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The 5 Themes of Geography: Definitions and Examples

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46 views5 pages

The 5 Themes of Geography: Definitions and Examples

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garnovbrana
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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The 5 Themes of Geography

Location, Place, Human-Environment


Interaction, Movement, and Region

Wolfgang_Steiner / Getty Images

The five themes of geography are location, place, human-


environment interaction, movement, and region. These
were defined in 1984 by the National Council for
Geographic Education and the Association of American
Geographers to facilitate and organize the teaching of
geography in the K-12 classroom.

While the five themes have since been supplanted by the


more comprehensive National Geography Standards, they
still provide an effective means of organizing geography
instruction.

What Is Geography?
Geography, which comes from the Greek roots "ge" for
earth and "graph" for "to write," covers a vast array of
concepts linked to people, cultures, and earth. The field
has only gotten more complex over time, as technologies
including computerized mapping and data analysis lead to
new tools such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS).

The five themes of geography effectively helped simplify


this complicated nature of geography, making the subject
more approachable for students and educators alike.

Location
Most geographic studies begin by learning the locations
of places. Location can be absolute or relative.

Absolute location: Provides a definite reference for


locating a place. The reference can be latitude and
longitude, a street address, or even the Township and
Range system. For example, you might be located at 183
Main Street in Anytown, USA, or you might be positioned
at 42.2542° N, 77.7906° W.
Relative location: Describes a place with respect to its
environment and connection to other places. As an
example, a home might be located four miles from the
Atlantic Ocean, 2.4 miles from the town's elementary
school, and 32 miles from the nearest international
airport.

Place
Place describes the human and physical characteristics of
a location.

Physical characteristics: Include a description of such


things as mountains, rivers, beaches, topography, climate,
and animal and plant life. If a place is described as hot,
sandy, fertile, or forested, these terms all paint a picture of
the location's physical characteristics. A topographical
map is one tool used to illustrate the physical
characteristics of a location.
Human characteristics: Include the human-designed
cultural features of a place. These features include land
use, architectural styles, forms of livelihood, religious
practices, political systems, common foods, local folklore,
means of transportation, and methods of communication.
For example, a location could be described as a
technologically advanced French-speaking democracy
with a Catholic majority.

Human-Environment Interaction
This theme considers how humans adapt to and modify
the environment. Humans shape the landscape through
their interaction with the land, which has both positive and
negative effects on the environment.
As an example of the human-environment interaction,
think about how people living in cold climates have often
mined coal or drilled for natural gas to heat their homes.
Another example would be the massive landfill projects in
Boston conducted in the 18th and 19th centuries to
expand habitable areas and improve transportation.

Movement
Humans move—a lot, and ideas, fads, goods, resources,
and communication all travel distances as well. This
theme studies movement and migration across the planet.
The emigration of Syrians during wartime, the flow of
water in the Gulf Stream, and the expansion of cell phone
reception around the planet are all examples of
movement.

Regions
Regions divide the world into manageable units for
geographic study. Regions have some sort of
characteristic that unifies the area and can be formal,
functional, or vernacular.

Formal regions: These are designated by official


boundaries, such as cities, states, counties, and countries.
For the most part, they are clearly indicated and publicly
known.
Functional regions: These are defined by their
connections. For example, a newspaper's circulation, or
geographical area where it's distributed and read, can be
considered the functional region for that newspaper.
Vernacular regions: These include perceived regions,
such as "The South," "The Midwest," or the "Middle East";
they have no formal boundaries but are understood in
mental maps of the world.

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