AP Human Geography Course Vocabulary Summary (Units 1-7)

Scale

Generally, the relationship between the portion of Earth being studied and Earth as a whole, specifically the relationship between the size of an object on a map and the size of the actual feature on Earth's surface.

Remote sensing

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

Geographic Information System (GIS)

A computer system that can capture, store, query, analyze, and display geographic data.

Global Positioning System (GPS)

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

Satellite imagery

Images of the earth taken from orbiting satellites. Images can be taken in a variety of forms so as to detect specific information about the earth, vegetation and other types of land cover.

Geotagging

The process of adding geographical information to various media in the form of metadata. The data usually consists of coordinates like latitude and longitude, but may even include bearing, altitude, distance and place names.

Map Ratio

Map scale refers to the relationship (or ratio) between distance on a map and the corresponding distance on the ground. For example, on a 1:100000 scale map, 1cm on the map equals 1km on the ground. ...

Geospatial data

Information about a physical object that can be represented by numerical values in a geographic coordinate system.

Map distortion

Happens when a round surface is made flat; distortion may be in size or shape of landforms, distance between landforms, or in direction.

Map Projection

a way of representing the spherical Earth on a flat surface

Prime Meridian

The meridian, designated at 0° longitude, which passes through the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, England.

Longitude

Distance east or west of the prime meridian, measured in degrees.

Latitude

Distance north or south of the Equator, measured in degrees.

Toponym

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

Absolute location

Exact location of a place on the earth described by global coordinates

Relative location

The position of a place in relation to another place

Place

A specific point on Earth distinguished by a particular character.

Site

The physical character of a place

Situation

The location of a place relative to another place

Cultural landscape

Fashioning of a natural landscape by a cultural group.

Formal/uniform region

An area in which everyone shares in common one or more distinctive characteristics

Functional/nodal region

Area organized around a node or focal point/place where there is a central focus that diminishes in importance outward. Used to display information about economic areas.

Vernacular

This region is neither formal nor functional, but has a unique identity due to the perceptions of people about it

perceptual region

A place that people believe exists as part of their cultural identity from people's informal sense of place such as mental maps.

Globalization

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

Transnational Corporation

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

Density

The degree of compactness of a substance. The amount of something in a given space. Population Density.

Distribution

The arrangement of something across Earth's surface.

Concentration / Clustered

Group of some items in a location (housing).

Dispersed

distributed or spread over a considerable extent

environmental determinism

A doctrine that claims that cultural traits are formed and controlled by environmental conditions.

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.

Aging Population

A population in which the percentage that is age 65 and older is increasing relative to other age groups

Agricultural population density

The ratio of the number of farmers to the amount of arable land

Anti Natalist population policies

-Encourage couples to limit the number of children they have

-These policies discourage growth through provision of contraception or abortion or through establishment of specific disincentives, such as steep penalties for couples bearing more children than allowed by the state

One-Child Policies

-China is famous for its one-child population policy from the '80s in which many drastic measures (e.g. forced sterilization for couples with one child or infanticide of female babies), ensured decreasing population growth

Anti-natalism

Arithmetic population density

The total number of people divided by the total land area.

Boserup Theory

Population growth will not exceed food production. Land can be intensified through new methods, increasing your yield.

Carrying Capacity

Largest number of individuals of a population that a environment can support

Crude Birth Rate (CBR)

The total number of live births in a year for every 1,000 people alive in the society.

Crude Death Rate (CDR)

The total number of deaths in a year for every 1,000 people alive in the society.

Contraception

Intentionally preventing pregnancy from occurring

Demographic transition model (DTM)

In the four stages of transition from an agricultural subsistence economy to an industrialized country, demographic patterns move from extremely high birth and death rates to low birth and death rates. In the process, population growth rates skyrocket and then fall again. The crude death rate first falls because of the influx of better health technology, and then the birth rate gradually falls to match the new social structure.

Dependency ratio

The number of people under age 15 and over age 64 compared to the number of people active in the labor force

Ehrlich Theory

Ehrlich's theory is that there will be a disaster for humanity due to over population.

Epidemiological transition model (ETM)

A model highlighting the distinctive causes of death in each stage of the demographic transition

Fertility

The production of offspring within a population

Infant Mortality Rate (IMR)

The total number of deaths in a year among infants under 1 year old for every 1,000 live births in a society.

Life Expectancy

The average number of years an individual can be expected to live, given current social, economic, and medical conditions. Life expectancy at birth is the average number of years a newborn infant can expect to live.

