Gale provides useful and authoritative resources for human geography studies from cultural geography to globalization and migration studies as well as research on a variety of other geographical topics.
Geography is derived from the Greek word geo, meaning “earth, ground, or land” and graph, meaning “to write.” Geography is writing about the earth. Greek mathematician Eratosthenes (276–194 BCE) was the first to coin the term and establish the study of geography. Geography is the study of the natural physical environment, including the characteristics of and the arrangement of landforms and the spatial relations of places on Earth as well as the impact of the natural environment and environmental change on humans. As a science, geography has many fields and subfields but the main branches of geography are physical geography and human geography. Cartography, or mapping and map making, is also a scientific discipline within geography. It is the creation of maps through mapping a physical location. Geographers show and analyze the relationship of a location to its human population and their interactions, which is human geography, sometimes called cultural geography, though this is also considered a subfield.
Classical geography as it was practiced from the ancient Greek period through the nineteenth century was primarily the physical geography of local areas. Cartographers from around the world added other places as they were explored. Geography and cartographic knowledge later became academic disciplines and part of the education students were required to learn in universities during the expansion of colonial powers into Asia, Africa, Australia, and North and South America. This knowledge was connected by geographers to the analysis of each continent's natural resources, which were then used to fuel the Industrial Revolution. Along with the need to map the Earth physically grew a desire for the cultural study of human geography—the study of how humans interact within communities and cultures and what part environment and location play in those relationships. An early use of geography for more than mapping physical location occurred in the nineteenth century when a doctor used geographical methods to observe, use an analysis of human interactions, and map a cholera outbreak in a London neighborhood. The theory of environmental determinism became popular at this time, purporting that one’s human habits were influenced directly by a person's local geography and the ecology.
Specifically, human geography uses qualitative and quantitative methods to research patterns within human interactions in communities, economies, and cultures in particular environments and locations. From the early days of environmental determinism to the introduction of statistical information in the 1960s and the use of geographical information systems, subfields have developed that research economic, social, political, language, migration, globalization, urban, feminist, sexuality, spatial, children’s, animal, and cultural geography, to name a few.
With how diverse the physical world is and how the human population has spread to all areas of the earth and continues to relate spatially to the environment, human geography research is infinite.
Gale resources guide research on human geography, its subdisciplines, and related interdisciplinary studies, from biogeography to geopolitics to world history. Gale's collections of primary source archives and eBooks provide journals, books, archives, literature, multimedia, and more to library users, K-12 students, and university researchers on topics of interest to human geographers, both teachers and students.
Gale Primary Sources contains archives and articles that present geographic researchers with firsthand content. Users can research historical geography journals, documents, archives, and manuscripts to examine topics and create reports.
Gale eBooks offers a variety of books online that support human geography studies. Users can add Gale eBooks to a customized library and cross-search to pinpoint relevant content. Workflow tools help users easily share, save, and download content.
E-Learning for Geographers: Online Materials, Resources and Repositories
Information Science Reference | 2008 | ISBN-13: 9781599049816
This online resource provides information on developing learning materials from an international team of geographers, educators, and computer scientists. Researchers can use descriptions of the learning resources developed in various geography topic areas, such as cultural geography and human geography, and find general guidance relevant to all who intend to use electronic or online learning as geographers.
Urban Geography: A Critical Introduction
Andrew E.G. Jonas - Eugene McCann - Mary Thomas | 2015 | ISBN-13: 9781118608500
This resource provides a comprehensive introduction to a variety of issues relating to contemporary urban geography, including patterns and processes of urbanization, urban development, urban economic patterns, urban landscapes, urban planning, and life experiences in modern cities. It reveals both the diversity of ordinary urban geographies and the networks, flows, and relations that increasingly connect cities and urban spaces at the global scale. Readers will learn how to develop critical perspectives on dominant neoliberal representations of the city.
From trending social issues to classic literature, Gale resources have you covered. Explore overviews, statistics, essay topics, and more or log in through your library to find even more content.
