Everything human geo
Unit 1: Maps and Spatial Data
This unit covers the fundamentals of maps, data analysis, and spatial relationships.
Types of Maps
Thematic Maps: These maps highlight specific data related to a particular theme or subject.
Reference Maps: These maps display general geographic information, like boundaries and landmarks.
It's essential to be able to read and analyze maps, identifying patterns at different scales and interpreting various data types.
Map Projections and Distortion
All map projections have some degree of distortion. The four main types of distortion are:
Shape: The form of landmasses can be altered.
Area: The size of regions can be misrepresented.
Distance: The distances between points can be inaccurate.
Direction: The orientation of features can be skewed.
For example, the Mercator projection preserves direction, which is why it was historically used for naval navigation. However, it significantly distorts the size and shape of continents.
GIS (Geographic Information Systems)
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) layer data on maps to reveal spatial relationships.
Qualitative vs. Quantitative Research
Governments and businesses use both types of data to inform decisions such as zoning laws, store locations, and infrastructure development. Even individuals use this information to determine where they want to live.
Spatial Concepts
Advancements in technology and communication have reduced distance decay, making the world more interconnected. Spatial patterns and interactions create a unique sense of place and cultural landscape in different areas.
Environmental Sustainability
Environmental Determinism:
This theory states that the environment restricts societal and cultural development.
Environmental Possibilism:
This theory suggests that society can shape and modify the environment to meet its needs.
Scale and Scale of Analysis
Scale of Analysis: This refers to how data is organized or grouped (e.g., national vs. local level). It focuses on the level at which data is aggregated and analyzed.
Scale: This refers to the extent of the area being viewed on a map (small scale vs. large scale).
Types of Regions
Functional (Nodal) Regions:
These are areas organized around a central node, often related to economic activities, travel, or communication (e.g., airport delivery range).
Perceptual (Vernacular) Regions:
These regions are based on people's beliefs, feelings, or attitudes about an area (e.g., the Middle East).
Formal (Uniform) Regions:
These are areas with common attributes, typically defined by economic, social, political, or environmental characteristics (e.g., state boundaries).
🧑🤝🧑 Unit 2: Population and Migration
This unit covers population distribution, density, and demographic measures.
Population Distribution
Population distribution refers to where people live. Factors influencing distribution include:
Economic opportunities
Social opportunities
Political factors
Environmental factors
Areas with more opportunities tend to attract more people. Larger urban areas offer more economic and social opportunities, while smaller rural settlements have fewer of these but can have more land and a quieter lifestyle.
Population Density
Arithmetic Density:
Total Population÷Total Land Area
Total Population÷Total Land Area
Physiological Density:
Total Population÷Arable Land
Total Population÷Arable Land
Agricultural Density:
Number of Farmers÷Arable Land
Number of Farmers÷Arable Land
These densities provide insights into population pressure on resources and agricultural efficiency.
Population Vocabulary
Key terms to understand include:
CBR (Crude Birth Rate)
CDR (Crude Death Rate)
NIR (Natural Increase Rate)
Growth Rate
Sex Ratios
Doubling Time
Dependency Ratios
These measures show different aspects of a society that are essential to understand when looking at population data.
Population Pyramids
Population pyramids graphically display the age and sex structure of a population. Analyzing different countries' pyramids reveals much about their stage in the demographic transition.
📈 Demographic Transition Model
This model helps interpret population charts. A large base suggests an early stage, while a top-heavy pyramid indicates a later stage, potentially causing dependency ratio issues and burdening the working class.
Stages of the Demographic Transition Model
Stage 1: Low Growth
High crude birth rate (CBR) and crude death rate (CDR) cancel each other out.
Stage 2: Industrial/Medical Revolution
Deaths decrease significantly, but births remain high, causing a population boom.
Stage 3: Urbanization & Socioeconomic Opportunities
Birth rates begin to decline, and the growth rate becomes more moderate.
Stage 4: Opportunities for Women
Zero population growth (ZPG) occurs as births and deaths equalize at lower rates.
Stage 5: Population Decline (Debated)
Death rates rise above birth rates, leading to a population decrease.
Understanding this model is key to understanding societies around the world.
⚕ Epidemiologic Transition Model
This model follows the demographic transition model and analyzes the causes of death in each stage. It mostly aligns with the demographic transition model, but there are differences in Stage 5.
