Jackie Payne

AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
I.

Why is geography a science?

A. Geography is the study of where things are found on Earths surface and the
reasons for the locations.
1. Geographers vs. Historians
a. Geographers
i. Identify the locations of important places and explain why
human activities are located beside one another
ii. Ask where and why
iii. Organize material spastically
iv. Recognize that an action at one point on Earth can result
from actions at another point, which can consequently
affect conditions elsewhere
b. Historians
i. Identify the dates of important events and explain why
human activities follow one another chronologically
ii. Ask when and why
iii. Organize material chronologically
iv. Recognize that an action at one point in time can result
from past actions that can in turn affect future ones
B. Introducing Geography
1. Main features of human behavior
a. Place
i. A specific point on Earth, distinguished by a particular
characteristic. Every place occupies a unique location, or
position on Earths surface.
b. Region
i. An area of earth defined by one or more distinctive
characteristics. Geographers divide the world into a number
of regions, such as north America and Latin America.
c. Scale
i. The relationship between the portion of Earth being studied
and Earth as a whole. Geographers study a variety of
scales, from local to global. Many processes that affect
humanitys occupation of Earth are global in scale, such as
climate change and depletion of energy supplies. At the
same time, local-scale processessuch as preservation of
distinctive cultural and economic activitiesare
increasingly important.
d. Space
i. The physical gap or interval between two objects.
Geographers observe that many objects are distributed
across space in a regular manner, for discernible reasons.
e. Connection

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
i. Relationships among people and objects across the barrier
of space. Geographers are concerned with the various
means by which connections occur.
C. Cartography: The Science of Mapmaking
1. Maps: two dimensional or flat-scale model of Earths surface
a. Used as a reference tool
i. Find the shortest rout between two points
ii. Learn where something is located
b. Communications tool
i. Depicting the distribution of human activities or physical
features
2. Geography in the ancient world
a. Earliest surviving map of atalhyk dating back to 6200 BC
b. Centers of early geographic thought: China and Eastern
Mediterranean
3. Geographys Revival
a. In Europe, maps became less mathematical and more fanciful
b. Outside Europe...
i. Muhammad al-Idris prepared a world map and geography
text
ii. Abu Adbullah Muhammad Ibn-Battuta wrote Rihla based
on 3 decades of journeys covering more than 120,000
kilometers through northern Africa, southern Europe, and
much of asia.
c. Maps as reference tools revived during the Age of Exploration
and Discovery.
i. Explorers needed maps to sail and cartographers used the
information collected by explorers to create accurate maps
D. Contemporary Geographic Tools
1. GPS: global positioning system
a. GPS in US has 3 elements
i. Satellites placed in predetermined orbits by the US military
ii. Tracking stations to monitor and control the satellites
iii. A receiver that can locate at least 4 satellites, figure out the
distance to each, and use this information to pinpoint its
own location.
b. GPS is mainly used for navigation
i. Pilots of ships and aircraft use it to stay on course.
ii. GPS detects a vehicles current position & is used to get
from one place to another using the fastest route
iii. Also used to detect location in case of emergency or a
customer to monitor the progress of a delivery truck or bus
or train (or UBER).
c. Geotagging: locations of all the information we gather and photos
we take.

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
i. Identification and storage of a piece of information by its
precise latitude and longitude coordinates. (lowkey
invasion of privacy)
2. Analyzing Data: GI-Science
a. Geographic information science (GIScience): analysis of data
about Earth acquired through satellite and other electronic
information technologies
i. Helps geographers create more accurate and complex maps
and measure changes over time in the characteristics of
places.
ii. Enables geographers to calculate whether relationships
between objects on a map are significant or merely
coincidental
b. Geographic information system (GISystem): captures, stores,
quieries and displays the geographic data
i. Produces more accurate and attractive maps (compared to
hand drawn)
ii. Map is created by retrieving a number of stored objects and
combining them to form an image
c. Remote sensing: the acquisition of data about Earths surface from
a satellite orbiting Earth or from other long-distance methods
i. Remote sensing satellites scan Earths surgace and transmit
images in digital form to receiving station of Eaths surface
ii. Satellite sensor records the image of a tiny area called a
picture element or pixel
iii. Scanners detect the radiation being reflected from that tiny
area
iv. A map is created by remote sensing is essentially a grid
containing many rows of pixels
v. Geographers use remote sensing to map the changing
distribution of wide variety of features
1) Agriculture, drought, and sprawl
3. Collecting and Sharing Data: VGI
a. Volunteered geographic information (VGI): the creation and
dissemination of geographic data contributed voluntarily and for
free by individuals
i. Citizen science: scientific research by amateur scientists
ii. Participatory GIS (PGIS): community based mapping
1) Both collet and disseminate local knowledge and
information through electronic devices
iii. Mashup: a map that overlays data fro one source on top of a
map provided by a mapping service
1) Ex. Google maps or google earth
E. Interpreting Maps

