Chapter 1: Introduction

Flashcards covering key vocabulary and concepts from the lecture on globalization, early human societies, the advent of agriculture, and the rise of empires and trade systems like mercantilism and colonialism.

Globalization

A process amplified since the Industrial Revolution with roots in colonialism, involving increasing geographic interconnectedness, power relations, spatial inequalities, and dynamic change driven by commodities and resources.

Pre-Hearth Areas

Refers to the period before the advent of agriculture, representing about 95% of human existence.

Hunter-Gatherer Foragers

Small, mobile communities that lived for most of human existence, extracting resources based on local availability and seasonality.

Macro Bands

Larger social groups (e.g., 50 people) that hunter-gatherers would sometimes form during times of abundant resource availability.

BP (Before Present)

A dating term, where 10,000 BP is approximately 12,000 BC, used to signify thousands of years ago.

Domestication

A long and drawn-out process over generations where plants and animals are modified by human intervention through selection for desired characteristics.

Agriculture

The practice that changes the landscape by human selection for specific plant traits (e.g., bigger kernels, drought resistance) and impacts the abundance of plants, as well as the animals and insects living on the landscape.

Selective Force

The process by which humans choose and favor characteristics in plants or animals that are most beneficial or desirable to them, leading to the gradual development of domesticated species.

Teosinte

The ancestor of modern corn, characterized by a very small stalk and tiny kernels.

First Agricultural Revolution (Neolithic Revolution)

A period around 10,000 BP (8,000-9,000 BC) when agriculture was first invented in multiple places across the globe.

Agricultural Hearth Areas

Numerous diverse geographic locations where agriculture was first developed, such as parts of Africa, China, Mesoamerica, and the Near East.

Mini Systems

Societies with a single cultural base and a reciprocal social economy, marking a transition from hunter-gatherer to more settled communities engaging in trade.

Swidden Agriculture (Slash and Burn)

A farming method where a patch of forest is cut, dried, and burned to release nutrients into the soil before planting, after which the land is left to regrow for several years.

Managed Mosaic

A landscape created by swidden agriculture, characterized by a patchwork of areas in various stages of forest regrowth.

Hearth Areas (General Definition)

General geographic settings where new practices, ideas, or innovations arise and eventually spread through diffusion processes.

Sedentary Communities

Settlements where people no longer live a mobile, hunter-gatherer lifestyle but remain in one place, often due to the practice of agriculture.

Social Hierarchies

Systems of social stratification that arise from agricultural surpluses, leading to differing levels of prestige, power, and inequality within a society.

Specialization

The division of labor where individuals focus on specific skills or crafts, such as farming, pottery, or tool-making, and trade their specialized goods with others.

Empires

Large political units that emerge as populations grow, requiring expansion into new territories to acquire more resources and consolidate wide areas under a central control.

Law of Diminishing Returns (in empires)

The tendency for productivity to decline as resources become scarce in an empire, necessitating continuous expansion to acquire new resources.

Colonization

The physical settlement of a new territory by people from a colonizing state.

Urbanization

The growth and development of cities with increasing infrastructure to support growing populations.

Pastoralist Economies

Economic systems, often found in harsher environments like dry belt steps or deserts, where people move from place to place with larger animal herds rather than settling in large cities for agriculture.

Silk Road

A major historic overland trade route from China to Europe, facilitating the movement of goods like silk and spices, which created significant demand.

Ottoman Empire

An empire that rose after the Fall of Constantinople, eventually blocking overland silk trade into Europe and leading to a shift towards sea trade routes.

Triple Alliance (Aztec Empire)

A political entity comprising Tenochtitlan, Teshkopo, and Tlacopan, centered in the area of modern-day Mexico City, which formed the core of the Aztec Empire.

Pochteca

Elite merchants and spies within the Aztec society who played a key role in acquiring resources and expanding the territory of the Triple Alliance by gathering intelligence.

Mercantilism

An economic concept from the 15th-17th centuries stating that trade generates wealth for a society by maximizing exports and minimizing finished imports, often promoting colonialism and imperialism.

East India Company

A powerful company in the 16th-17th centuries, associated with British expansion, that played a significant role in spreading colonialism and establishing trade routes globally for resource extraction.