GEOG 1700 Exam 2 Key Terms

African Union (AU)

Founded in 1963, the organization grew to include all the states of the continent except South Africa, which finally was asked to join in 1994. Morocco withdrew in 1984, but now wishes to rejoin. In 2004 the body changed its name from the Organization of African Unity (OAU) to the African Union. It is mostly a political body that has tried to resolve regional conflicts.

Agricultural density

The number of farmers per unit of arable land. This figure indicates the number of people who directly depend upon agriculture, and it is an important indicator of population pressure in places where rural subsistence dominates

Apartheid

The policy of racial separateness that directed separate residential and work spaces for white, black, coloreds, and Indians in South Africa for nearly 50 years. It was abolished when the African National Congress came to power in 1994

Berlin Conference

The 1884-1885 conference that set the framework for dividing Africa into European colonial territories. The boundaries created in Berlin satisfied European ambition but ignore indigenous cultural affiliations. Many of Africa’s civil conflicts can be traced to ill-conceived territorial divisions created during this event

biofuels

Energy sources derived from plants or animals. Throughout the developing world, wood, charcoal, and dung are primary energy sources for cooking and heating

Clans

A social unit that is typically smaller than a tribe or ethnic group but larger than a family, based on supposed descent from a common ancestor

Coloured

A racial category used throughout South Africa to define people of mixed European and African ancestry

Conflict diamonds

Diamonds that are sold on the black market to fund armed conflict and civil war, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa

Desertification

The spread of desert conditions into semiarid areas owing to improper management of the land

Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)

ECOWAS is an intergovernmental organization that promoted economic integration and security among its 15 member states in West Africa. It was founded in 1975.

Food insecurity

When people lack physical or economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs for extended periods of time

Gondwana

The name given for the southerly supercontinent that existed over 200 million years ago that included Africa, South America, Antarctica, Australia, the Arabian Peninsula, and the Indian subcontinent

Great Escarpment

A landform that rims southern Africa from Angola to South Africa. It forms where the narrow coastal plains meet the elevated plateaus in an abrupt break in elevation

Great Rift Valley

Caused by the breakup of Gondwana, the ancient mega continent that included Africa, South America, Antarctica, Australia, and the Arabian Peninsula, this term refers to the continental uplifts that left much of the area with vast plateaus– where the highest areas, found on the eastern edge of the African continent, forms a complex upland area of lakes, volcanoes, and deep valleys. In contrast, lowlands prevail in West Africa.

Homelands

Normally independent ethnic territories created for blacks under the grand apartheid scheme. Homelands were on marginal land, overcrowded, and poorly serviced. In the post-apartheid era, they were eliminated

Horn of Africa

The northeastern corner of Sub-Saharan Africa that includes the states of Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Djibouti. Since the 1980s, drought, famine, ethnic conflict, and political turmoil have undermined development efforts in this area

Internally displaced persons (IDPs)

Groups and individuals who flee an area due to conflict or famine but still remain in their country of origin. These populations often live in refugee-like conditions but are harder to assist because technically do not qualify as refugees 

Kleptocracy

A state where corruption is so institutionalized that politicians and bureaucrats siphon off a large percentage of a country’s wealth for personal gain

Pan-African Movement

Founded in 1900 by U.S. intellectuals W.E.B. Du Bois and Marcus Garvey, this movement’s slogan was “Africa for Africans,” and its influence extended across the Atlantic

Pastoralists

Nomadic and sedentary peoples who rely upon livestock (especially cattle, camels, sheep, and goats) for their sustenance and livelihood

Physiological density

A population statistic that relates to the number of people in a country to the amount of arable land

Refugees

A person who flees his or her country because of a well-founded fear of persecution based on race, ethnicity, religion, ideology, or political affiliation

Sahel

The semidesert region at the southern fringe of the Sahara, and the countries that fall within this region, which extends from Senegal to Sudan. Droughts in the 1970s and early 1980s caused widespread famine and dislocation of population

Southern African Development Community (SADC)

A trade bloc formed in the 1970s to facilitate intraregional exchange and development. It became even more important in the 1990s and is anchored by South Africa, one of the region’s largest economies

