people on the land chapter 2 – part i the human matrix

People on the Land

Chapter 2 – Part I

The Human Matrix

Review

Five themes– Culture Region– Cultural Diffusion– Cultural Ecology– Cultural Ecology– Cultural Landscape

On to “People on the Land”

Deography

Statistical analysis of human population– Spatial Density– Humans are quite unevenly distributed over the

Earth’s surface– Population densities range from zero to over

2,000 people per square mile

Demography

Fertility Gender Health Age Nutrition Mortality Migration

Population Geographers

Study spatial and ecological aspects of demography, but are also interested in spatial variation of other demographic qualities.

– Birthrate differences– Death rates– Overpopulation– Sex ratios– Age groups– Crime– Quality of life– Human mobility

Demographic regions

Formal regions devised by population geographers

Distribution of people by continents– Eurasia 73.3 percent– North America 7.3 percent– Africa 12.7 percent– South America 5.5 percent– Australia and Pacific Islands < 0.5 percent

Demographic regions

Population density categories for demographic regions– Thickly settled areas – 250 or more per sq mi– Moderately settled areas – 60 to 250 per sq mi– Thinly settled areas – 2 to 60 per sq mi– Categories based on single trait of population

density.

Ten Most Populous Countries

Country Population As % of World Total People per sq mi (km)China 1,236,700,000 21.20% 335 (129)India 969,700,000 16.60% 783 (303)United States 269,000,000 4.60% 72 (28)Indonesia 204,300,000 3.50% 272 (105)Brazil 160,300,000 2.70% 49 (19)Russia 147,300,000 2.50% 22 (9)Pakistan 137,800,000 2.50% 406 (157)Japan 126,100,000 2.20% 864 (334)Bangladesh 122,200,000 2.10% 2198 (849)Nigeria 107,100,000 1.80% 300 (116)

Demographic regions

Is the world really overcrowded? Does population density give us the full

picture?

Shanghai, China

Shanghai, China

Shanghai Municipality with close to 13 million people is one of the largest cities in the world

The central city exceeds 7 million Nanjing Lu, one of it’s major thoroughfares,

illustrates the country’s highest population density averaging 9,650 per square mile and rising as high as 88,789 per square mile.

Shanghai, China

With the recent relaxation controls on population movement in China, rural-urban migration and natural increas are expected to expand Shanghai’s population to 15 million by the turn of the century.

The problems of providing adequate housing and services are formidable indeed.

Population density

What population densities do not tell us– Standard of living– Over or under population– As a statistic concept it conceals changes that

constantly occur

Patterns of natality

Birthrates – measured as the number of births in a year per thousand people.

Patterns of natality

Does not generally correspond to population density Inverse situation in China/Europe and interior of

Africa High birthrates concentrated in a belt through the

lower latitudes Mid-latitudes and high-latitude countries have low

birthrates Birthrates now declining in most all countries

Total Fertility Rate (TFR)

Measured as the average number of children born to each woman during her reproductive years– Focuses on female segment of population and

reveals family size– In Europe TFR now stands at 1.4– Sub-Saharan Africa’s overall rate is 60, Niger is

highest with 7.4

Geography of mortality

Number of deaths per 1000 people Similar yet different from birthrates

– Concentration of high figures in Sub-Saharan Africa, worst area of the world for life-threatening diseases

– American tropics generally have rather low death rates

– Desert belt across North Africa, the Middle East, ad Central Asia have rather low death rates.


Reasons for differences in death rates when compared with birth rates– Countries with high birth rates tend to have

younger population– More developed regions, such as Europe,

including Russia, have low birth rates and an aging population that is reflected in higher death rates.

