Human Geography: A Comprehensive Guide to the Study of Human Societies and Their Environments
Place
Place refers to any site where societies interact with each other and the physical environment over time.
Region / Geographical Space
A region is an area defined by physical, political, or cultural criteria. It is dynamic and can change over time.
Interaction: Place – Region – Landscape – Population – Human Societies – Culture
Place, region, landscape, population, human societies, and culture are all interconnected and influence each other.
Other Phenomena
Other phenomena that influence human geography include language, religion, development, health, economic and governmental structures, globalization, and other cultural issues.
Population
Population refers to all persons included in a census, comprising either the usual residents or the people present in the country at the time of the census.
Population Density
Population density refers to the number of people per square kilometer. It is calculated by dividing the total population by the square kilometers of a territory.
Population Growth Rate
Population growth rate is the average annual percent change in the population, resulting from a surplus (or deficit) of births over deaths and the balance of migrants entering and leaving a country.
Age Structure
Age structure refers to the distribution of the population according to age. Data are provided by sex and age group (0-14 years, 15-64 years, 65 years and over). The age structure of a population affects a nation’s key socioeconomic issues.
Sex Ratio
Sex ratio refers to the number of males for each female in five age groups (at birth, under 15 years, 15-64 years, 65 years and over, and for the total population).
Life Expectancy (at Birth)
Life expectancy refers to the average number of years to be lived by a group of people born in the same year, if mortality at each age remains constant in the future.
Urbanization
Urbanization refers to the total population of a country living in urban areas.
Birth Rate
Birth rate refers to the average annual number of births during a year per 1,000 persons.
Death Rate
Death rate refers to the average annual number of deaths during a year per 1,000 persons.
Natural Increase
Natural increase refers to the difference between the birth rate and the death rate. This increase does not take into account migrations.
Infant Mortality Rate
Infant mortality rate refers to the number of children under 1 year old that die during a year per 1,000 live births.
Total Fertility Rate
Total fertility rate refers to the average number of children that would be born per woman.
Ecosystem
An ecosystem is a community of living organisms (plants, animals, and microbes) in conjunction with the nonliving components of their environment (things like air, water, and mineral soil), interacting as a system. These biotic and abiotic components are regarded as linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Ecosystems can be of any size but usually encompass specific, limited spaces.
Habitat
A habitat is an area of uniform environmental conditions providing a living place for a specific assemblage of plants and animals. Habitat is used as the synonymous for the academic term biotope, which is less commonly used in English-speaking countries.
Biological Community
A biological community, or wildlife, describes the interacting organisms living together in a habitat (biotope). This term is used as the synonymous for the academic term biocenosis. Biological communities are formed by the faunal community (Zoocenosis), the vegetation or the flora community (Phytocenosis), and the microbial community (Microbiocenosis).
Environmental Degradation
Environmental degradation refers to the deterioration of the environment through depletion of resources such as air, water, and soil, the destruction of ecosystems, and the extinction of wildlife. It is generally defined as any change or undesirable disturbance to the environment.
Ecological Footprint
Ecological Footprint is a standardized measure of human demand on the Earth’s ecosystems that may be contrasted with the planet’s ecological capacity to regenerate. It represents the amount of biologically productive land and sea area necessary to supply the resources a human population consumes, and to assimilate associated waste. By using this measure, it is possible to estimate how much of the Earth (or how many planet Earths) it would take to support humanity if everybody followed a given lifestyle.
Biocapacity
Biocapacity refers to the capability of an area to provide resources and absorb wastes.
Ecological Deficit
Ecological Deficit occurs when the Ecological Footprint of a population exceeds the Biocapacity of the area available to that population because of a high consumption level and waste discharge.
Sustainable Development
Sustainable Development refers to a mode of human development in which resource use aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come.
Biodiversity
Biodiversity refers to the number and variety of ecosystems and natural species. The extinction of species is a natural process related to evolution.
Settlement
Isolated Dwelling or Individual Household
An isolated dwelling or individual household is the smallest kind of settlement with only one or two houses or families living in it.