Structural adjustment programs

Controversial yet widely implemented programs used to reduce government spending, encourage the private sector, and refinance foreign debt. Typically, those IMF and World Bank policies trigger drastic cutbacks to government-supported services and food subsidies, which disproportionately affect the poor

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Goals resulting from an UN-led effort to end extreme poverty by focusing on 17 key indicators, the top five of which are no poverty, zero hunger, good health, quality education, and gender equality, with key benchmarks for 2030

Swidden

A form of cultivation in which forested or brushy plots are cleared of vegetation, burned, and then played in crops, only to be abandoned a few years later as soil fertility declines. Also called slash-and-burn agriculture or shifting cultivation

Townships

Racially segregated neighborhoods created for nonwhite groups under apartheid in South Africa. They are usually found on the outskirts of cities and classified as black, coloured, and South Asian

Transhumance

A form of pastoralism in which animals are taken to high-altitude pastures during the summer months and returned to low-altitude pastures during the winter

Tribalism

Allegiance to a particular tribe or ethnic group rather than to the nation-state. Tribalism is often blamed for internal conflict within Sub-Saharan states

Tribes

A group of families or clans with a common kinship, language, and definable territory but not an organized state

Arab League

A regional and economic organization of independent countries focused on the unity and development of the Arabic-speaking realm. Three non-Arabic-speaking countries, however, also belong to this organization: Somalia, Djibouti, and Comoros

Arab Spring

A series of public protests, strikes, and rebellions in the Arab countries, often facilitated by social media, that have called for fundamental government and economic reforms

Brain drain

Migration of the best-educated people from developing countries to developed nations where economic opportunities are greater

Choke points

A strategic setting where a narrow waterway is vulnerable to military blockade or disruption. A prominent example would be the Strait of Hormuz, which forms the entrance to the Persian Gulf

Culture hearth

An area of historic cultural innovation that gave rise to a particular culture region

Domestication

The purposeful selection and breeding of wild plants and animals for cultural purposes

Exotic rivers

A river that issues from a humid area and flows into a dry area otherwise lacking streams

Fertile Crescent

An ecologically diverse zone of lands in Southwest Asia that extends from Lebanon eastward to Iraq and that is often associated with early forms of agricultural domestication

Fossil water

Water supplies that were stored underground during wetter climatic periods

Greater Arab Free Trade Area (GAFTA)

An organization, established in 2005 by 17 Arab League members, designed to eliminate all intraregional trade barriers and spur economic cooperation

Hajj

An islamic religionn pilgrimagein Makkah. One of the five essential pillars of the Muslim creed to be undertaken once in life, if an individual is physically and financially able to do it

Hydropolitics

The interplay of water resource issues and politics. Countries often disagree about water resources, especially in regard to major rivers that cross international boundaries

ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant)

The Sunni extremist organization, also known as ISIS or as IS, which has brouht about especially violent instability in the Syria and Iraq area in attempts to create a new religious state (a caliphate)

Islamic fundamentalism

A movement within both the Shiite and Sunnu Muslim traditions to return to a more conservative, religious-based society and state. Often associated with a rejection of Western culture and with a political aim to merge civic and religious authority

Islamism

A political movement within the religion of Islam that challenged the encroachment of global popular culture and blames colonial, imperial, and Western elements for many of the region’s problems. Adherents of Islamism advocate merging civil and religious authority

Levant

The eastern Mediterranean region

Maghreb

A region in northwestern Africa, including portions of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia

Medina

The original urban core of a traditional Islamic city

monotheism

A religious belief in a single God

Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)

An international organization, formed in 1960, that now includes 13 oil-producing countries that attempts to influence global prices and supplies of oil. Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Gabon, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudia Arabia, The United Arabian Emirates, and Venezuela are members

Ottoman Empire

A large, Turkish-based empire (named for Osman, one of its founders) that dominated large portions of southeastern Europe, North Africa, and Southwest Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries

Palestinian Authority (PA)

A quasi-governmental body that represents Palestinian interests in the West Bank and Gaza