Malthusian Theory

Starvation is the inevitable result of population growth, because the population increases at a geometric rate while food supply can only increase arithmetically

Mortality

death rate

Neo-Malthusians

People who believed in Malthusian Theory and in the idea that population was not only outstripping food but other resources

Physiological population density

The number of people per unit of area of arable land, which is land suitable for agriculture.

Population density

Number of individuals per unit area

Population Distribution

Description of locations on Earth's surface where populations live

Population-doubling time

The number of years it takes a population to double; calculated by dividing the number 72 by the rate of natural increase

Population Pyramids

Visual representations of the age and sex composition of a population whereby the percentage of each age group (generally five-year increments) is represented by a horizontal bar the length of which represents its relationship to the total population. The males in each age group are represented to the left of the center line of each horizontal bar; the females in each age group are represented to the right of the center line

Pro Natalist population policies

Policies that provide incentives for women to have children, typically in countries where population is declining.

Rate of natural increase

The annual rate of population growth

Sex ratio

The number of males per 100 females in the population.

Total Fertility Rate (TFR)

The average number of children a woman will have throughout her childbearing years.

Migration

Movement of people from one place to another

Asylum seekers

Someone who has migrated to another country in the hope of being recognized as a refugee

Chain migration

The migration event in which individuals follow the migratory path of preceding friends or family members to an existing community.

Forced migration

Human migration flows in which the movers have no choice but to relocate.

Guest worker

A term once used for a worker who migrated to the developed countries of Northern and Western Europe, usually from Southern and Eastern Europe or from North Africa, in search of a higher-paying job.

Internal migration

Migration within a country

Internally displaced persons

People who have been displaced within their own countries and do not cross international borders as they flee.

Interregional migration

movement from one region of a country to another

Intervening opportunities/obstacles

Is an environmental or cultural feature that hinders migration.

Intraregional migration

Movement within a region

Push/pull factors

Conditions that draw people to another location (pull factors) or cause people to leave their homelands and migrate to another region (push factors)

Ravenstein's laws of migration

Most migrants move only a short distance.

There is a process of absorption, whereby people immediately surrounding a rapidly growing town move into it and the gaps they leave are filled by migrants from more distant areas, and so on until the attractive force [pull factors] is spent.

Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

There is a process of dispersion, which is the inverse of absorption.

**Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration**

Each migration flow produces a compensating counter-flow.

Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

Long-distance migrants go to one of the great centers of commerce and industry.

Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

Natives of towns are less migratory than those from rural areas.

Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

Females are more migratory than males.

Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

Economic factors are the main cause of migration.

Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

Refugees

People who are forced to migrate from their home country and cannot return for fear of persecution because of their race, religion, nationality, membership in a social group, or political opinion.

Rural-to-urban migration

The movement of people from the countryside to the city

Slavery

A system of enforced servitude in which some people are owned by other people.

Step migration

Migration to a distant destination that occurs in stages, for example, from farm to nearby village and later to a town and city

Transhumance

The seasonal migration of livestock between mountains and lowland pastures.

Transnational migration

A form of population movement in which a person regularly moves between two or more countries and forms a new cultural identity transcending a single geopolitical unit.

Voluntary migrations

When people wish to move because they wish to improve their economic or social wellbeing and/or gain personal freedom.

Acculturation

The adoption of cultural traits, such as language, by one group under the influence of another.

Assimilation

The social process of absorbing one cultural group into harmony with another

Contagious Diffusion

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

Culture

Beliefs, customs, and traditions of a specific group of people.

Cultural divergence

is the tendency for culture to become increasingly dissimilar with passage of time. Example: Amish people resist outside influences of modern. technology, clothes. and pop culture.

Cultural landscape

a cultural landscape as a geographic area (including both cultural and natural resources), that is associated with a historic event, activity or person, or exhibiting any other cultural or aesthetic values.

Sikhism

The doctrines of a monotheistic religion founded in northern India in the 16th century by Guru Nanak and combining elements of Hinduism and Islam

Judaism

The monotheistic religion of the Jews having its spiritual and ethical principles embodied chiefly in the Torah and in the Talmud

Islam

A religion based on the teachings of the prophet Mohammed which stresses belief in one god (Allah), Paradise and Hell, and a body of law written in the Quran. Followers are called Muslims.

Cultural relativism

The practice of judging a culture by its own standards

Diffusion

The process of spread of a feature or trend from one place to another over time

Ethnic cultures

Pertaining to or characteristic of a people, especially a group (ethnic group ) sharing a common and distinctive culture, religion, language, or the like.