AP人文地理复习重点及考点

　　下面总结了2015年AP人文地理复习重点及考点，大家在考前一定要认真看一遍，小马过河祝大家都能取得优异成绩。

　　Preface

　　- Geography is the study of where things are located on Earth’s surface and the reasons for the location

　　- Focus on Where and Why

　　- Central theme – Tension between two important themes — globalization and cultural diversity

　　- This book is concerned with geography from a social science perspective

　　- This book is organized by topics rather than locations

　　- This book uses both the descriptive and systematic methods

　　Chapter 1: Basic Concepts

　　Human geography – The study of where and why human activities are located where they are

　　Map – A two dimensional or flat-scale model of Earth’s surface, or a portion of it

　　Place – A specific point on Earth distinguished by a particular characteristic

　　Region – An area of Earth distinguished by a distinctive combination of cultural and physical features

　　Scale – The relationship between the portion of Earth being studied and Earth as a whole

　　Space – The physical gap or interval between two objects

　　Connections – Relationships among people and objects across the barrier of space

　　Key Issue 1

　　How Do Geographers Describe Where Things Are?

　　- Maps

　　- Contemporary Tools

　　Maps

　　- A map is a scale model of the real world, made small enough to work with on a desk or computer

　　- Two purposes of a map

　　As a reference tool: find the shortest route and avoid getting lost along the way

　　As a communication tool: depicting the distribution of human activities and thinking about reasons underlying a distribution

　　Map Scale

　　- Map scale is presented in three ways

　　- A ratio or fraction, show distance by a numerical ratio

　　- A written scale, show distance by words

　　- A graphic scale, use a bar line marked to show distance

　　Projection

　　- The scientific method of transferring locations on Earth’s surface to a flat map is called projection

　　- Possible distortions of projection

　　The shape of an area can be distorted

　　The distance between two points may change

　　The relative size of different areas may be altered

　　The direction from one place to another can be distorted

　　Contemporary tools

　　Satellite-based Imagery

　　- The system that accurately determines the precise position of something on Earth is GPS (Global Positioning System)

　　- A receiver that can locate at least 4 satellites, figure out the distance to each

　　- Remote sensing – The acquisition of data about Earth’s surface from a satellite orbiting Earth or from other long-distance methods

　　GIS

　　- GIS – A computer system that can capture, store, query, analyze, and display geographic data

　　- A map can be created by asking the computer to retrieve a number of stored objects and combine them to form an image

　　- Each type of information can be stored in a layer

　　- Layers can be compared to show relationships of different kinds of information

　　Key Issue 2

　　Why is Each Point on Earth Unique?

　　- Place: Unique Location of a Feature

　　- Regions: Areas of Unique Characteristics

　　- Spatial Association

　　Place: Unique Location of a Feature

　　- Place – A feeling for the feature that contribute to the distinctiveness of a particular spot of Earth

　　- Geographers describe a feature’s place on Earth by indentifying its location, there are four ways: place name, site, situation, and mathematical location

　　Place Names

　　- Toponym – The name given to a place on Earth

　　- Ways to name a place:

　　Named for a person

　　Associated with religion

　　Derive from ancient history

　　Picturesque names on the landscape

　　Features of the physical environment

　　Places can change names

　　Site

　　- Site – The physical characteristics of a place

　　- Important site characteristics include climate, water sources, topography, soil, vegetation, latitude and elevation

　　- Human have the ability to modify the characteristics of a site

　　Situation

　　- Situation – The location of a place relative to other places

　　- Situation is importance for two reasons:

　　Finding an unfamiliar place, by comparing it with several familiar places

　　Understanding its importance, by relating to some importance places, the place examined can be important

　　Mathematical Location

　　- location can be described precisely by medians and parallels

　　- Meridians are arcs drawn between the North and South Pole, together constitute longitude

　　- Parallels are circles around the globe parallel to the equator and at right angles to the meridians, together constitute latitude Regions: Areas of Unique Characteristics

　　Cultural Landscape

　　- 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

　　- A region derives its unified character through the cultural language

　　- People, activities and environment display similarities and regularities within a region and differ in some way from those of other regions

　　- In the real world, characteristics are integrated

　　- People are the most important agents of change to Earth’s surface.