Pastoral nomadism

A traditional subsistence agricultural system in which practitioners depend on the seasonal movements of livestock within marginal natural environment

Protectorates

During the period of Western global imperialism, a state or other political entity that remained autonomous but sacrificed its foreign affairs to an imperial power in exchange for “protection” from other imperial powers

Quaran

The holy book of Islam, which Muslims believe to the the divine revelations received by he prophet Muhammad

Salinization

The accumulation of salts in the upper layers of soil, often causing a reduction in crop yields, resulting from irrigation with water of high natural salt content and/or irrigation of soils that contain a high level of mineral salts

Sectarian violence

Conflicts that divide people along ethnic, religious, and sectarian lines

Shiites

Muslims who practice one of the two main branches of Islam, especially dominant in Iran and nearby southern Iraq

Suez Canal

Pivotal waterway connecting the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, opened in 1869

Sunnis

Muslims who practice the dominant branch of Islam

Sykes-Picot Agreement

A secret agreement in 1916 between Great Britain and France, and agreed to by the Russian Empire that defined imperial spheres of influence in the disintegrating Ottoman Empire. According to the pact, France was to have a dominant position after WWI in what is now Syria and Lebanon, whereas Britain was to receive the area extending from what is now Israel and Palestine through Iraq. As Britain has previously promised independence to the Arabs of the region who were rebelling against the Ottoman Empire, the Sykes-Picot Agreement is widely seen in Southwest Asia as a prime example of European dishonesty and double-dealing

Theocratic state

A political state led by religious authorities

Asylum laws

Protection for refugees who are victims of ethnic, religious, or political persecuion in other parts of the world

Balkanization

Geopolitical process of fragmentation of larger states into smaller ones through independence of smaller regions and ethnic groups. The term takes its name from the geopolitical fabric of the Balkan region.

Brexit

The June 2016 referendum by United Kingdom voters to leave the European Union, which passed by a vote of 52 percent to 48 percent. Energizing the “Leave” vote were an array of anti-EU feelings ranging from unemployment allegedly caused by industry shifting to other EU countries, restrictive EU market regulations, “too many foreigners” because of EU free movement policies, and concerns about the EU’s inability to deal with the increase of extra-legal immigration into Europe

Buffer zone

An array of nonaligned or friendly states that “buffer” a larger country from invasion. In Eurasia, maintaining a buffer zone has been a long-term policy of Russia (and also of the former Soviet Union) to protect its western borders from European invasion

Cold War

The ideological struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union that occurred between 1946 and 1991

continental climates

The term describes inland climates with hot summers and cold winters. The interior portions of North America, Europe, and Asia have continental climates

Cyrillic alphabet

A writing system based on the Greek alphabet and used by Slabic languages heavily influenced by the Eastern Orthodox Church. Attributed to the missionary work of St. Cyril in the 9th century

devolution

The breaking apart or separation within a political unit such as a nation-state

Economic and Monetary Union (EMU)

An organization of 11 EU members states formed in 1999 that then agreed, in 2002, to use new euro coins and bills that replaced national currencies in the EMU countries. Today 19 of the EU’s 28 member states use the euro, with some refusing to join the Eurozone, while others await resolution of ongoing tensions between rich and poor euro countries

European Union (EU)

The current association of 28 European countries that are joined together in an agenda of economic, political, and cultural integration

Eurozone

The common monetary policy and currency of the European Union; those countries of Europe using the euro as its currency and who are members of the EU’s common monetary system, contrasted to those countries having a national currency and monetary system. France is an example of the former, and the United Kingdom of the latter

Family-friendly policies

Established in places such as Germany, France, and Scandinavia, these are politics that address concerns about population loss by offering full pay maternity and paternity leaves, guarantees of continues employment once these leaves conclude, extensive child-care facilities for working parents, outright cash subsidies for having children, and free or low-cost public education and job training for their offspring

Fjords

flooded, glacially carved valley. In Europe, fjords are found primarily along Norway’s western coast

Indo-European language family

The world’s largest group of languages that are descended from a common ancestral language. Most languages of Europe, northern and central South Asia, and Iran belong to this language family

