Regionalization of Mexico Geographers utilize regions to simplify the great diversity on Earth’s surface. A region is an area on Earth’s surface that shares certain similarities, physical or cultural, throughout. The slides in this presentation show some regionalizations of Mexico.

Mexico is divided into 31 states and the Distrito Federal, which sits in the center of Mexico City. These states are political regions that encompass great physical and cultural diversity within their boundaries.

You’ve seen this regionalization before You’ve seen this regionalization before. It’s based on the geographical distribution of cultural features. You see that the southern 1/3 of Mexico was in Mesoamerica.

Here’s a map from a tourism web-site Here’s a map from a tourism web-site. You can see in the description of each region that regions are based on physical and cultural traits. Tourism Regions Baja California: The western peninsula, which borders the U.S. state of California Northern Mexico:The expansive deserts and mountains of the border states; ignored by tourists, this is "Unknown Mexico" The Bajio: Historic states in a traditional silver-mining region Central Mexico: Center, surrounding the capital city Pacific Coast:Tropical beaches on Mexico's southern coast Yucatan Peninsula: Jungle and impressive Mayan archaeological sites, along with the Caribbean coast

This is another regionalization that I found on a tourism web-site.

Yet another tourism map from a web-site Yet another tourism map from a web-site. It’s more useful than the previous tourism maps because it shows the destinations within each region.

Birding region map; useful to practitioners of a growing type of tourism.

Here’s an economic regionalization Here’s an economic regionalization. The map shows distribution centers and market regions for a Mexican corporation. Market Coverage Through our 4 main hubs, we cover the whole Mexican market. Our corporate offices and principal warehouse is in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon. From there, we serve the Northeast Region. From Guadalajara, in the state of Jalisco, we serve the West and Northwest Regions. From our distribution center in San Luis Potosi we serve Mexico's Central Region. And from our Mexico City distribution center we serve the East and Southeast Regions.

Yet another tourism region map from a web-site.

This map is from a role-playing web-site.

Cartel cartography.

More cartel cartography

State populations, 2010.

Mexico Population Density, 2010.

This map is from a book called the “Nine Nations of North America”, which was the inspiration for the article that you read called “The Five Nations of Mexico”. Each author believes that the regions that they created are more useful for understanding the US and Mexico than either country’s 50 or 31 states.

This map is based on Casagrande’s article.