Unit 1 vocab Flashcards
Spatial
Pertaining to space on the Earth’s surface; sometimes used as a synonym for geographic.
Thematic Maps
Maps that tell stories, typically showing the degree of some attribute or the movement of a geographic phenomenon.
Absolute Location
The position or place of a certain item on the surface of the Earth as expressed in degrees, minutes, and seconds of latitude and longitude. (ex: London = 51.5072° N, 0.1276° W or Washington D.C. = 47.7511° N, 120.7401° W)
Relative Location
The regional position or situation of a place relative to the position of other places. Distance, accessibility, and connectivity affect relative location. (ex: take a right at the school, a five minute walk from the pet store)
Boundary
Vertical plane between states that cuts through the rocks below, and the airspace above the surface.
Diffusion
The spatial spreading or dissemination of a culture element (like a technological innovation) or some other phenomenon (like a disease outbreak).
Contagious Diffusion
The distance-controlled spreading of an idea, innovation, or some other item through a local population by contact from person to person.
Expansion Diffusion
The spread of an innovation or and idea through a population in an area in such a way that the number of those influences grows continuously larger, resulting in an expanding area of dissemination.
Hierarchal Diffusion
The spread of an idea from a person/place of power/ authority to other people/ places.
Relocation Diffusion
The spread of culture traits through the movement of people.
Stimulus Diffusion
The process by which a cultural trait or idea spreads to another culture or region but is modified to adapt to the new culture.
Time-space compression
The social and psychological effects of living in a world in which time-space convergence has rapidly reached a high level of intensity.
Distance Decay
The effects of distance on interaction, generally the greater the distance the less interaction.
Sustainability
The use of Earth’s land and natural resources in ways the ensures they will continue to be available in the future.
Environmental determinism
The view that the natural environment has a controlling influence over various aspects of human life, including cultural development. Also referred to as environmentalism.
Possibilism
Geographic viewpoint that holds that human decision making, not the environment, is the crucial factor in cultural development. Nonetheless, possibilists view the environment as providing a set of broad constraints that limits the possibilities of human choice.
Friction of distance
The increase in time and cost that usually comes with increasing distance.
Scale
Representation of a real-world phenomenon at a certain level of reduction or generalization. Could be the ratio of map distance to ground distance; indicated on a map as a bar graph, representative fraction, and/or verbal statement.
Reference Maps
Maps that show the absolute location of places and geographic features determined by a frame of reference, typically latitude and longitude.
Perceptual/Vernacular Region
A region that only exists as a conceptualization or an idea and not as a physically demarcated entity. For example, “the South” and “the Mid-Atlantic” are perceptual regions in the US.
Formal Region
A type of region marked by a certain degree of homogeneity in one or more phenomena; also called uniform region or homogeneous.
Functional Region
A region defined by the particular set of activities or interactions that occur within it.
