Why Is Each Point on Why Is Each Point on Earth UniqueEarth Unique

LocationLocation

• Place Names

• Site

• Situation

• Mathematic Location

Place NamesPlace Names

• Toponym: name given to a place on Earth

• Persons, Religious Significance, Physical

features

• Can be changed: Political Upheavals

SiteSite

• May be referred to as Place theme

• Physical and cultural attributes of the place itself

• Essential in selecting locations for settlements

• Humans can modify

• Factors of Production: Land, Labor and Capital

SituationSituation

• Relative location

• Find an unfamiliar place by comparing to a familiar one

• External relations of a locale

• Helps to understand its importance

• Centrality: function of location

• Economics: Transportation/Movement

Mathematical LocationMathematical Location

• Longitude and Latitude: Meridians and parallels

• Longitude calculates time zones: 360 divided by 24 equals 15

• O degrees is a human creation: international agreement. International date line 180

• Latitudes derived by Earth’s space and rotation around the Sun

Region: Region:

• Cultural features• Economic features• Physical features• CULTURAL LANDSCAPE: VISIBLE

EXPRESSION OF HUMAN ACTIVITY• Sauer: “An area fashioned from nature by a

cultural group”• Sauer and Platt: Each region has its own

distinctive landscape: from combination of social relationships and physical processes

Formal RegionFormal Region

• Uniform or Homogeneous

• Common characteristic

• Characteristic may be Predominant rather than universal

• Significant elements of internal uniformity

and external differences from surrounding territories

• Explain broad global or national patterns

Functional RegionFunctional Region

• Also called nodal region

• Characteristic chosen dominates at a central focus and diminishes as move outward

• Centrality: function of location relative to other places. Relation to networks

• Typically tied by movement: Communication and transportation

Vernacular RegionVernacular Region

• Perceptual Region

• Exists as part of cultural identity

• Mental map: contains personal impressions

Spatial AssociationSpatial Association

• Region expands over widely varying scale

• Way that places and things are laid out, organized and arranged on the surface of the earth

Three spatial themesThree spatial themes

• Integration in place: how and why people or things found in same place influence each other

• Interdependencies between places: Nature and significance of patterns and networks that tie places together

• Interdependencies among scales: how processes operating at different scales influence each other

Human-Environment InteractionHuman-Environment Interaction

• Geographic study of relationships: cultural ecology

• Humboldt and Ritter: use methods of scientific inquiry

• H-R: apply laws from natural sciences to understand relations between physical and human actions

• Physical environment caused social development: environmental determinism

Human-Environment InteractionHuman-Environment Interaction

• Human behavior: individual and collective is strongly affected by the physical environment

• Ratzel, Semple agree. Huntington: climate a major determinant of civilization

• Reactions against determinism: possibilism: physical envir may limit actions but people have the ability toadjust

Human EnvironmentHuman Environment

• Choices on how we modify our environment

• Dependent on: technology, wealth, and socially acceptability

Physical features Physical features

• Necessary to understand distribution of human activities

• Climate: Koppen SystemA: TropicalB. DryC. Warm Mid LatitudeD. Cold Mid LatitudeE. Polar Climates

VegetationVegetation

• Influences the type of agriculture practiced

• Forest: Tropical, Coniferous, DeciduousChaparral

• Grasslands (Savannas, Prairies)

• Desert

SoilSoil

• Thin interface between air and rocks

• Human Geography Destruction of soil that results from natural processes and human action

• Concern with erosion and depletion of nutrients

LandformsLandforms

• Geomorphology: study of landforms

• Explains the distribution of people and the choice of economic activities at different locations.

• Topographic maps show relief and slope of localities