Geography 2: Human Geography Final Exam Study Guide, Fall 2016
Chapter 10: Economic geographies
Primary, secondary, tertiary industries
Commodities
Staple theory, Mackintosh & Innis
Linkages—forward, backward and demand
Staple theory and scale—local economy shaped by staple, less important at the national, global scale
Impacts of staple economy—Mackintosh vs. Innis
Do staple economies promote industrialization or inhibit it?
Consider example of Australia
Innis—staple economies promote dependency—volatile prices, prices don’t grow much, lack of economic diversification
CDDCs
Secondary—manufacturing, processing, assembly
Heavy vs light industry
Cottage industries
Industrial revolution—changes in technology and growth of capital, now work in factories, urbanization
Geography of industry determined by resources (coal, iron ore)
Industry in the US—New England and the South; Great Lakes
Fordism and Taylorism
Vertical integration
Post-Fordism
Flexible labor
Deindustrialization of MDCs, industrialization in LDCs—consequences?
Possible Essay Questions:
Describe the industrial revolution (what was it), and how it evolved in the United States? Consider where both light and heavy industry were located in the U.S. and why and the role of Fordism in industry.
What have LDCs done to attract industry to their countries?
Discuss the weaknesses of Foridsm and explain what led to the ‘Crisis of Fordism.’ What replaced Fordism and how has it changed the geography of manufacturing?
What have the outcomes of a post-Fordism, post-industrial society been for the U.S.? What have the outcomes been for Less Developed Countries?
Chapter 11: Agricultural geographies
Domestication, hunter-gatherers
Origins of civilization
Origins of agriculture—Carl Sauer, independent innovation
Three main hearths of agricultural innovation: Fertile Crescent, Asia, Mesoamerica.
Alfred Crosby, “Columbian Exchange”
Types of agricultural production: subsistence, commercial
Intensive subsistence, wet-rice farming (sawah), densely populated areas of tropics, sub-tropics
Extensive subsistence, slash and burn, shifting cultivation, less densely populated areas of tropics, sub-tropics
Pastoralism, nomadic herding
Intensive commercial—luxury items, perishable goods, California.
Commercial dairy/livestock—dry-lot dairies, CAFOs
Extensive commercial—grain
First agricultural revolution
Second agricultural revolution, moldboard plow, horse collar, four course system
Mixed crop and livestock farming
Third agricultural revolution, Green Revolution, Gene Revolution
Agribusiness, horizontal integration, vertical integration, industrial farming
Public health concerns, ethical issues, carbon footprint of livestock production.
Nutrition transition
Sustainable agriculture: contour plowing, strip cropping, no-till farming, crop rotation, precision agriculture, organic agriculture.
Possible Essay Questions:
Describe the origins of agriculture. Include a mention of what humans were doing pre-agriculture and how agriculture changed human societies.
Describe the types of agricultural production including intensive and extensive forms of commercial and subsistence production.
Describe the changes that come in the second agricultural revolution.
Describe the Green Revolution and its impacts.
Explain how the Gene Revolution differs from previous technological advances in agricultural production. Discuss changes in the who and how of agricultural production as a result, including the rise of agribusiness and industrial farming.
Discuss forms of sustainable agriculture.
Chapter 12: Natural Resources and Environmental Concerns
Garrett Hardin’s first law of ecology
Natural capital
Nonrenewable resources, economic depletion, peak oil (M. King Hubbert).
Renewable resources, sustainable yield, ecologically sustainable yield.
Energy resources
Non-renewable energy resources: fossil fuels (oil, coal, natural gas). Pros/Cons of each.
Who produces and who consumes oil, energy resources?
Shale, tar sands
Mountaintop removal
Fracking
Transboundary pollution
Acid rain
Nuclear energy—pros/cons
Renewable energy resources: water (pros/cons), biomass (direct or indirect), solar (pros/cons), wind (pros/cons), geothermal (where?).
Possible Essay Questions:
Explain why most scholars agree that a finite resource, such as oil, will not be completely depleted. Include a discussion of M. King Hubbert’s Peak Oil theory in your essay.
Describe the unevenness in patterns of consumption and production of energy and energy resources.
Discuss the positives and the drawbacks of reliance on fossil fuels as an energy source.
Discuss the potential alternatives to fossil-fuel based energy resources.
What is global warming, how is it linked to energy resources and what global initiatives have attempted to address it?
Chapter 8: Urban Geographies
Six characteristics of cities
U.S. Census definitions of ‘urban’, MSA, CSA
Megalopolis, Bon-Wash, etc.
Level of urbanization
Rate or urban growth
Three current trends in urbanization
Megacities
Cities and development, inequality
World city or why not?
FHA, VA
Redlining, Blockbusting
Residential segregation
White flight
Urban renewal/urban redevelopment
Eminent domain
Los Angeles’ Bunker Hill
Downtown Oklahoma City
Gentrification
Sustainable cities
Vision Zero
Green roofs
Urban farming
Equality?
Sprawl and its costs
Possible Essay Questions
Explain how American cities developed clear patterns of racial segregation. How does this connect to suburban growth?
Describe the current trends in urbanization and explain the geography of megacities and what makes a city a world city.
What possibilities exist for creating urban areas that are both livable and sustainable?
What is positive and also negative about processes of urban redevelopment and gentrification?