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
1. Map scale: relationship of a features size on a map to its actual size on
Earth
a. How much of Earths surface to depict on the map?
i. Level of detail of a map depends on map scale
ii. Smaller = more detail
b. map scale is presented in 3 ways
i. ratio: shows the numerical ration between distances on the
map and on Earths surface
1) 1:1000 (in:ft) every 1 inch on map = 1000 feet on
earth
ii. written: describes the relationship between map and Earth
distances in words
1) 1 centimeter equals 10 kilometers
iii. graphic: consists of a bar line marked to show distance on
Earths surface
2. Projection: the scientific method of transferring locations of Earths
surface to a flat map
a. Globes, while accurate to Earths shape, are not effective for small
details and difficult to write on, photocopy, display on a computer
screen, or carry around.
b. Most maps are flat
i. Drawing maps on a 2 dimensional scale produces distortion
ii. 4 types of distortion can occur
1) shape
2) distance
3) relative size
4) direction
F. The geographic map
1. Latitude and Longitude: used together to identify locations
a. Latitude is based of the Earths shape and its rotation around the
Sun. Longitude is a human creation
i. 0 longitude runs through Greenwich because England was
the most powerful country when it was invented
b. Meridian: an arc drawn between the North and South poles
c. Longitude: the location of each meridian is identified on earths
surface
d. Parallel: a circle drawn around the globe parallel to the equator and
at right angles to the meridians
e. Latitude: the numbering system to indicate the location of a
parallel
f. Prime meridian: 0 longitude
g. Equator: 0 latitude
2. Telling Time
a. Greenwich Mean Time (GMT): the time at the prime meridian
(master reference time for all point on Earth)

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
b. Each 15 band of longitude is assigned a time zone
c. International Date Line: follows 180 longitude, the clock moves
back 24 hours

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
II.

Why Is Each Point On Earth Unique?

A. Place: A Unique Location
1. Geographers describe a features place on Earth by identifying its location
a. The position that something occupies on Earths surface
2. 3 ways of doing this
a. Place name, site and situation
3. Place name
a. Topnoym: the name given to a place on Earth
i. A place can be named for a person (founder? famous?)
ii. Can be associated with religion
b. Place name can indicate the origin of its settlers
i. British origins in North America and Australia
ii. Portuguese origins in Brazil
iii. Spanish origins in Latin America
iv. Dutch origins in South Africa
c. Place names derived from physical environment like
i. Trees, valleys, bodies of water, etc.
d. The Board of Geographical Names
i. Established in the late nineteenth century to be the final
arbiter of names on US map
4. Site
a. Site: the physical character of a place
i. Climate
ii. Water sources
iii. Typography
iv. Soil
v. Vegetation
vi. Latitude
vii. Elevation
b. Site factors are essential for selecting location
i. Easy defense/strategy
ii. Convenient river crossings
iii. Communication
c. Humans can alter the characteristics of sites
i. Make them bigger or smaller
ii. Expansions
5. Situation
a. Situation: the location of a place relative to other places
i. Finding an unfamiliar place
1) Comparing locations to familiar ones
2) Identification of important buildings, streets,
landmarks
ii. Understanding the importance of a place
1) Accessibility
2) Other uses

