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| Source: 2nd Green Revolution |
Here are a few concepts that are important in the Geography discipline.
Accessibility
The ease with which one place can be reached from another. It can be measured in terms of distance, time, or cost. Access to certain places may be made less easy by non-physical barriers such as social class or ethnicity.
Building density
Concentration (amount) of buildings in a given geographic area. A measure of the amount of floor space available for occupation in a development expressed in the area of land on which it is built. The number of habitations per hectare, number of square meters per hectare, plot ratio are other terms.
City
A large urban settlement with a dense population that is usually a centre of government and administration, culture, social networking and economic enterprise.
Capital
There are two types of capital. Physical capital (all useful assets e.g. money and machinery) and human capital (people’s knowledge, skills and energies), used to produce goods and services. The amount of money belonging to a country, factory or a person.
Co-variation
The study of two or more geographic distributions which vary over the same area, such as unemployment and crime.
Culture
A bundle of attributes of shared behaviour or belief. These may include virtually anything about the way people live.
Distance
The extent of space between two objects or places; it can be measured absolutely, in terms of kilometres, or in terms of other units, such as time or cost to cross.
Diffusion
The spatio-temporal process concerned with the movement of objects from one area to another through time.
Education
The process of receiving or giving systematic instruction, especially at a school or university. The theory and practice of teaching.
Environment
All external conditions and factors, living and non-living (chemicals and energy), that affect any living organism or other specified systems. Physical, biological, social, cultural conditions affecting people’s lives and the growth of plants and animals.
Facilities
A place, amenity, or piece of equipment provided for a particular purpose. Anything useful or serviceable.
Functions
The function of a settlement describes all the main activities that occur in it. These can be grouped into a number of headings, such as residential, recreational, retail, government, entertainment and industrial.
Geography
Geography refers to the Greek words geo and graphein, meaning earth writing. Geography is about studying and understanding the deliberate and unintentional changes caused by humans transforming the earth’s surface. It comprises the dynamic interaction and real-world relationship and movement between natural (the earth and its living organisms) and non-natural phenomena (societies, human activities, cultural features), and space relative to a spatial dimension.
GIS
The use of computer systems to organise, store, analyse, and map information. It merges information in a computer database with spatial coordinates on a digital map.
Globalisation
The organisation of any activity treating the entire globe as one place. It is a complex of related economic, cultural, and political processes that have served to increase the interconnectedness of social life in the contemporary world.
Governance
A term used to indicate the shift away from direct government control of the economy and society via hierarchical bureaucracies (government) towards more indirect control via diverse non-governmental organisations.
Health
State of physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.
Hierarchy of settlements and services
A ranking of settlements or shopping centres according to their population size or the number of services they provide. Settlements can be described as being part of the urban hierarchy. Where they stand on the hierarchy depends on a number of factors, the main ones being population, the number of services a settlement has and its sphere of influence. Settlements ordered by their size: hamlets, villages, towns, cities, conurbations.
IDP
Integrated Development Planning is an approach to planning that involves the entire municipality and its citizens in finding the best solutions to achieve good long-term development.
Infrastructure
Fixed assets in place, such as buildings, dams, and roads. It also includes, factories, schools, railways, networks, landing strips, communication networks, power lines, as well as the human-made assets of a certain city, region or country.
Justice
The quality of being fair and reasonable.
Landscape
All the visible features of an area of land, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal. The scenery. What the land looks like.
Linkages
Contacts and flows of materials and information between interdependent economic agents.
Mobility
The ability to move between different activity sites.
Neighbourhood
An urban district, in a strict sense defined as one in which there is an identifiable subculture to which the majority of residents conform.
Opportunities
A time or set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something.
Place
A unique and special location in space where the regular activities of human beings occur and which may furnish the basis of our sense of identity as human beings, as well as of our sense of community.
Planning
Attempting to carry out a programme of work, such as building a new town or protecting historic buildings, by following an agreed set of guidelines, design or plan.
Quality of life
The state of social wellbeing of an individual or group, either perceived or as identified by observable indicators. An idea which is difficult to define because it means different things to different people. Things which make for a good quality of life might include high income, good health, good housing, basic home amenities, pleasant surroundings, recreational open space, good local shops, a secure job, etc..
Region
A territory that exhibits a certain uniformity. A two dimensional space on the surface of the Earth. It is a definable space that can be demarcated and mapped.
Resources
Anything obtained from the environment to meet human needs and wants. It can also be applied to other species.
Services
Services are things such as retailers (shops), professionals (doctors, lawyers etc), entertainment, government functions and leisure. The theory goes that the larger a settlement is, and therefore the higher it is on the urban hierarchy, the more services and functions it will have.
Scale
A quantitative statement of the relative sizes of an object on a map and in reality.
Spatial analysis
Any form of analysis using geographical data.
Spatial location
The location of a phenomenon is the place or point on the Earth’ surface where this phenomenon is situated or occurs. It can either be absolute (latitude and longitude) or relative.
Spatial pattern
Everything that has a location in geographic space inevitably creates or contributes to a
spatial pattern.
Urban
In, relating to, or characteristic of a town or city. The built-up, non-rural area in a region.
Zoning
Restricting or prescribing the use to which parcels of land may be put. Regulating how various parcels of land can be used.