Village
is much larger in population (up to 2,000 – 5,000 people). It supports a wide range of services, such as a general store, primary school, baker, hardware, or pubs.Large town provides both low and high-order services. High-order services are unique to urban settlements. These include shopping centers, department stores, entertainment venues (cinemas, theatres and night clubs), hospitals, large police stations, financial institutions, furniture shops, car dealerships, educational institutions, etc. As the urban settlement grows, so does the number of facilities, goods and services.
City is large and permanent settlement that is bigger than a town. Most of the cities have a particular administrative, legal or historical status based on local law. In Europe, it is considered that a city is an urban settlement with a cathedral or that has received a royal charter.City: it is a kind of human settlement with some specific features such as the following: high population density, artificial characteristics, multiculturalism, centrality and economic activities mostly linked to industry and the tertiary sector.Urban: it is an adjective that refers to every phenomenon concerned to the city as a particular socio-cultural system with a number of implications.Urban layout: it is also known as “town planning” or “morphology”. It is the shape of the city as a result of its architectural design and its implementation in the physical space. The urban layout is the consequence of how the buildings are constructed and how the open spaces (streets, squares, parks) are organized according to different patterns.Urban structure: it is the division of the city into different parts or sectors taking into account an internal system and a series of functions and land uses. Metropolitan área:urban agglomeration around a large city that is considered a dominant political or industrial nucleus. Thus, there is a clear hierarchy. Conurbation:urban network formed by a number of cities that looks like a continuous with no hierarchical relationship. Thus, there is no dominant nucleus.Historical Center: Roman or Medieval origin, in process of aging or abandon of population, set aside for cultural or touristic functions.City expansion: zone extended in the XIX and XX Centuries (“ensanches”), with a very high land value, concentrates tertiary activities (commercial, administrative and of representation), and nowadays it constitutes the true neuralgic center of the city.Residential periphery: added in the second half of the XX Century, it is formed by groups of compact buildings, with homogeneous characteristics, economical level, and social behavior. They can be working class neighborhood built with little planification during the industrial development of 1960-1970, or new urbanizations of semi[1]detached houses, more modern and with a higher life quality.Boundary: it is a physical barrier (river, hill) or a road, railways, etc. that mark the limits of the spatial growing of the city.Extra radio: outside the boundary, it includes the industrial park, area of substandard housing, and other spontaneous settlements surrounding bypasses. Field of study:economic activities of human societies, their organization according to the location and exploitation of raw materials, how all this is influenced by the environment and determinate people’s life. Also, the way resources are distributed in the space and how the mechanics of production, distribution and consumption are delivered.Hamlet is a small collection of farms and houses lacking the most basic services and facilities. Population is often less than 100 people.Traditional subsistence agriculture: usual in developing countries, in which mechanization has not been introduced yet. The peasant produces only for their subsistence; surpluses for the market are scarce and rudimentarily traded. The plots are smallholdings, for polyculture, and are exploited with traditional techniques such as shifting cultivation. Profitability is scarce and climate have a great influence.