　　Types of Regions

　　- Region is any area larger than a point and smaller than the entire planet

　　- Neighboring countries that share important features can be combine to one region

　　- Many localities within a country can be split to many regions

　　Formal Region

　　- Formal region (aka uniform region or homogeneous region) – An area within which everyone shares in common one or more distinctive characteristics

　　- Characteristics may be predominant rather than universal (most or only)

　　Functional Region

　　- Functional region (aka nodal region) – An area organized around a node or focal point

　　- A functional region dominates at a central focus or node and diminishes in importance outward

　　- New technology is breaking down traditional functional regions

　　Vernacular Region

　　- Vernacular region (aka perceptual region) – A place that people believe exists as part of their cultural identity

　　- Mental Map – An internal representation of a portion of Earth’s surface

　　- A useful way to identify a perceptual region is to get someone to draw a mental map

　　- A mental map depicts what an individual knows about a place

　　Spatial Association

　　- To explain why regions possess distinctive features, geographers try to indentify cultural, economic, and environmental factors that display similar spatial distributions

　　Regional Integration of Culture

　　- Culture – the body of customary beliefs, material traits, and social forms that together constitute the distinct tradition of a group of people

　　- Culture is a complex concept because “to care for ” something has two very different meanings:

　　To care about – To adore or worship something, as in the modern word “cult”

　　To take care of – To nurse or look after something, as in the modern word “cultivate”

　　What People Care About

　　- Geographers study why the customary ideas, beliefs, and values of a people produce a distinctive culture in particular place

　　- Language is a system of signs, sounds, gestures, and marks that have meanings understood within a cultural group

　　What People Take Care Of

　　- The second element of culture of interest to geographers is production of material wealth, the food, clothing, and shelter that humans need in order to survive and thrive

　　- More developed countries (MDCs)

　　- Less developed countries (LDCs)

　　Cultural Ecology: Integrating Culture and Environment

　　- Cultural Ecology – The geographic study of human-environment relationships

　　Human and Physical Factors

　　- Possibilism – The physical environment may limit some human actions, but people have the ability to adjust to their environment. People can choose a course of action from many alternatives in the physical environment

　　- Resources – Substances that are useful to people, economically and technologically feasible to access, and socially acceptable to use

　　Physical Processes: Climate

　　- Climate is the long-term average weather condition at a particular location

　　- Five main climate regions:

　　A: Tropical Climates

　　B: Dry Climates

　　C: Warm Mid-Latitude Climates

　　D: Cold Mid-Latitude Climates

　　E: Polar Climates

　　Physical Processes: Vegetation

　　- Plant life covers nearly the entire land surface of Earth

　　- Biome – Major form of plant community

　　- Four main types of biomes:

　　Forest Biome – continuous canopy, covers a large percentage of Earth’s surface

　　Savanna Biome – no continuous canopy, abundant grass, covers large areas of Africa, South Africa, South Asia, South America, and Australia

　　Grassland Biome – covered by grass rather than trees, low precipitation

　　Desert Biome – barely vegetation, only plants adapted to dry conditions and small numbers of animals

　　Physical Processes: Soil

　　- Soil, the material that forms on Earth’s surface

　　- Soil contain the nutrients necessary for successful growth of plants

　　- Destruction of soil: erosion and depletion of nutrients

　　Erosion – Soil washes away in the rain or blows away in the wind

　　Nutrition Depletion – Plants withdraw more nutrition that natural processes can replace

　　Physical Processes: Land Forms

　　- Geomorphology – Study of Earth’s landforms

　　- It helps to explain the distribution of people and the choice of economic activities at different locations

　　- People prefer living on flatter land, which generally is better suited for agriculture

　　Polder – A piece of land that is created by draining water from an area

　　Key Issue 3

　　Why Are Different Places Similar?

