GEOGRAPHIC REALMS Spatial – the largest geographic units into which the inhabited world can be divided Functional – defined by farms, mines, fishing ports, transport routes, dams, bridges, villages, and other features on the landscapeDemographic – represent the most comprehensive and encompassing definition of the great clusters of humankind in the world todayTransitional – where geographic realms meet transition zones (not sharp boundaries) mark their contacts … areas where peripheries of two adjacent realms join as a gradual shift distinguishing the neighboring realmsVariable – change over time
REGIONS
Areas of the earth’s surface marked by certain properties
Devices that enable us to make spatial generalizations
Based on criteria we establish
Criteria can be:
o
Human (cultural) properties
o
Physical (natural) characteristics
o
Both
All regions have:
o
Area
o
Boundaries
o
Location
FORMAL REGION
Marked by a certain degree of homogeneity in one or more variable (culture, physical, etc)
Also called a uniform region or homogeneous region
FUNCTIONAL REGION
A region marked less by its sameness than its dynamic internal structure … integration of functions
A region formed by a set of places and their functional integration
A spatial system focused on a central core (a city & its suburbs)
Also called a “nodal” region
Hinterland – the area surrounding a core (“country behind”) The 12 regions we are studying are on the pages linked above and are found as shown below. the americas PAGE 1. NORTH AMERICA 2. Latin AMERICA 3. The Caribbean
africa PAGE 4. sub-Saharan Africa
5. NORTH AFRICA & Southwest Asia
EUROPE (6) & rUSSIA (7) PAGE  asia & the pacific PAGE8. Central Asia9. EAST Asia10. South Asia11. Southeast Asia12. Australia & OCEANA
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