Unit 1 Terms Flashcards
Built Landscape
definition: an area of land represented by its features and patterns of human occupation and use of natural resources.
example: city
Breaking Point
The outer edge of a city’s sphere of influence, used in the law of retail gravitation to describe the area of a city’s hinterlands that depend on that city for its retail supplies.
Sequent Occupance
definition: the notion that successive societies leave their cultural imprints on a place, each contributions to the cumulative cultural landscape
example: Chinatown
Cultural Landscape
definition: a geographic area that includes cultural resources and natural resources associated with the interactions between nature and human behavior
example: California State Parks
Arithmetic Density
definition: the total number of people divided by the total land area
Physiological Density
definition: the number of people per unit area of arable land
example: Singapore 6,483
Diffusion
Diffusion is the spread of an idea or characteristic over time. When people move, or relocate, they spread ideas along with them. Therefore this is called relocation diffusion.
Connectivity
The relationships among people and objects across the barrier of space. Geographers are concerned with the various means by which connections occur.
Scattered
If objects are relatively far apart.
Distribution
definition: arrangement of features in space
example: patterns, density, concentration
Environmental Determinism
definition: view that natural environment has an influence over aspects of human life
example: climate
Absolute Location
definition: the position of a place on a certain item on Earth
example: 40 N, 90 W
Relative Location
definition: the regional place relative to other places
example: the McDonald’s near Walmart
Site
definition: the physical character of a place
example: dirty streets
Toponym
definition: place name
example: Walmart
Natural Landscape
the physical environment of a region that is largely untouched by human intervention or development. It includes elements such as landforms, climate, vegetation, and wildlife.
Cartographer
The science of making maps
Land Use
the way in which land is used within a given area
Sustainability
the use of natural resources in a way that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Formal Region (Uniform)
an area within which everyone shares distinctive characteristics
Functional Region (Nodal)
defined by a social or economic function that occurs between a node or focal point and the surrounding areas. For example the circulation area of the New York Times is a functional region and New York is the node.
Vernacular or Perceptual Region
An area that people believe exists as part of their cultural identity due to shared cultural traits
Scale
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.
Distance Decay
as the distance between two places increases, the interaction between those two places decreases.
Friction of Distance
based on the notion that distance usually requires some amount of effort, money, and/or energy to overcome.
Time-Space Compression
he metaphorical shrinking of our world due to developments in technology, communications, transport, and capitalist processes
Distortion
the alteration of the original shape (or other characteristic) of an object, image, sound, waveform or other form of information or representation
Geographic Information System (GIS)
a computer system for capturing, storing, checking, and displaying data related to positions on Earth’s surface
Global Positioning System (GPS)
commonly used to determine an individual’s exact location on Earth.
Map Scale
the relationship between distance on a map and the corresponding distance on the ground.
Thematic Map
maps that tell a story about a place., displays one or more variables such as population or income level
Statistical Map
geographic entities defined by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget for collecting, tabulating, and publishing federal statistics.
Cartogram
maps in which the geometry or size of a region is distorted in order to convey some variable
Dot Map
Thematic maps that use points to show the precise locations of specific observations or occurrences, such as crimes, car accidents, or births.
Choropleth Map
Maps with areas shaded or patterned in proportion to the measurement of the statistical variable
Isoline Map
Maps that show lines that join points of equal value
Mental Map (Cognitive)
An image of a portion of Earth’s surface that an individual creates in his or her mind. Cognitive maps can include knowledge of actual locations and relationships among locations as well as personal perceptions and preferences of particular places.
Model
various theories and frameworks used to express physical space.
Remote sensing
the process of taking pictures of the Earth’s surface from satellites (or, earlier, airplanes) to provide a greater understanding of the Earth’s geography over large distances.
Gravity Model
A mathematical formula that describes the level of interaction between two places, based on the size of their populations and their distance from each other.