　　- Scale: From Local to Global

　　- Space: Distribution of Features

　　- Connections Between Places

　　Scale: From Local to Global

　　- Local scale – unique features

　　- Global scale – general pattern

　　Globalization of Economy

　　- Globalization – A force or process that involves the entire world and results in making something worldwide in scope

　　- Globalization means that the scale of the world is shrinking in the ability of a person, object, or idea to interact with a person, object, or idea in another place

　　- Globalization of the economy has been led primarily by transnational corporations

　　- Transnational Corporation – A corporation that conducts research, operates factories, and sell products in many countries

　　- Globalization of the economy has heightened economic differences among places

　　Globalization of Culture

　　- Underlying the uniform cultural landscape is globalization of cultural beliefs and forms, especially religion and language

　　- Culturally, people residing in different places are displaying fewer differences and more similarities in their cultural preferences

　　Space: Distribution of Features

　　Distribution

　　- Distribution – The arrangement of a feature in space

　　- Three main properties of distribution across Earth: Density, Concentration, and Pattern

　　Density

　　- Density – The frequency with which something occurs in space

　　- Arithmetic Density – The total number of objects in an area

　　- Physiological Density – The number of persons per unit of arable land

　　- Agricultural Density – The number of farmers per unit area of farmland

　　Concentration

　　- Concentration – The extent of a feature’s spread over space

　　- If the objects in an area are close together, they are clustered; if relatively far apart, they are dispersed

　　- Concentration is not the same as density

　　Pattern

　　- Pattern – The geometric arrangement of objects in space

　　- Linear distribution – objects arranged in a line

　　- Grid distribution – objects that forms squares of lines

　　Connection between Places

　　- Space-Time Compression – The reduction in the time for something to reach another place

　　- Space-time compression promoted rapid change, as the culture and economy of one place reach other places much more quickly than in the past

　　Spatial Interaction

　　- When places are connected to each other through a network, geographers say that there is spatial interaction between them

　　- Distance Decay – Contact diminishes with increasing distance and eventually disappear

　　Diffusion

　　- Diffusion – The process by which a characteristics spread across space from one place to another over time.

　　- Today, ideas that originate in one area diffuse rapidly to other areas through sophisticated communications and transportation networks

　　- Hearth – The place which an innovation originates

　　Relocation Diffusion

　　- Relocation Diffusion – The spread of an idea through physical movement of people from one place to another

　　Expansion Diffusion

　　- Expansion Diffusion – The spread of a feature from one place to another in a snowballing process

　　- Three possible process of expansion diffusion:

　　Hierarchical Diffusion – The spread of an idea from persons or nodes of authority or power to other people or places

　　Contagious Diffusion – The rapid, wide spread diffusion of a characteristic throughout the population

　　Stimulus Diffusion – The spread of an underlying principle, even though a characteristic itself apparently fails to diffuse

　　Diffusion of Culture and Economy

　　- Global culture and economy are increasingly centered on the three core or hearth regions of North America, Western Europe, and Japan

　　- Countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America contain three fourths of the world’s population and nearly all of its population growth, but they find themselves on a periphery

　　- Uneven Development – The increasing gap in economic conditions between regions in the core and periphery that results from the globalization of the economy

　　Summery

　　How do geographers describe where things are?

　　- Geography is most fundamentally a spatial science. Geographers use maps to display the location of objects and the extract information about places. Early geographers drew maps of Earth’s surface based on exploration and observation. GIS and other contemporary tools assist geographers in understanding reasons for observed regularities across Earth.

　　Why is each point on Earth unique?

　　- Every place in the world has a unique location or position on Earth’s surface. Geographers also identify regions as areas distinguished by distinctive combinations of cultural as well as economic and environmental features. The distributions of features help us to understand why every place and every region is unique.

　　Why are different places similar?

　　- Geographers work at all scales, from local to global. The global scale is increasingly important because few places in the contemporary world are totally isolated. Because places are connected to each other, they display similarities. Geographers study the interactions of groups of people and human activities across space, and identify processes by which people and ideas diffuse from one location to another over time

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