1. Thinking Geographically
How do geographers address where things are?

2. Maps Cartography Serve 2 purposes
Reference source (provide a route)
Communication tool (provide data)
Babylonians 2300 B.C. on clay tablets & earlier
Polynesian people “stick-charts”
Maps as art

4. Eratosthenes 194BC?

5. Al-Idrisi 1154

6. Ortelius 1571

7. Map Scale Amount of detail, how much “zoomed in”
Relationship between a feature’s size on a map to its actual size on Earth
Fraction or Ratio, Written statement, bar
or…..
Local, regional, national, global

9. Projection Most accurate representation of the earth is a globe
Scientific method of transferring locations on Earth’s surface to a flat map
“All maps lie flat, and all flat maps lie”
Distortion in
Shape
Area
Distance
Direction

10.
West Wing

11. True Size

12. Cont’d… Equal area – Distortion at poles (shape)
Mercator – Distortion at poles (size)
Polar – Shows relative closeness between US & former USSR
Robinson – Better portrays relationship between land & water

13. Cont’d…
Van Der Grinten – Shows Canada & Russia 200% bigger than they are
Dymaxion – attempt to show global connections in a worldwide ocean
Mollweide – attempt to avoid high latitude distortions
“Interuption”

15. GIS Geographic Information System
Computer system that stores information in ‘layers’
Helps draw connections between various information
Crime & Air Pollution
Low income families & teenage pregnancies
Retirement homes & hospitals
Cancer rates & Native Canadians

19. GPS Global Positioning System
24 satellites that tell us the exact location of something on the earth
Aircrafts, ships, now quite common in cars
Originally for US defence, available to citizens within last 20 years