Human Geography Review Expanded

Human Geography — How humans create, organize, and contest space through culture, politics, economies, and movement.
Environmental Geography — How human societies change environments and how environments shape social possibilities.
Space — Abstract geometric location (no emotional meaning).
Place — Space + meaning + identity + lived experience.
Sense of Place (Tuan) — Emotional connection that forms belonging or home.
Placelessness (Relph) — Spaces lose identity through globalization (airports, malls, Starbucks look identical everywhere).
Landscape — Visible layers of cultural + physical processes across time (what you see = history made visible).
Cultural Landscape (Sauer) — Every landscape reflects cultural values, labor, power, religion, economy, and identity.
Scale — What level we analyze shapes conclusions (neighborhood vs region vs global gives different answers).
Spatial Interaction — Who/what connects across space and how (migration, trade, digital flow).
Distance Decay — Further = less interaction (unless tech cancels it).

🌐 GLOBALISATION (Expanded)

Globalisation — Increasing interdependence in economies, labor, culture, tech, migration, and communication.
Time–Space Compression (Harvey) — Planes, the internet, finance make far places feel “closer,” collapsing barriers of distance.
Network Society (Castells) — Real power runs through networks (banks, fibre cables, influencer markets), not states.
World Systems Theory (Wallerstein) — Wealth moves upward: core profits, periphery supplies cheap labor & resources.
Uneven Development (Neil Smith) — Inequality isn’t accidental — capitalism needs geographic winners & losers to function.
Dependency Theory — Poor states remain poor because rich states extract their resources & labor value.
Commodity Chains — Following a product shows power: cocoa farmer starves while chocolate branding profits.
Post-Development (Escobar) — “Development” often destroys cultures and ecologies by forcing Western norms.

🧭 KEY GEOGRAPHERS (Expanded)

Harvey — Cities shaped by capitalism; space is used for profit (rent gaps, finance, displacement).
Massey — Space isn’t a container, it’s relationships and flows (migration, capital, messages).
Lefebvre — Space is politically produced, not neutral (zoning, prisons, borders = power).
Tuan — Space becomes place only after memory & emotional attachment form.
Relph — Global sameness erases culture (same coffee shop vibe worldwide).
Sauer — Culture leaves fingerprints on land (churches, farms, roads = culture visible).
Sassen — A few mega-cities control global finance networks (NYC, London, Singapore).
Castells — Networks of tech & finance override physical borders.
Neil Smith — Gentrification is not “natural,” it’s economic strategy of reinvestment.
Escobar — Western “help” often harms local systems more.
Robbins — Environment issues always tied to wealth & power.
Swyngedouw — Cities function like metabolic organisms moving water, food, finance, pollution.

🏙 URBAN GEOGRAPHY (Expanded)

Urbanisation — Shift to cities for work, services, lifestyle, education → crowding & inequality.
Primate City — One city dominates everything (jobs, culture, politics).
Megacity — 10M+ people → infrastructure stress.
Gentrification — Wealthier residents replace original communities → displacement.
Urban Sprawl — Cars & suburbs spread out → increased emissions & isolation.
Transit-Oriented Development — Housing & life built around trains, not cars → density, walkability.
Planetary Urbanisation — Even “rural” spaces serve cities via mining, tourism, agriculture.

🌿 ENVIRONMENT + HUMAN GEOGRAPHY (Expanded)

Anthropocene — Human carbon, mining, plastic, farming rewired Earth’s systems.
Political Ecology — Climate effects ≠ random; they follow power & exploitation lines (pollution hits poorest).
Environmental Justice — Some communities bear more toxic waste, heat, floods than others (racial, class patterns).
Tragedy of the Commons — Everyone benefits individually from overuse → collective collapse (fisheries, CO₂).
Carrying Capacity — Planetary limit to human extraction & waste.
Ecological Footprint — How much land/water your lifestyle requires.
Climate Migration — People forced out by drought, saltwater intrusion, heat collapse.
Carbon Colonialism — Rich nations pollute, poor host carbon-offset forests or mines.

🚰 WATER & FOOD (Expanded)

Hydropolitics — Rivers cross borders; power decides who drinks first (Egypt vs Nile states).
Virtual Water — Eating beef uses hidden water from other nations → global inequality.
Food Deserts — Low-income areas lack fresh food, but have fast food → health inequality.
Land Grabbing — Gulf states, China, corporations control African farmland to feed their own populations.

🛠 METHODS (Expanded)

GIS — Mapping inequality, hazard zones, transit gaps.
Remote Sensing — Satellite data to track urban heat, deforestation, floods.
Spatial Autocorrelation — Patterns cluster for a reason (poverty & pollution align).
MAUP — Changing district boundaries changes what data “says” (politically useful).
Qualitative — Stories, meaning, everyday lived geography.
Quantitative — Patterns, census, statistical inequality.
Mixed Methods — What & why together.
Positionality — Who you are shapes what you see (class, gender, race, nationality).
Reflexivity — Researchers acknowledge their bias.

🇺🇳 DEVELOPMENT + INEQUALITY (Expanded)

Neoliberalism — Cutting social programs, privatising housing → bigger gaps.
Debt Colonialism — IMF loans force poor states to slash services, export raw goods.
HDI — Measures quality of life, not just money.
Gini Coefficient — Shows inequality, not wealth level.
Post-Development — “Progress” = cultural erasure if forced.