➕ External Forces
Pro-Natalism
Government policies that encourage citizens to have more children to increase population growth.
Anti-Natalism
Government policies that restrict population growth, encouraging people to have fewer children.
👨🏫 Malthus and Neo-Malthusians
Malthus believed in a Malthusian catastrophe, where population growth would outpace food production:
Population(growsexponentially)>FoodProduction(growsarithmetically)
Population(growsexponentially)>FoodProduction(growsarithmetically)
Neo-Malthusians believe that Malthus was correct but too narrow in scope. They argue that population will exceed Earth's carrying capacity considering all resources, not just food, leading to a catastrophe.
🚶 Migration
Push and Pull Factors
Pull Factors: Factors that attract people to an area.
Push Factors: Factors that cause people to leave an area.
People migrate due to political, economic, social, or environmental reasons, with economics being the primary driver.
Types of Migration
Forced Migration: Occurs when migrants' lives or families are in jeopardy.
Voluntary Migration: Migrants choose to move without fear of persecution or death.
Counter Migration: When people are moving from point A to point B, these places are now connected and they'll influence each other in a variety of ways.
📚 Unit 2 Key Concepts
Demographic Transition Model
Population Pyramids
Migration Types
Vocab
Diffusion
Acculturation
Assimilation
Cultural Resistance
🌍 Culture
Cultural Relativism
Viewing a culture through its own perspective, without applying one's own cultural standards.
Ethnocentrism
Judging another culture based on one's own social norms and cultural standards.
Culture encompasses a group's shared practices, beliefs, attitudes, customs, technologies, and food.
Cultural Landscape
The visible imprint of human activity and culture on the environment
The cultural landscape reflects land use patterns, agricultural practices, religious and linguistic characteristics, and architectural styles.
Cultural Forces
Centripetal Forces: These forces push and pull society together, creating a unique sense of place and cultural identity.
Centrifugal Forces: These forces separate a society.
➕ Diffusion
Diffusion is the spread of cultural traits from one place to another.
Types of Diffusion
Relocation Diffusion: The spread of an idea through physical movement of people from one place to another.
Expansion Diffusion: The amount of people participating in a cultural trait is growing.
Hierarchical Diffusion: Spreads through a system of structures, often top-down.
Contagious Diffusion: Spreads in all directions, allowing widespread access.
Stimulus Diffusion: Adapts to the cultural traits of the area it diffuses to.
Historical Diffusion Examples
Colonialism and Imperialism: Led to the spread of English, which became a lingua franca.
Religion: Christianity and Islam diffused globally as universalizing religions.
Modern Diffusion
Urbanization and Globalization: Driven by the internet, transportation, and communication advancements.
Space-Time Compression: Reduces the impact of distance decay, enabling global communication.
Cultural Changes Due to Diffusion
Cultural Resistance: Protests against migrant communities or new cultural traits.
Acculturation: Cultures merge and adapt.
Assimilation: Cultures merge together.
Syncretism: Cultures blend together
Multiculturalism: Cultures come together to create a melting pot
Cultural Isolation: Folk and indigenous cultures protect their unique identities.
⛪ Religions
Universalizing Religions
Religions that seek to appeal to people of diverse cultural backgrounds and actively seek new converts.
Christianity
Islam
Buddhism
Sikhism
Ethnic Religions
Religions that are closely tied to a specific ethnic or cultural group and do not actively seek converts.
Judaism
Hinduism
Religion Review Focus
Impact on the cultural landscape
Hearth location
Diffusion patterns
Major beliefs## 🌍 Unit 4: Political Geography - Nations, States, and Boundaries
📜 Nation vs. State
Understanding the difference between a nation and a state is crucial.
Nation:
A group of people with a shared history, cultural identity, and a history of self-determination.State:
An entity with a permanent population, a sovereign government, and recognition from other states.
🤝 Nation-State vs. Multinational State
Nation-State: A state made up of one nation (homogeneous).
Multinational State: A state made up of multiple nations that have agreed to coexist peacefully under one state.
Multi-State Nation: A nation that exists across multiple states (e.g., the Korean nation in North and South Korea).
Stateless Nation: A nation without its own state (e.g., the Kurdish nation).
🛡 Self-Determination
Self-determination is the right of a nation to govern itself without external influence to protect its cultural identity.
⚔ Colonialism and Imperialism
Colonialism and Imperialism: Political boundaries are created through military conquest, leading to diffusion and the expression of power through territoriality.
