its headquarters or shareholders are located.

Uneven development

The increasing gap in economic conditions between core and peripheral regions as a result of the globalization of the economy.

Vernacular (Perceptual) region

An area that people believe exists as part of their cultural identity.

Volunteered geographic information (VGI)

Creation and dissemination of geographic data contributed voluntarily and for free by individuals.