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
B. Region: A Unique Area
1. Concept on 2 scales
i. Several neighboring countries that share important features
ii. Many localities within a country
b. Cultural Landscape: a combination of cultural features such as
language and religion, economic features such as agriculture and
industry, and physical features such as climate and vegetation
c. A region gains uniqueness from possessing not a single human or
environmental characteristic but a combination of them
2. Formal Region
a. Aka Uniform Region: an area within which everyone shares in
common or one more distinctive characteristics
i. Common language
ii. Economic activity
iii. Environmental property
b. A characteristic may be predominant rather than universal
c. The need to recognize the diversity of cultural, economic and
environmental factors
i. Problems may arise because a minority of people in a
region speak a language, practice a religion or possess
resources different from those of the majority
3. Functional Region
a. Aka a nodal region: is an area organized around a node of focal
point
i. Characteristics chosen to define a functional region
dominates at a central focus or node and diminishes in
importance outward
ii. Tied at a central point by transportation or communications
systems or by economic or functional associations
b. Display information about economical areas
4. Vernacular Region
a. Aka perceptual region: an area that people believe exists as a part
of their cultural identity
i. Emerge from peoples informal sense of place
C. Culture Regions
1. Culture: the body of customary beliefs, material traits, and social forms
that together constitute the distinct tradition of a group of people
2. Culture: What People Care About
a. Why the customary idea, beliefs and values of a people produce a
distinctive culture in a particular place
i. Derive from
ii. a groups language
1) system of signs, sounds, gestures, and marks that
have meanings understood within a cultural group
iii. religion

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
1) the principal system of attitudes, beliefs, and
practice through which people worship in a formal,
organized way
iv. ethnicity
1) encompasses a groups language, religion, and other
cultural values as well as its physical traits
3. Culture: What People Take Care Of
a. Production of material wealth
i. Food
ii. Clothing
iii. Shelter
b. Possession of wealth and material goods is higher in developed
countries than in developing countries
i. People in developing countries engage in agriculture
ii. Developed countries earn their living through performing
services in exchange for wages
4. Spatial Association: the distribution of one feature is related to the
distribution of another feature
a. Income
b. Life expectancy at birth
c. Crime
d. Liquor stores
e. Etc.

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
III.

Why are different places similar?

A. Scale: Global and Local
1. Globalization: a force or process that involves the entire world and results
in making something worldwide in scope
a. The world is shrinking in the ability of a person, an object, or an
idea to interact with a person, an object, or an idea in another place
2. Economic Globalization and Local Diversity
a. Most economic activities undertaken in one region are influenced
by interaction with decision makers located elsewhere
b. Transmittal corporation: a corporation that conducts research,
operates factories and sells products in many countries, not just
where its headquarters and principal shareholders are located
i. Remain competitive by correctly identifying the optimal
location for each of these activities
ii. Decide where to produce things in repose to characteristics
of the local labor force
1) Skill
2) Prevailing wage rates
3) Attitudes towards unions
c. Each place plays a role based on its local assets
3. Cultural Globalization and Local Diversity
a. Uniform cultural landscape
i. Fast food restaurants
ii. Service stations
iii. Retail chains
iv. Globalization of cultural beliefs and forms, especially
religion and language
b. Local cultures distinctive beliefs, forms, and traits are threatened
4. Space Distribution of Features
a. Distribution Properties: Density
i. Distribution: the arrangement of a feature in space
ii. Density: the frequency with which something occurs in
space
1) People
2) Houses
3) Cars
4) Trees, etc.
b. Distribution Properties: Concentration
i. Concentration: the extent of a features spread over space
1) Clustered: close together
2) Dispersed: far apart
3) Describes changes in distribution
c. Distribution properties: Pattern
i. Pattern: the geometric arrangement of objects in space

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
1) Some features are organized in a geometric pattern
2) Others are distributed irregularly
5. Space: Cultural Identity
a. Cultural identity and distribution across space
i. Ethnicity
ii. Sexual orientation
iii. Gender
6. Space: Inequality
a. Cultural identity and contemporary geographic thought
i. Poststructuralist geography: examines how the powerful in
a society dominate
1) Understand space as the product of ideologies
ii. Humanistic geography: a branch of human geography that
emphasizes the different ways that individuals form ideas
about place and give those places symbolic meanings
iii. Behavioral geography: emphasizes the importance of
understanding the psychological basis for individual human
actions in space
b. Unequal Access
i. Electronic communications was seen as bad because the
ease of communications between distant places removed
barriers to interaction
ii. Unequal access to interaction I part because the quality of
electronics service varies among places
iii. Global culture and economy are increasingly centered on
the three core, or hearth, regions
1) Have the highest percentage of the worlds
advanced technology
2) North America
3) Europe
4) Japan
iv. Uneven development: the increasing gap in economic
conditions between regions in the core and periphery that
results from the globalization of the economy
7. Connections: Diffusion
a. Assimilation: the process by which a groups cultural features are
altered to resemble those of another group
b. Acculturation: the process of changes in culture that result from the
meeting of two groups
c. Syncretism: the combination of elements of two groups into a new
cultural feature
d. Diffusion: the process by which a feature spreads across space
from one place to another over time
i. Hearth: a place from which an innovation originates

