Mr. Walsh- Geography

What is geography? 1. The spatial perspective: how human activities are organized in space and how they relate to the natural environment. 2. The five themes of geography: a. Location b. Place c. Region d. Movement e. Human-environment interaction.

Maps—a 2-dimensional graphical representation of the surface of the earth.

1. Ways that maps manipulate and distort information. Choice of projection

Mercator

Robinson

Peters Projection

2. Ways that maps manipulate and distort information. Choice of simplification

Simplified maps

Simplified maps 2

3. Ways that maps manipulate and distort information. Choice of Scale

Scale The ratio of map distance to earth distance measured in the same units.

Representative Fraction The map distance to ground distance ratio is written as a simple fraction. (e.g. 1/50000) In this example it simply means that one unit ( centimeters, inches, etc) on the map represents of the same units on the ground

Verbal Scale Words instead of numbers are used to express the scale. The verbal scale can be thought of as a “translation” of the representative fraction into words. For example, the scale of 1: cm can be expressed as “one cm to 1km”

Graphic scale This normally appears as a line or bar divided into conveniently numbered segments. You can think of this as a picture of the words in the verbal scale.

Graphic scale 1

Graphic scale 2

Map Scales Large scale means a more detailed map The smaller the right hand number the larger the scale of the map 1:75000 is a more detailed map then 1: which is a small scale map

Which is the larger scale?

Aggregation The level of detail for dividing a thematic map into geographic units, ranging from a coarse division(e.g. countries ) to a fine division (e.g. Zip codes)

Aggregation

Oceania Pop Density

Australia Pop Density

Reference maps General- Purpose maps with a variety of common features like cities, boundaries, mountains, or roads are known as reference maps

Thematic maps A map that demonstrates a particular feature or a single variable. Four types of thematic map are Dot maps Choropleth maps Proportional symbol maps Isoline maps

Dot Maps – A thematic map in which a dot is used to represent some frequency of the mapped variable. A simple dot map of commercial wireless antennas in the USA.

U.K. Conservation sites

Choropleth Maps A thematic map in which ranked classes of some variable are depicted with shading patterns or colors for predefined zones

Proportional symbol maps A thematic map in which the size of the symbol varies in proportion to the frequency or intensity of the mapped variable

Circle Map of Total 1991 Population in Leicestershire Same Map, Intensity Shaded by Same Variable

Isoline maps A Thematic map with lines that connect points of equal value

Spatial data is data that has a geographical component Primary data Information collected directly by the researchers or their equipment without any intermediary. E.g. observations, interviews etc.. Secondary data Information obtained from another source that was previously collected, processed and made available to a larger audience

Mr. Walsh’s Geography Jokes Q:Why didn't the map grids go to the punk disco? A:Because they were all squares. Q:Which has the higher IQ, latitude or longitude? A:Longitude; it's got 360 degrees!