Shatter Belt Regions: Regions caught between two external fighting powers.
💸 Neocolonialism
Neocolonialism: A country uses economic or political influence to control another country without direct occupation.
🚧 Political Boundaries
Relic Boundaries: Boundaries that no longer exist but still impact the cultural landscape (e.g., the Berlin Wall).
Antecedent Boundaries: Boundaries that existed before human settlement.
Subsequent Boundaries: Boundaries based on different ethnic groups and cultures.
Consequent Boundaries: Boundaries that divide different cultural groups and accommodate their differences.
Superimposed Boundaries: Boundaries created by a foreign state (e.g., most African countries during the scramble for Africa by European powers).
Geometric Boundaries: Cultural boundaries that are straight lines, often following parallels of latitude.
🌊 Law of the Sea
Territorial Waters: 12 nautical miles off the coastline.
Contiguous Zone: Extends 24 nautical miles off the coast.
Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ): Extends 200 nautical miles off the coastline.
Anything past the EEZ is considered International Waters.
🗳 Gerrymandering
Gerrymandering: Redistricting voting districts to create a district more favorable to one party, giving them an edge over the competition.
🏛 Unitary vs. Federal States
Unitary State: Concentrates power in the national government without sharing it with regional levels.
Federal State: Shares power between the national and regional governments.
💥 Centripetal vs. Centrifugal Forces
Centrifugal Forces: Forces that push a state apart (e.g., terrorism, irredentism, isolated cultural groups).
Centripetal Forces: Forces that unite a country together (e.g., common culture, national identity).
Devolution: The transfer of power from a national government down to a regional government.
🌐 State Sovereignty
State Sovereignty: The state's right to govern itself.
Challenges: Devolution, advancements in technology, interference from foreign states (e.g., through social media or election interference).
Supranational Organizations: Organizations like the European Union, NATO, or the UN, which states join, giving up some sovereign control to follow international rules, participate in trade agreements, and form military alliances.
🌾 Unit 5: Agriculture
🚜 Intensive vs. Extensive Agricultural Practices
Intensive Agricultural Practices
Located near population centers.
Focus on maximizing agricultural production.
Require a lot of labor and capital.
Examples:
Plantation Farming: Found in less developed countries.
Mixed Crop and Livestock: Found in developed countries, where crops are primarily fed to livestock.
Market Gardening: Located in regions with longer growing seasons; fruits and vegetables are picked, processed, and shipped across the country.
Extensive Agricultural Practices
Located farther away from population centers.
Require a lot more land.
Most of the work is done by hand.
Examples:
Shifting Cultivation: Often found in developing countries with tropical regions; a type of subsistence agriculture.## 🧑🌾 Types of Agriculture
Subsistence vs. Commercial Agriculture
Subsistence agriculture is about feeding your family or community, not making a profit. On the other hand, commercial agriculture is all about generating profit.
Extensive Agriculture Types
Nomadic Herding:
Found in dry climate areas.
Farmers move with their animals.
Ranching:
Uses a lot of land for grazing.
Located far from urban areas due to land needs.
🏘 Settlement Patterns and Survey Methods
Settlement Patterns
Clustered Settlements:
High population density.
Homes are packed closely together.
Dispersed Settlements:
Lower population density.
Homes and buildings are spaced out.
Linear Settlement Patterns:
Located along a river, road, or train line.
Built in a line for transportation access.
Survey Methods
Meets and Bounds:
Used for short distances.
Based on key geographic features.
Long Lots:
Divide land into narrow parcels.
Each parcel connects to a transportation system (road or river).
Township and Range:
Uses longitude and latitude to create a grid-like system.
🌍 Agricultural Hearths and Diffusion
Areas like the Fertile Crescent and Indus Valley River show where crops and animals originated.
Historical events like the Columbian Exchange led to the diffusion of agricultural practices and products globally.
⚙ Agricultural Revolutions
First Agricultural Revolution (Neolithic Revolution):
Sedentary agriculture began to take off.
Second Agricultural Revolution (Industrial Revolution):
Transformation in food production with new technologies like the seed drill.
Increased food output and surplus.
Led to the enclosure movement, changed migration patterns, and created a globalized economy.
Population boom.
Green Revolution:
Introduction of GMOs, hybrid plants, chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides.
Higher yielding crops.