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
1) A hearth emerges when a cultural group is willing
to try something new and is able to allocate
resources to nurturing the innovation
a) Must have technical ability to achieve the
desired idea and the economic structures to
implement the innovation
e. Relocation diffusion: the spread of an idea through physical
movement or people from one place to another
f. Expansion diffusion: The spread of a feature from one place to
another in an additive process
i. Hierarchical diffusion: the spread of an idea from persons
or nodes of authority or power to other persons or places
ii. Contagious diffusion: the rapid, wide spread diffusion of a
characteristic throughout the population
iii. Stimulus diffusion: the spread of an underlying principle
even though a characteristic itself apparently fails to diffuse
8. Connections: Spatial interaction
a. Network: a chain of communications that connects place
b. Distance decay: the farther away someone is from another, the less
likely the two are to interact. Contact diminishes with increasing
distance and eventually disappears
c. Space-time compression: the reduction in the time it takes from
something reach another place

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
IV.

Why are some actions not sustainable?

A. Geography, Sustainability, and Resources
1. Intro
a. Resource: a substance in the environment that is useful to people,
economically and technologically feasible to access and socially
acceptable to use
i. Renewable resource: produced in nature more rapidly than
it is consumed by humans
ii. Nonrenewable resource: produced in nature more slowly
than it is consumed by humans
b. Sustainability: the use of Earths resources in ways that ensure
their availability in the future
i. Humans deplete non renewable resources (coal, natural gas,
petroleum)
ii. Humans destroy otherwise renewable resources through
pollution of air, water, and soil
2. Three Pillars of Sustainability
a. Intro
i. Sustainability requires curtailing the use of nonrenewable
resources and limiting the use of renewable resource to the
level at which the environment can continue to supply them
indefinitely
ii. Sustainability can be achieved only by brining people
together environmental protection, economic growth and
social equity
b. Environment Pillar
i. Conservation: the sustainable use and management of
Earths natural resources to meet human needs such as
food, medicine, and recreation
1) Renewable resources such as trees and wildlife are
conserved if they are consumed at a less rapid rate
than they can be replaced
2) Nonrenewable resources such as petroleum and coal
are conserved if we use less today in order to
maintain more for future generations
ii. Preservation: the maintenance of resources in their present
condition with as little human impact as possible
1) The value of nature does not derive from human
needs and interests but from the fact that every plant
and animal living on Earth has a right to exist and
should be preserved
c. Social Pillar
i. Humans need shelter, food and clothing to survive thus
resources are used to meet these needs

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
1) Homes can be built of grass, wood, mud, stone or
brick
2) Food can be consumed by harvesting grains, fruit,
and vegetables or eating fish, cattle and pigs.
3) Clothing can be made from harvesting cotton,
removing skins from animals, or turning petroleum
into polyester
ii. Consumer choices can support sustainability when people
embrace it as a value
iii. Societys values are the basis for choosing which resources
to use
d. The Economy Pillar
i. Natural resources acquire a monetary value through
exchange in a market place
1) Supply and demand are factors that determine
affordability
a) Large supply = low price
b) Low supply = high price
ii. Price of a resource depends on a societys technological
ability to obtain it and to adapt it to that societys purposes
3. Sustainabilitys Critics
a. World has passed sustainable level around 1980
b. Biologically productive land: the amount of land required to
produce the resources currently consumed and handle the wastes
currently generated
c. Humans are using 13 billion hectares of earths land area
i. 3 billion for cropland
ii. 2 billion for forest
iii. 7 billion for energy
B. Sustainability and Earths Physical systems
1. Intro
a. Biotic: a system composed of living organisms
b. Abiotic: a system composed of nonliving or inorganic matter
c. Atmosphere: a thin layer of gases surrounding earth
d. Hydrosphere: all of the water on and near the Earths surface
e. Lithosphere: earths crust and a portion of upper mantle directly
below the crust
f. Biosphere: all living organisms on earth, including plants and
animals, as well as microorganisms
2. Atmosphere
a. A thin layer of gases surrpounds Earth at an altitude up to 480
kilometers
i. Pure dry air in the lower atmosphere contains 78%
nitrogen, 21% oxygen, 0.9% argon, 0.036% carbon
dioxide, 0.064% other gases