– Australia, Canada, and the United States attract more young immigrants


Nature seeking to find a balance may have developed effective diseases to control dss population in Africa where our species originated.– Changing climatic patterns imposed a great

desert belt across Africa blocking the spread of diseases from its humid tropic region

– AIDS apparently started in Tropical Africa but has diffused to more temperate climates


Fatal or potentially fatal diseases can occur in all parts of the world– Many are increasingly resistant to medicines– Monitored by World Health Organization and US

Center for Disease Control– Next slide shows that few areas of the world have

been spared.– Medical Geography – name given to spatial study

of human health


Death comes in different forms geographically– In developed world – age-induced degenerative

conditions– In developing nations contagious diseases are

leading cause of death

The population explosion

Triggered by the dramatic decrease in the death rate especially in infants and children

Not accompanied by decline in birth rates Improved health conditions allowed more

children to survive to adulthood Globally, population has increased

geometrically


Rapid growth began about 1700– Presently some 100 million more people are born

each year than die– One hundred and seventy persons are added to

the world population each minute– World population will double in 43 years at

present growth rates– Some population scholars expect the world

population to level out, perhaps early in the 21st century, at about 10 to 15 billion people


Others predict a sharp population decline in near future

Population decline may already be under way in parts of eastern Europe

Some feel stabilization will occur before any catastrophic depletion of resources

Others believe Earth cannot support many more people without ecological disaster

Demographic transformation

World population explosion is not a worldwide phenomena– Confined to underdeveloped and developed

countries with high TFR– All industrialized, technologically advanced

countries have achieved low fertility rates– Stabilized or declining populations– Passed through the demographic transformation

Natural increase


In pre-industrial societies, birth and death rates are normally high

Coming of industrial era– Medical advances and diet improvements– Sets state for drop in death rates– Life expectancy soared from average of 35 years to 75

years or more at present– Results in population explosion– Eventually leads to decline in birth rate following decline in

death rate


In post-industrial period, demographic transformation produces actual zero population growth or decline

Stages 3 and 4 of demographic transformation– Require effective methods of birth control– Traditionally, infanticide – the killing of the newborn –

served as principal method in some cultures– Abortion remains common in some parts of the world– More common are various contraceptive devices

Why children?

Rural Pakistan

These girls are visiting their brothers at a boy’s school in a village north of Peshawar.

In rural settings where a child becomes an economic asst by the age of six, girls train for early marriage and motherhood by looking after their younger siblings.

While studies show that more educated women bear fewer children, only one in four women is literate.

Rural Pakistan

The average Pakistani woman has more than six children.

Since daughters will marry out of their birth households, spending money on their education is seen as wasteful.

Parents prefer sons for their labor, old-age assistance, and pride of accomplishement.

With a natural increase rate of close to 3%, Pakistan is still in state 2 of the demographic transformation.

Geography of contraception

Age distributions

How countries differ– Countries with almost half their population under

15 years of age– Kenya, Africa has the highest number– Many other nations in Latin America, Africa, and

tropical Asia– Early industrialized countries have greatest

preponderance of people in the over-20/under-60 category age bracket

Age distributions

Growing number of affluent countries have remarkably aged population

Sweden has 18 percent over the age of 65 Other European countries not far behind In Africa, Latin America, or other parts of Asia, the

average person never lives to age 65 In Sudan, Gambia, Saudi Arabia, Guatemala, and

other countries only 2 or 3 percent reach age 65.

Age and youth

Age distribution

Different cultures result in populations that have large numbers of young or aged people

Age structure differs spatially within individual countries

Rural populations– In US and many other countries are usually older than the

urban areas– In the United States, the flight of young people has resulted

in rural people having a median age of 45 years or older

Age distribution

Retirement havens for the elderly– Arizona and Florida have populations far above

normal average age– Sun City, Arizona legally restricts residence to

elderly– In Great Britain, coastal districts have a higher

proportion of elderly

Population pyramid

Population pyramid

Useful graphic device for comparing national age characteristics

Reveals past progress of birth control Allows geographers to predict future population

trends Broad based pyramids suggest the rapid growth of

population explosion Excessively narrow based pyramids represent

countries approaching population stability

Geography of gender

The human race is divided almost evenly between females and males, but geographical differences in the sex ratio occur

Recently settled areas tend to have more males than females

Look at the next slides parts of Alaska, tropical Australia Alaska 53% male Mississippi 52% female reflecting the emigration of

young males seeking better jobs Africa – 59% females in some poverty-stricken areas