🌱 Modern Agricultural Practices
Monocropping:
Growing the same crop each year to increase production.
Can deplete nutrients in the land.
Monoculture:
Growing one type of crop at a time.
Switching the type of crop after each harvest.
Economy of Scale:
New technology allows farmers to scale up their business.
Produce crops at a cheaper rate when producing more quantity.
Value-Added Specialty Crop:
Crops that gain in value as the production occurs (e.g., wheat to flour, strawberries to jam).
⚖ Debates and Counter-Movements
Heated debates surround genetically modified food, chemical fertilizers, environmental impacts, health concerns, and worker conditions.
These debates have led to:
Organic Farming: Removes chemical fertilizers and non-sustainable practices.
Local Food Movements: Counter food deserts.
Free Trade Movements
Urban Farming
Community Supported Agriculture (CSA): Counter ethical, health, and environmental concerns.
👩🌾 Women in Agriculture
In developing countries, women make up a larger percentage of subsistence farmers.
These farmers are part of the informal economy, with lower wages, fewer opportunities, and higher risk of discrimination.
As countries develop, women gain more roles but are still primarily in agricultural fields in urban areas.
Further development leads to more economic, social, and political opportunities for women, approaching equality.
💸 Bid Rent Theory
The bid-rent theory looks at the relationship between land prices and an urban area or market.
Farther from urban areas:
Land prices decrease.
More extensive agricultural practices occur.
Closer to urban areas:
Land prices increase.
More skyscrapers and densely populated areas.
More intensive agricultural practices.
👨🌾 Von Thunen's Model
Von Thunen's model looks at the spatial layout of agriculture around a market.
Market (Center): Sale of produced goods.
Dairy and Horticulture: Closest to the market.
Forest: Wood for cooking and heating, needs accessibility.
Grain and Field Crops: Easily transported, non-perishable.
Livestock: Furthest, needs the most land, can walk to the slaughterhouse.
Wilderness: The outermost ring.
🏙 Settlements and Cities
Site and Situation Factors
Site Factors: Unique to a specific place (climate, natural resources, absolute location).
Situation Factors: Connections between different places (rivers, roads, airports, ports).
Advancements in communication and technology have increased connections between settlements.
Understanding Settlements and Cities
Understand the location, operation, and connections of different settlements and cities.
Cultural trends diffuse through world cities and large urban areas, spreading to surrounding settlements.
Distribution of Cities
Gravity Model:
Predicts the likelihood of interaction between two places; larger settlements are more likely to have interactions.
Christaller's Central Place Theory:
Larger settlements are more specialized.## 🏘 Central Place Theory and Urban Hierarchy Central place theory illustrates urban hierarchy by showing the spatial association between cities, towns, villages, and hamlets.
Specialized services have a larger range, attracting people from farther distances.
These services require a higher threshold, needing a densely populated area to support the business.
📏 Primate City vs. Rank-Size Rule
Primate City Rule: The largest settlement has double the population of the second largest.
Rank-Size Rule: The largest settlement has about half the population of the second largest, the third has a third, and so on. This creates more large urban areas and evenly dispersed economic development.
🏙 Urban Models
Burgess Concentric Zone Model
Cities grow outwards from the CBD in a series of rings, with newer homes on the outside and older homes near the center.
Hoyt Sector Model
Cities develop in a series of wedges, with the CBD in the center. Transportation and industry are key factors.
Harris and Ullman Multiple Nuclei Model
Cities have multiple CBDs, each attracting specific people and jobs.
Galactic (Periphery) Model
An expansion of the multiple nuclei model, with edge cities forming outside the city limits.
Latin American City Model
Spine: Connects the CBD to a wealthy shopping district.
Disamenity Zone: High-poverty neighborhoods lacking essential services.
Sub-Saharan African City Model
Consists of three different CBDs and informal settlements (squatter settlements) around the urban area.
Squatter Settlements/Favelas: Low-income neighborhoods with no legal claim to the land, higher crime rates, informal economy, and less infrastructure.
Southeast Asian City Model
Based around a port with a government zone overseeing trade.
💰 Bid Rent Theory
Density gradient affects settlement patterns:
High-Density: Vertical construction near the CBD due to limited and expensive land.
Medium-Density: Single-family or multi-family homes with limited space between properties.
Low-Density: Large yards and spaces between buildings in suburban or rural areas.
