1(i). Definition & Scope of Geography.doc
- 1. P a g e | 1 Introduction of Geography Geography is a fundamental science that helps us to understand our physical environment with its elements and components forming a complex structure of the earth which is the only habitable planet in the solar system. Geographers study the factors responsible for spatial distribution and variation of people, places with their locations. Physical geographers explain the phenomenon of evolution of landforms, tectonic movements, weather and climate, ocean characteristics and properties, flora and fauna. Human geographers explain the interrelationship between man and his physical environment. Definitions of Geography Geography is related to the distribution of various features natural or man-made on the surface of the earth. I. A Greek scholar Eratosthenes was the first to coin the term Geography derived from the two Greek words i.e. ‘Geo’ means ‘earth’ and ‘graphe’ means description. Geography is thus a description of earth’s surface and the entire phenomenon appearing on it. However different scholars have defined geography as per their view point. Some of these are as follows: II. According to Richard Hartshorne ‘Geography is a discipline that seeks to describe and interpret the variable character from place to place of the earth as the world of man’. III. According to Bowman ‘Geography tells what is where, why and what it is made of’. IV. Vidal de la Blache defines Geography as the science of places. V. As per Griffith Taylor opinion ‘Geography is the correlative science’. VI. According to David Harvey ‘Geography is concerned with the description and explanation of the areal differentiation of the earth’s surface’.
- 2. P a g e | 2 VII. Alfred Hettner, 1895, defines Geography as the chorological science of the earth or the science of the earth areas and places in terms of their differences and their spatial relations. VIII. According to American College, Geography is the study of the areal differentiation of the earth surface, as shown in the character, arrangement, and inter-relations over the earth’s elements such as climate, relief, soil, vegetation, population, land use, industries, or states, and of the unit areas formed by the complex of these individual elements. IX. S.W. Woolridge and J.Gordon East said, “Geography seeks to discover the spatial relationships of the manifold features, physical and human”. X. Ullman in 1954 describes Geography is the interaction between spaces. XI. Peter Haggett defined geography as the study of the earth surface in the space within which human population lives. XII. Ptolemy, 150 CE, described the purpose of geography is to provide 'a view of the whole' earth by mapping the location of places. XIII. Kant defined geography as a synoptic discipline synthesizing findings of other sciences through the concept of area or space. Scope of Geography Geography is the study of the natural world and how humans have changed it. It examines the physical Earth and life on it, looking at the world’s diverse cultures and economies and at the environmental problems they produce. Geography addresses many issues about the contemporary world. Some are local, such as documenting the development of ethnic neighborhoods within Los Angeles. Others are regional, such as determining the best locations for nature reserves in California. Many are global, such as the study of greenhouse gases and how they affect climates, culture and
- 3. P a g e | 3 resource issues in developing countries, and the impact of information technologies on people in different places. The work of geographers often takes them out of the classroom into the field to collect information on topics that range from the settlement of new immigrants to the distribution of endangered species, the erosion of shorelines, and the location of high-tech businesses. On other occasions, geographers work in laboratories, using techniques such as the computer analysis of satellite photographs to look for changes in river courses and the computer modeling of shifts in global vegetation patterns and the distribution of human populations. Research is also conducted in libraries and archives, probing documentary sources on human interaction with the natural world and how that world is imagined.