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
b. As atmospheric gases are held to earth by gravity, pressure is
created
c. Climate: the long term average weather condition at a particular
location (created Koppn_
i. A. Humid low latitude climates
ii. B. Dry climates
iii. C. Warm mid latitude climates
iv. D. Cold mid latitude climates
v. E Polar climates
3. Hydrosphere
a. Water exists in liquid form in oceans, lakes and rivers as well as
groundwater in soil and rock and as water vapor in the atmosphere
and as ice in glaciers
b. Over 97% of the worlds water is in the oceans
c. Ocean supply the atmosphere with water vapor which returns to
earths surface as precipitation/fresh water
i. Water is essential for survival of plants and animals
ii. Water gains and loses hear relatively slowly so it also
moderates seasonal temperature extremes over much of the
earths surface
d. Climate influences human activities
4. Lithosphere
a. Earth is composed of concentric spheres
i. Core is a dense, metallic sphere about 3,500 kilometers in
radius
ii. The mantle is about 2,900 kilometers thick
iii. The crust, a thin brittle outer shell, is 8 to 40 kilometers
thick
iv. The lithosphere encompasses the crust, a portion of the
mantle extending down about 70 kilometers
b. Earths landforms distribute people
i. Flat land is suited for agriculture
C. Geography, sustainability, and ecology
1. Ecology and the biosphere
a. The biosphere encompasses all of earths living organisms
i. Living organisms cannot exist except though interaction
with the surrounding physical environment the biosphere
also includes portions of the three abiotic systems
ii. Most of the living organisms interact within the top 3
meters of the lithosphere, the top 200 meters of the
hydrosphere, and the lowest 30 meters of the atmosphere
b. Lithosphere
i. Where most plants and animals live and where they obtain
food and shelter
c. Hydrosphere

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
i. Provides water to drink and physical support for aquatic
life
d. Atmosphere
i. Proves the air for animals to breathe and protects them
from the suns rays
e. Ecosystem: a group of living organisms and the abiotic spheres
with which they interact with
f. Ecology: the scientific study of ecosystems
i. Study interrelationships between living organisms and the
three abiotic environments as well as interrelationships
among the various living organisms in the biosphere
ii. If the atmosphere contains pollutants, or its oxygen level is
reduced, humans have trouble breathing
iii. Without water in the hydrosphere, humans waste away and
die
iv. A stable lithosphere provides humans with materials for
buildings and fuel for energy
v. The rest of the biosphere provides humans with food
vi. Human actions are sustainable if they preserve and
conserve elements of the four spheres and unstainable if
they cause destruction
g. Erosion
i. Occurs when soil washes away in the rain or blows away in
the wind
h. Depletion of nutrients
i. Soil contains nutrients necessary for successful growth of
plants, including those that are useful to humans
ii. Nutrients are depleted when plants withdraw more nutrients
than natural processes can replace
2. Cultural ecology: integrating culture and ecology
a. Cultural ecology: the relationship between human and environment
i. Environmental determinism: the physical environment
caused social development
ii. Possibilism: the physical environment may limit some
human actions but people have the ability to adjust to their
environment
1) Some human impacts on the environment are based
on deep seated cultural values
2) A peoples level of wealth can influence its attitude
toward modifying the environment
iii. Possibilism and sustainability
1) The physical environment is not always the most
significant factor in human decisions

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016
2) Economic systems, political structures, living
arrangements, religious practices and human
activities can produce distinctive landscapes
D. Sustainable environmental change
1. Sustainable Ecosystem: The Netherlands
a. Polder: a piece of land that is created by draining water from an
area
b. They modified their environment into 2 distinctive
c. Widespread use of pesticides is harmful for the environment
d. Global warming threatening their environment because of rising
sea level
2. Unsustainable Ecosystem: California
a. a long term drought
b. 70% of its water from surface water sources
i. melting snow
c. 30% comes fro groundwater consumption
i. being removed more rapidly than it is being replenished
d. California accounts for 12% of all US agriculture, 21% milk
supplies and 99% of such crops as almonds, artichokes, grapes,
olives, peaches, rice, and walnuts

Jackie Payne
AP Human Geography
Sep 6 2016