Commercial agriculture: typical in industrialized and urbanized countries, in which there is a large amount of consumer population. It pursues the commercialization of products and greater profitability, putting into practice several strategies: specialization of agricultural spaces, creation of massive farms, application of technological advances, etc. It is also subject to the instability of the markets; therefore, some specialized products (fruits, flowers) have a high cost. In Europe, agriculture is conditioned by the compensatory and protectionist measures of the EU, and in the United States it has a super-technical and speculative character Socialized agriculture: in communist countries the State is the largest owner of the land and plans both farming production and distribution. It was typical in the Soviet Union but still happening in countries such as China, Cuba and Venezuela. Out of Socialism there are samples of collectivized farms too, like the Israeli “kibbutz”.Country: it generally refers to a territory or a geographical space; it is not always considered as a nation.Nation: from a political perspective it is a human community that is settled in a territory delimited by boundaries and it is ruled by certain laws and social institutions. From a cultural perspective it is considered that there are a homogenous number of ethnics, linguistic, historical and cultural features that are shared by a group of people; these features provide a consciousness of identity and unity as a factor of singularity.Nation State: it is a State housing a cultural nation. A political organized area in which nation and state coincide.Buffer State: it refers to a small country laying between two rival or potentially hostile greater powers, which by its existence and neutrality is thought to prevent conflict between them (i.e.: Uruguay, Afghanistan). Colony: it is a territory politically annexed or militarily submitted to a powerful state. The status of the colony is characterized by certain rules of dependence and loss of sovereignty because it is controlled by the powerful country.Unitary or centralized State: in which the central administration retains a great amount of competences of government and the sovereignty is not divided (e.g.: France).State of autonomies: in which the central government has assigned to the regions a part of its competence of government, that are developed in an autonomous way (e.g.: Spain).Federal State: the sovereignty is divided into two levels of government; we can find institutions and laws of common interest but this does not impede the self-government of each territory.Confederal State: the same as in the previous one, but with the possibility that some territories disassociate from the federation by their own request (e.g. American Civil War).Rough border: they are diplomatic conventions traced on paper in relation to certain territories, that are not occupied yet in an effective way completely (e.g.: Antarctica).Borders in formation: are the ones of those States that, despite being a geographical nuclei with their own historical identity, are still defining their limits of territorial expansion and their relationships with other surrounding countries (e.g.: Spain before the marriage of the Catholic Monarchs). Borders in regression: they correspond to political formations in an instable situation, that have been modifying its territorial limits or that they were organized as big empires that have been dismembered (e.g.: the ex-soviet republics that became independent after the end of the Cold War).Historical borders: defined long time ago, they constitute an element of cultural identity and they do not represent any longer a cause of conflict among nations (in general, all of the ones in Western Europe)
A migration is a movement of people that come of a permanent change of residence with a complete change of community ties. It does not include commuting (a daily movement to work), seasonal movements (i.e.: for holidays) or moving house in the same neighbourhood that cannot be considered migrations. Social Geography considers migrations as the result of a personal choice influenced not only by familiars and friends but also by the positive or negative perception of the possible benefits to be obtained in the destination. Zelinsky (1971) related migrations with the stage of the Demographic Transition because developing societies normally emigrate more than the industrial societies.TYPES: Emigration (go away) vs. Immigration (come in). → According to the distance: long or short distance → According to the country: international or internal → According to the setting: rural exodus, from the cities to the countryside, interurban → According to the personal decisions: voluntary or forced (refugees) → According to the causes: economic, political, for studying, for retirement.Ernst Ravenstein suggested a list of ten causes of migration. These causes are related with the great migratory phenomena occurred during the time frame of 1834 to 1913 (from Europe to the USA) but some of them can be still applied nowadays. The majority of migrants move a short distance. 2. Migration happens stage by stage. 3. Every migration flow can generate a return or countermigration. 4. Immigrants who move longer distances tend to choose big-city destinations. 5. Urban residents are often less migratory than inhabitants of rural areas. 6. Women emigrate more than men but men emigrate to more distant places. 7. Most emigrants are young adults. Families are less likely to make international moves. 8. Large towns grow by migration rather than natural increase. 9. Technology (means of transport, trade, industry) makes migration more intense. 10.The most important cause of migration is economic.The geographer Everett Lee explained migrations as a complex event that may be conditioned by two types of factors. On the one hand there are push factors, which are negative things that cause people to move away from the country they live. On the other hand there are pull factors, which are positive things that attract people to move to another area.PUSH: War Bullying Discrimination Landlord/tenant issues Poor housing Pollution Lack of political/religious freedom Death threats Natural disasters Loss of wealth Poor medical care Slavery or forced labor Political fear or persecution Famine or drought Desertification Primitive conditions Few opportunities Not enough jobs Poor chances of marrying. PULL: Industry Better chances of marrying Family links Security Attractive climates Better medical care Education Enjoyment Political/religious freedom Better living conditions Job opportunities