GEOG 3430 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Food Security, Prairie Pothole Region, Ecumene
9 May 2016
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Document Summary
Geography- greek for describing the earth : study of spatial relationships. Physical geography- stuff in the physical world. Human geography- culture, economic geography, political geography: human/environment interaction, to what extent does the physical environment impact human development/activity, 1800s-1930s: geographers embraced the theory of environmental determinism. The idea that the physical environment directly impacted human physical and social evolution. Euro centrism- we think that we are better than everyone else: environmental determinism enabled the academic community to legitimate. Eurocentric views of primitive cultures, particularly those of lower latitudes: tropical and subtropical climates blamed for creating peoples characteristic of dark skin and a lazy disposition . Because they were not as industrious as europeans, they were thought to be naturally inferior. Human agency- we have a role in shaping our own activity and that we also have a large impact in shaping the physical environment: opposite of environmental determinism, has human agency created an anthropocene? .