🛣 Infrastructure and Sustainable Cities
Investing in public transportation, schools, and healthcare can attract residents back to urban areas, countering urban sprawl.
Strategies for Sustainable Cities
Smart growth policies
Urban growth boundaries
New urbanism
Green belts
Sustainability: Meeting present needs without compromising future generations' ability to meet their own needs.
Controversies in Urban Policy
Changes in urban policy can lead to:
Segregation
Unequal economic development
Loss of historical neighborhoods and cultural landscapes
Examples of Disastrous Urban Policies
Redlining: Discriminatory housing loan practices that segregated neighborhoods.
Blockbusting: Contributed to white flight, further segregating neighborhoods and causing unequal economic development.
🏘 Gentrification
Increases property values and wealth in low-income neighborhoods near the CBD.
Attracts wealthier communities, converting old warehouses into apartments.
Can lead to displacement of current residents.
🏛 Government Layers and Urban Planning
Different levels of government (federal, regional, state, local, city, county) have varying ideas and control over funding and urban planning.
🌎 Globalization and Economy
Globalization has drastically changed food, goods, services, migration, urbanization, and settlement patterns since the Industrial Revolution.
Formal vs. Informal Economy
Formal Economy: Jobs regulated and monitored by the government.
Informal Economy: Jobs that are unregulated and not monitored by the government.
Economic Sectors
International Division of Labor
Core countries are shifting from primary and secondary sectors to the tertiary sector, while semi-periphery and periphery countries are offering more primary and secondary sector jobs.
Companies in core countries exploit cheap resources and labor in developing countries to reduce production costs.
Offshoring: Moving jobs from a home country to another country.
Manufacturing Zones
Economically advantageous for multinational corporations to relocate production in developing countries due to cheaper resources and labor.
💰 Multinational Corporations and Global Trade
Developed countries try to attract multinational corporations to benefit from the multiplier effect.
The multiplier effect refers to an initial investment in a country having a ripple effect, creating new avenues in which products are produced and traded worldwide.
This has led companies to adopt methods like:
Post-Fordist methods of production: Flexible production systems.
Just-in-time delivery: Inventory management strategy.
Agglomeration: Clustering of similar businesses in the same area.
Growth poles: Centers of economic activity.
All these strategies help increase profit margins and boost global trade.
🤝 Neoliberal Policies and Trade
Neoliberal policies aim to promote free trade agreements worldwide. Examples include:
NAFTA
World Trade Organization (WTO)
International Monetary Fund (IMF)
These organizations facilitate world trade and a globalized economy. However, some countries resist globalization through isolationist policies, such as imposing tariffs (taxes on imports) to encourage companies to relocate domestically.
Countries that engage in trade generally experience greater production of goods and services. Trade often occurs between countries with complementary needs or when a country has a comparative advantage in producing a specific good or service. Specializing in the production of such items leads to increased efficiency and allows countries to trade for other products, ultimately improving citizens' access to goods and services while reducing opportunity costs.
📊 Measuring Economic Development
There are several gross indicators to measure a formal economy:
GDP (Gross Domestic Product): Measures the overall health of the economy.
GNP (Gross National Product): Focuses on the production of all a country's citizens.
GNI (Gross National Income): Assesses the standard of living.
These indicators help understand the formal economy of a country. Additionally, the Gender Inequality Index and the Human Development Index provide insights into social issues, such as gender inequality, expected years of schooling, life expectancy, and standard of living.
👩💼 Women in the Economy
Women are disproportionately represented in:
Subsistence agriculture
The informal economy
They are more likely to:
Receive low wages
Have less legal protection
Experience discrimination and sexual assault
However, programs in developed countries, like microloans (loans from individuals within a society), aim to reduce this gap.
⚙ Theories and Models of Economic Growth
Rostow's Stages of Economic Growth
Wallerstein's World System Theory
This theory describes an economic imbalance in the world:
Core countries exploit less developed periphery and semi-periphery countries.
Periphery and semi-periphery countries produce goods and services for core countries, leading to dependency theory.
Dependency theory states that core countries disproportionately benefit from this trade, as periphery countries' economies become based around exporting goods to core countries instead of using those products for themselves.
This can lead to commodity dependence, where a developing country's economy relies on one commodity. If the price of that commodity falls, it can devastate the economy. Core countries, however, can find alternative developing countries to produce their products. This model illustrates the difficulty for developing countries to reach the same economic level as core countries.