Females as % of population

Gender

Gendered spaces: Daphne Spain– Finds them in homes, schools, at work, and sometimes

regionally– Males and females often spatially segregated– Inequality of status, access to knowledge, and well-being

Some cultures impose gender-specific place taboos– Muslim countries– Mount Athos peninsula in Greece

Influence of WWII on Germany where lower number of males, even 50 years later

Gender

Female-specific infanticide or abortion– Most notorious in China and India– Results from culturally-based preference for male offspring– About 100,000 ultrasound devices available, even to rural

Chinese peasants, allowing sexual identification of fetuses– By 2020 China will have 110 marriageable aged males for

every 100 females– India today, has only 930 females for each 1000 males

creating a profound gender imbalance

Standard of living

One simple measure to map living standards is using infant mortality rate

Tells how many children die (per 1000 live births) before reaching one year of age

Reveals many different things– Health and nutrition– Sanitation– Access to doctors, clinics, and ability to obtain medicines– Education– Adequacy of housing

Standard of living

Infant mortality rate

Standard of living

East vs west component, brought on by collapse of the Soviet empire

Standard of living could be the basis of future mass migrations or conflicts, especially where rich border poor

Standard of Living

Brazil

This boy lives in a village in the Amazon basin accessible only by river.

While the village has electricity, there is no plumbing and raw sewage puddles in the dirt road.

There is a clinic but no resident doctor, a two-room school but few supplies

Television is received via satellite.

Brazil

Chances for employment in the village are negligible.

Most young people seek economic opportunity in mines and logging camps or in larger settlements such as Manaus.

Will this boy join the ranks of the rural-urban migrants?

Diffusion in population geography

Migration– Constitutes cultural diffusion– Represents the most basic aspect of relocation– Humankind has proved remarkably adaptable to

new and different physical environments Except such places as ice-sheathed Antarctica and

Arabia’s “Empty Quarter” Permanent habitat extends from ice sheet edges to

seashores and desert valleys

Migration

The far-flung distribution of humankind is product of migration

Migrating humans generally remember the event for the rest of their lives

Prehistoric migrations often remain embedded in folklore for centuries or millennia

Aztec codex

Voluntary migration

Takes place when the difficulties of moving seem more than offset by the expected rewards

Considered to be relocation diffusion Decision to migrate can also spread by expansion

diffusion Push-and-pull factors

– Act to make old home unattractive and new land attractive– Generally push factors are the key ones

Voluntary migration

Perhaps the most important factor prompting humans to migrate is economic

Since humans began migrating they have sought greater prosperity through better access to resources, especially land.

Some cultural ecologists see humans as seeking to fill every possible environmental niche

Voluntary migration

Ecologically, migration is a trial-and-error process– More often than not, leads to grief rather than

success– Some peole may be preconditioned genetically to

strike out into new lands– Some people have a compulsion that is not

grounded in push-and-pull factors

Voluntary migration

Migration in the nineteenth century– More than 50 million emigrants sought better lives

outside their native lands– Changed the racial and ethnic character of much

of the Earth

By 1970, about one-half of all Caucasians did not live in their ancestral European homelands

Voluntary migration

Foreign lands seem more attractive– Home country has a negative image in some

people’s minds– Great Britain loses almost a quarter of a million of

its own people each year

Governments often encourage migration– Want to redistribute population within countries

Relocation migration

Israel

These Russian Jews are bargaining for fabric with a Bedouin at the Thursday market in Beersheba, an ancient city at the edge of the Negev Desert.

Voluntary migrants, they were only recently permitted to leave the former Soviet Union.

Israel

Push-and-pull factors were Russian discriminatory practices, and Jewish perceptions of Israel as “The Promised Land” and place of refuge.

In 1950, Israel passed the “Law of Return” which gave every Jew the right to settle in Israel.

Such immigrants are known as “olim”

Indonesia

Forced migration

Westward displacement of Native Americans in the United States

Dispersal of Jews from Israel in Roman times Terrible export of African slaves to the

Americas Brutal “clearings” of Scottish farmers by

landlords to make way for large-scale sheep raising

Forced migration

Today refugee movements are common Prompted by:

– Despotism– War– Ethnic hatreds– Famine

Forced migration

Recent decades have witnessed a flood of refugees– Ethiopia, Sudan, and Somalia in Africa– Haiti in the Caribbean– Iraqi Kurdistan and Israel in the Middle East– Balkans in Europe– Cambidia in Southeast Asia

Forced migration

By mid-1900s, 18 million people lived outside their homelands as refugees

Great dislocations are occurring in southern Asia and Africa

An additional 21 million displaced persons resided in their own countries

Diffusion of fertility control

Needed for the final two stages of the demographic transformation– Successful cultural diffusion of effective methods

of birth control– Acceptance that small families are preferable to

large ones

Sustained fertility decline arose in Europe in the first half of the 1800s

Fertility decline in Europe


France was the country of origin Spread slowly at first, eventually diffused through

most of Europe Fertility decline became accepted as countries

industrialized and became prosperous Root of population explosion caused by failure of

European idea of fertility control to spread to less-developed countries

Why?


Reasons for birth control in an urban society:– Investment of large sums of money into the formal

education of its children– The forbidding of child labor makes children a

financial burden

People’s Republic of China

Enforced fertility control

China: “one couple, one child” Authorities sought to halt population growth and

decrease the number of people Penalties for violations of the policy

– Huge monetary fines– Cannot request new housing– Lose rather generous old-age benefits provided by the

government– Forfeit their children’s access to higher education– Maybe even lose their jobs


Late marriages encouraged China’s falling fertility rate

– Plummeted from 5.9 births per woman to 2.7 between 1970 and 1980.

– Was 2.2 by 1990– Latest statistics 1.8

China achieved one of the greatest short-term reduction of birthrates ever recorded

Cultural diffusion can be coerced


China has less rigidly enforced its population control program in recent years– Economic growth eroded government’s control

over the people– Allowed more couples to have two children

instead of one– Rise of economic opportunity and migration to

cities led others to have smaller families


Barriers to diffusion of fertility control Example of India’s rural society

– Children may offer the only way out of a life of poverty and an old age of solitary begging

– Costs of raising and educating a child are minimal and grow smaller with every child added to the family

– Children start working at an early age, replacing expensive hired labor

– Without offering a method of attaching the root problem, the struture of peasant poverty, tenancy, and insecurity is to offer nothing

AIDS cases per 100,000

Disease diffusion

AIDS Most widely accepted theory on where AIDS began

– HIV-1 – in east-central Africa– HIV-2 – in the upper Niger River country in the Guinea

highlands of West Africa Apparently originated in the local monkey population Passed on to humans through the local cultural

practice of injecting monkey blood as an aphrodisiac

Disease diffusion

HIV-2– Most similar to the simian type– Has had less impact on humans in its source

region– Has not spread as widely beyond Africa as HIV-1

Probable diffusion of AIDS

Disease diffusion

Diffusion after humans became infected– Apparently moved throughout central and western Africa– Followed transport routes and spread through growing

urban areas– Haitians working at civil service posts in Zaire (now

Democratic Republic of Congo) carried disease back to the Caribbean in the early 1960s

– Europeans visiting central Africa diffused AIDS back to Europe

Disease diffusion

American male homosexuals vacationing in Haiti likely contracted the virus and spread it throughout the gay communities in the United States

Americans falsely believed the virus was exclusively linked to homosexual behavior

Western Europe became a secondary diffusion area

Disease diffusion

Not all diseases spread by contagious diffusion

Relocation diffusion – tourism, temporary migration

Hierarchical diffusion – disease spread by persons affluent enough to participate in international tourism

people on the land chapter 2 – part i the human matrix

Documents

percent slide

land slide

slide shows

square mile slide

human matrix slide

temperate climates slide

leading cause of death

population movement