Human Geography Professor Lobb The Where, Who, What, Why and How of the World

What is Geography? – Geography is the science of place and space. Geographers ask where things are located on the surface of the earth, why they are located where they are, how places differ from one another, and how people interact with the environment—AAG – Geography is all about trying to make sense of the world—Peirce Lewis

Two Branches of Geography – Physical: environmental dynamics – Human: social dynamics What is Human Geography? – Study of people, places, spatial variation in human activities, relationship between humans and the environment. – Explaining the WHY of the WHERE

Nature vs Culture? – Nature: the physical environment, everything not human – Nature-Culture Dualism 18 th C European Scholars: man superior to nature Impact on social rankings Cultural Ecology – Humans relationship with the environment

Environmental Determinism: nature determines development of societies (and individuals) – Ancient Greeks—their climate perfect! Climate and location determined ‘success’ or ‘advancement’ – Early 20 th C Geographers—Huntington, Semple The ‘unproductive’ Tropics The ideal mid-latitudes

Criticism of Environmental Determinism – Simplistic – Ethnocentric – Variability in adaptation New forms of Determinism? – Political Ecology & Actor-Network Theory Paul Robbins “Lawn People” Jared Diamond “Collapse,” “Guns, Germs & Steel”

Humans as Modifiers of the Earth: Carl Sauer – The Cultural Landscape – Nature as a social construction: invented concept derived from shared perceptions & understandings – People shape the environment through practices and ideas about what nature is/should be – Dynamic: William Cronon 18 th C perceptions of wilderness vs. 19 th C perceptions (wasteland vs beauty) Possibilism – Human groups respond differently to the conditions & constraints of the natural environment

The ‘success’ and ‘failure’ of human groups: – A confluence of possibilities, social constructions and modifications – Sustainability? Easter Island

Hurricane Katrina, August 29, 2005, New Orleans, LA Flooded neighborhood in New Orleans, 9 days after Hurricane Katrina. August-September, 2005.

Category 4 Hurricane

New Orleans, LA: 2/3 of the population was African-American, but area spared flooding was less than ¼ African-American; % of rebuilding of destroyed homes has been much lower in neighborhoods with larger African-American populations.

Netherlands: Sustainable Ecosystems?

Organizing Space: Regions and Regional Analysis – Formal – Functional – Perceptual (Vernacular)

Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved. Formal Regions: share a unifying characteristic Educational attainment

Formal region: Blue States vs. Red States

Functional Regions: unified around an activity Campus of the Univ. of Texas U.S. television markets

Perceptual or Vernacular Region The South Chickasaw Country, Oklahoma

Culture: what makes place unique – “There’s no such thing as culture”—Don Mitchell – Not fixed, dynamic – Social creation – Complex – Material culture has to be understood in a larger, dynamic context

Reading the Cultural Landscape: – What are the invisible dimensions of power, identity, or class reflected in the cultural landscape?

Defining Place – Site and Situation The site of Istanbul: on a hillside, next to a deep harbor, on both sides of the Bosporus. The situation of Istanbul, it’s relation to other nearby bodies of water, the rest of Turkey, and even its position in relation to neighboring regions.

Does situation change over time?

Can site be altered by humans? Hurricane Sandy, late October 2012

Defining Space – Absolute: an area that can be precisely measured – Relative: space created by human activities, interactions: trade relations, social networking sites – The Geographer’s spatial perspective: attention to variations from one place or space to another in society and environment-society dynamics – Spatial variation, Spatial association

Spatial Variation, Spatial Association and Distribution

Scale in Geographic Study – Map or Cartographic Scale – Observational or Methodological Scale Map Scale: Large vs Small Scale Verbal Scale Graphic Scale Fractional Scale

Observational or Methodological Scale – Small scale: body – Large scale: global – The scale of the body: teeth filing, veiling

At what point might cultural standards of beauty become a form of oppression? Video Explorations: Teeth Chiseling Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

Maps: Representing Location – Collecting data for maps Remote Sensing GPS GIS

Cell phones are equipped with GPS

The Power of Maps - -Maps need to be read critically --Who made the map? To what end? --the ‘problem’ with all maps

Thematic maps – Display a ‘theme’ of information (global rice production)

Chloropleth Proportional Symbol Dot-density