Unit 1(intro)

• absolute location

  • the precise location of any object or place on the earth's surface as determined by a standard grid or coordinate system.
  • the most common system used to determine absolute location is latitude and longitude.
• absolute distance


  an exact measure of the separation between two points using a standard measure, such as inches, meters, or miles.
• accessibility


  relative ease with which you, goods, and/or ideas can reach a destination. determined by a place's connectivity; the more means there are for interacting with a place, the higher its accessibility.
• aerial photography


  taking of photographs of the ground from an elevated position off earth's surface.(kind of like taking a picture from a plane of the ground.
• built environment


  the man-made surroundings that provide the setting for human activity.
• administrative region

  • politically determined, boundaries are exact.
  • are hierarchical or nested; for example, in the United States(an administrative region), States exists within the country, countries exist within states, and census tracts exist within countries.
• cartography


  the art and science of making maps. the goal of cartographers is to develop maps that accurately convey spatial information.
• aggregation

  • refers to the size oof the unit under investigation such as cities, counties, states, or countries.
  • like simplification, completely depends on the purpose of the map.
  • level also depends on the data geographers have access to.
  • if a geographer investigates population density with data at the state level, his or her map will dramatically differ from a geographer that has density data at the county level.
• azimuthal projections(planar projections)


  planar projections, meaning they are formed when a flat piece of paper is placed on top of the globe and a light source projects surrounding areas onto the map.

  • typically, the North Pole or the South Pole is oriented at the center of the map, giving an impression of looking up or down at the earth.
• Barriers to diffusion


  Something that inhibits a phenomenon from spreading across space
• Types of barriers to diffusion

  • Physical barriers
  • Sociocultural factors
  • Psychological barriers
• Physical barriers


  • Objects in the environment that prohibit interaction from taking place, including features like mountain ranges, highways (when interaction occurs on foot), rivers, and so on
• Sociocultural factors


  • Prohibit diffusion when a person's beliefs, culture, or place in society prohibit interaction with certain people or places
• Psychological barriers


  • Generally fear or ignorance that keep individuals from interactions with certain people or places and thereby prohibit the spread of a particular phenomenon
• cartograms


  transform space so that the political unit, such as a state or country with the greatest value for some type of data is represented by the largest relative area and all other polygons are represented proportionately to that largest polygon.

  • can be powerful for illustrating comparative patterns. For example, a cartogram of electoral votes in the United States by area(Wyoming, Montana, and the Dakotas) very small, whereas some smaller states with more electoral votes would expand showing a more accurate picture of each state's influence on the political process.
• cartographic scale


  (map scale) refers to the ratio between distance on a map and the actual distance on the earth's surface.

  • ratio remains constant despite units; for example, a map scale 1:200 means that 1 unit on the map(feet, inches, miles, etc) is equivalent to 200 of that same unit in reality.
  • on small scale maps, ratio between map and units and ground units is large, meaning map represents a relatively small piece of the earth's surface.
  • on large scale maps, ratio between map units and ground units is large, meaning map represents a relatively small piece of the earth's surface.
• choropleth maps


  use colors or tonal shadings to represent categories of data for given geographic areas; countries, states, or counties most commonly use polygons

  • a map of population density by country in the Unites States might use five shades of green to classify density values.

  
• cognitive maps


  a dynamic internal representation of a place or environment

  • the sketch map is the external representation of the spatial information that exists in a person's head.
  • each cognitive map is highly individual, dependent on information an individuals deems important, and is limited by amount and type of experience an individual has with a place.
• vernacular regions


  an area that people believe exist as part of their cultural identity.

  • how people informally organize places in their mind.
  • for example, in the United States, most people would draw similar boundaries around the "Deep South"
• concentration


  when spatial distributions of objects or features appear in close proximity to one another, they are said to be concentrated(cluster).(the extent of a feature's spread over space)
• conformal projection


  the shapes of small areas are preserved.

  • compass direction is preserved making the useful for navigation purposes.
• connectivity 


  measure of all the means of connection and communication between places.

  • virtually synonymous with relative distance as some places are highly connected to one another yet separately by significant distances.
• cultural ecology


  the study of human adaptions to social and physical environments.
• cultural landscape


  a historically significant property that shows evidence of human interactions with the physical environment.
• diffusion


  the spread of ideas, objects, innovations, inventions, and other practices from place to place
• contagious diffusion


  resulting from direct contact with an individual. all infections, diseases, such as COVID19.
• hierarchical diffusion


  idea spread by passing first among the most connected individuals, then spreading to other individuals(chain)
• relocation diffusion


  occurs when people move from their original location to another and bring their innovation with them.
• stimulus diffusion


  an idea diffuses from its cultural hearth outward, but the original idea is changed by the new adopters.
• expansion diffusion


  when innovations spread to new places while staying strong in their original locations.
• density


  is the amount if particular feature within a given area. it is not the same thing as dense, which implies a cluster.population density is the number of people within a given area.
• distance 


  the amount of space between two thing, regions, or land mass.
• distance-decay


  the effect of distance on cultural or spatial interactions. the interaction between two locales decline as the distance between them increases.
• distortion


  a result of projecting a three-dimensional surface on a two-dimensional surface.
• distribution


  the arrangement of features in a space.
• elevation


  distance above sea level.
• environmental determinism


  a philosophy of geography that stated that human behaviors are a direct result of the surrounding environment.
• equator


  a line that runs through the middle of the earth horizontally.
• field observation


  physically visiting an area of interest and directly observing and recording data on population density.
• fieldwork


  the process of observing and collecting data about people, cultures, and natural environments.