Industrial Revolution

The period of time in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when European factories first changed from using animate power (human and animals) to inanimate power (water and coal) to power machines

Iron Curtain

A term coined by British leader Winston Churchill during the Cold War that defned the western border of Soviet power in Europe. The notorious Berlin wall was a concrete manifestation of the Iron Curtain

Irredentism

A state or national policy of reclaiming lost lands or those inhabited by people of the same ethnicity in another nation-state

Latin alphabet

The alphabet derived from the ancient Roman that is used today for most European languages, including English. It is also used for a number of non-European languages, such as Indonesian and Vietnamese. The Latin alphabet is one of the two distinct alphabets which complicate the geography of Slavic languages. In countries with a strong Roman Catholic heritage, such as Poland and the Czech Republic, this language is used. In contrast, countries with close ties to the Orthodox Church– Bulgaria, Montenegro, Macedonia, parts of Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Serbia– use the Greek-derived Cyrillic alphabet

Marine west coast climate

A major climate type that is moderate and moist and modified by oceanic influences. Marine west coast climates are found along the west coast of Europe, in the Pacific Northwest in North America, in Southern Chile, in Tasmania, and along the western coast of New Zealand’s South Island

Mediterranean climate

A mild, dry-summer climate found in the mid-latitude belt on the west sides of continents. Most of the Mediterranean Basin has a Mediterranean climate, as do California, central Chile, the Cape region of South Africa, and the southwestern corner of Australia

nation-states

A relatively homogenous cultural group (a nation) with its own political territory (the state). While useful conceptually, the reality of today’s globalized world is that there are very few countries that fit this simplistic definition because of the influx of migrants and/or the presence of minority ethnic groups

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

Initially NATO was a group of North Atlantic and European allies who came together in 1949 to counter the Soviet threat to western Europe. NATO today is a member alliance of 28 member states in North America, Europe, and Southwest Asia (Turkey) pledged to common defense in the event of war

Schengen Agreement

The 1985 agreement between some– but not all– European Union member countries to reduce border formalities in order to facilitate free movement of citizens between member countries of this new “Schengenland.” For example, today there are reduced border controls between France and Germany, or between France and Italy

Warsaw Pact

The Cold War military pact between the Soviet Union and its eastern European satellite countries, formed to counter NATO

Autonomous areas

Minor political subunit created in the former Soviet Union and designed to recognize the special status of minority groups within existing republics. The term more generally can be used to designate any part of a country that has been given a certain degree of independence from the central government

Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM) Railroad

Key central Siberian railroad connection completed in the Soviet era (1984), which links to the Yenisey and Amur rivers and parallels the Trans-Siberian Railroad

Bolsheviks

A faction within the Russian communist movement led by Lenin that successfully took control of the country in 1917

Centralized economic planning

An economic system in which the state sets production targets and controls the means of production

Chernozem soils

A Russian term for dark, fertile soil, often associated with grassland settings in southern Russia and Ukraine

Communism

A belief based on the writings of Karl Marx that promoted the overthrow of capitalism by the workers, the large-scale elimination of private property, state ownership and central planning of major sectors of the economy (both agricultural and industrial), and one-party authoritarian rule

Cossacks

Highly mobile Slavic-speaking Christians of the southern Russia steppe who were pivotal in expanding Russia influence in 16th- and 17th-century Siberia

Dachas

A Russian country cottage used especially in the summer

Eastern Orthodox Christianity

A loose confederation of self-governing churches in eastern Europe and Russia that are historically linked to Byzantine traditions and to the primacy of the patriarch of Constantinople (Istanbul)

Eurasian Economic Union (EEU)

A customs union (paralleling the European Union \[EU\]) designed to encourage trade as well as closer political ties between member states. Formed in 2015, the EEU contains five member states (Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia, and Kyrgyzstan)

Exclave

A portion of a country’s territory that lies outside its contiguous land area

Glasnost

A policy of greater political openness in the Soviet Union initiated during the 1980s by Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev

Gulag Archipelago

A collection of Soviet-era labor camps for political prisoners, made famous by writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn