unit 0 geography

Geography and History 1º ESO Unit 0 Geography: Concept and branches

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Unit 0 Geography: Concept and branches

Contents:

- Concept of Geography

- Branches of Geography

Activities:

- Definitions´ workgroups

- Mind maps with geographical branches and techniques.

I- Concept of Geography

Welcome to Geography.

During the next few months you will learn what Geography is and what its main

purposes are. You will discover that Geography is a very ancient discipline, very useful

for human societies. For example, all the conquering empires along the History needed

to know how the world was and the resources of new lands to be discovered and

conquered.

First of all, we want to ask you about the meaning of Geography. Do you know who

Gaea is? Do you know the Greek myths about the world and the creation of humankind?

Do you know that Herodotus of Halicarnassus is considered the “father” of Geography?

And, what most importantly, do you know that Geography is more than studying maps?

Origin of Geography

Let´s begin with Greece. The ancient Greek civilisation is the origin of many of our

concepts about the world, and the very first creators of some of the science you will

study at school (Maths, Philosophy, History, etc.). Let´s read the myth of Uranus and

Gaea:

The Creation

In the beginning there was only Chaos. Then appeared Erebus, the place where

death lives, and Night. All else was empty, silent, endless, dark. Then, Love was

born bringing along the beginning of order. From Love emerged Light, followed

by Gaea, the earth.


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Gaea alone gave birth to Uranus, the sky.

Uranus became Gaea's husband,

surrounding her on all sides. Together,

they produced the three Cyclopes, the

three Hecatoncheires, and twelve Titans.

However, Uranus was a cruel father and

husband. He hated the Hecatoncheires

and imprisoned them by pushing them

into the hidden places of the earth, Gaea's

belly. This angered Gaea and she plotted

against Uranus. She tried to get her

children to attack Uranus. All were too

afraid, except the youngest Titan,

Cronus.

Gaea and Cronus set up a surprise attack

as Uranus lay with Gaea at night. Cronus

castrated him with the sickle, throwing

the severed genitals into the ocean. As

Uranus departed, he promised that

Cronus and the Titans would be

punished.

Cronus became the next ruler. He married his sister Rhea, and had many

children. He ruled for many ages; however, Gaea and Uranus both had

prophesied that Cronus would be eventually overthrown by a son. To avoid this,

Cronus swallowed all of his children as they were born. Rhea was angry at the

treatment of the children and plotted against Cronus. When it was time to give

birth to her sixth child, Rhea hid herself, and then she left the child to be raised

by nymphs. To conceal her act she wrapped a stone in clothes and passed it off

as the baby to Cronus, who swallowed it.

This child was Zeus, who grew into a handsome youth at the island of Crete and

after several fights could release all his brothers.

All these Gods and Goddesses were unharmed and

thankful to their youngest brother, so they made

him their leader.

https://youtu.be/LxoRWD-RwtU

It is interesting, isn´t it? Remember that all the

religions throughout the History tried to explain

https://youtu.be/LxoRWD-RwtU


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the origin of the world and the humankind, some of them in a more fascinating way than

others...

So we know who Gaea or Gaia is, the personification of the Earth and one of the

Greek primordial deities. Could we connect Gaea with Geography? Of course, we can

say that Geography is just the science that studies the Earth. But that is not enough for

us.

Geography is the study of places and the relationships between people and their

environments. It is a discipline that integrates knowledge from natural sciences,

social sciences and humanities to build an understanding of the world.

II- Branches of Geography:

Geography is divided into three major branches:

Physical geography is that branch of natural science which deals with the

study of processes and patterns in the natural environment like the

atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and geosphere.

Human geography is the branch of the social sciences that deals with the

world, its people and their communities, cultures, economies and interaction

with the environment by emphasizing their relationships with and across

space and place.

Regional geography is the study of world regions. Attention is paid to

unique characteristics of a particular region such as natural elements, human

elements, and regionalization which covers the techniques of delineating

space into regions.

Throughout this course you are going to study Physical Geography, so we will take a

look at everything that deals with the natural features of the planet (mountains, coasts,

rivers...) and the elements that can affect it, such as climate, erosion and so on.

Here you have some of the main sub- branches of Physical Geography:

- Biogeography: Animals and plants on earth are usually distributed in specific

patterns and biogeography is the discipline that is involved in this study.

- Water Resources Geography: This is a branch of geography that normally deals

with the study of how water resources are generally managed in a particular

region. Geographers who are involved in this discipline normally look at the

manner in which water is collected, distributed and ultimately used in various

places across the planet.

- Climate Geography: Geographers in this branch of geography are usually

concerned with the investigation of the weather patterns of the earth and the way

in which they affect the climate as a result. Moreover, activities that are taking

place within the atmosphere of the earth are also studied in this discipline.


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- Geomorphology: Land forms on earth usually develop in interesting ways and

there are numerous processes that normally lead to their eventual vanishing.

Geographers who are involved in this field usually study the entire process from

start to finish and erosion has been discovered to be a major factor that

influences the vanishing of land forms.

- Lithology: Deals with the characteristics of rocks.

- Oceanography: The study of ocean currents waves and tides.

- Orology: Study of mountains.

- Etc.

However, do you think that Geography is something important in your life? Do you use

some of its tools in your daily life? I bet you do...

Let´s see some of the most commons techniques and tools you use in your daily life:

- Statistic and mathematical models that can be used for demography or

hydrology (birth´s rates, weather forecast, etc.)

- Cartography is the discipline that deals with the conception, production,

dissemination and study of maps. Cartography is also about representation – the

map. This means that cartography is the whole process of mapping.

Of course the humankind has made maps since ancient times, but nowadays new

technologies have developed new tools that can be considered as a “map´s revolution”.

For example, we can talk about GIT (Geographical Information Technologies) that

deals with the new tools we use for representing and analysing our planet, Digital

Cartography, Remote Sensing and the Geographic Information System (GIS).

a) Digital cartography:

b) Remote Sensing:


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c) GIS (Geographic Information System)

And now you know what Geography is, we can start the journey through this subject.

unit 0 geography

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