| Term | Definition |
| TODALSIG | Title, Orientation, Date, Author, Legend, Scale, Index, Grid |
| Scale - large vs. small | Representation of a real-world phenomenon at a certain level of reduction or generalization |
| Scale - in cartography | ratio of map distance to ground distance; indicated on map as bar graph, representation fraction and/or verbal statement |
| Dot Map | Map where one dot represents a certain number of phenomenon, such as population |
| Thematic Map | Maps that tell stories, typically showing the degree of some attribute or the movement of a geographic phenomenon |
| Reference Map | Maps that show the absolute location of places and geographic features determined by a frame of reference, typically latitude and longitude |
| Cartography | The art and science of making maps, including data compilation, layout, and design. Also concerned with the interpretation of mapped patterns. |
| GIS (Geographic Information System) | A collection of computer hardware and software that permits spatial data to be collected, recorded, stored, retrieved, manipulated, analyzed and displayed to the user. |
| Remote Sensing | A method of collecting data or information through the use of instruments (e.g. satellites) that are physically distant from the area or object of study. |
| Five themes of geography | Developed by the Geography Educational National Implementation Project are location, human-environment, region, place and movement |
| Geography Theme 1 Location | The geographical situation of people and things |
| Geography Theme 2 Human-environment | Reciprocal relationship between humans and environment |
| Geography Theme 3 Region | An area on the Earth's surface marked by a degree of formal, functional, or perceptual homogeneity of some phenomenon |
| Geography Theme 4 Place | Uniqueness of a location |
| Geography Theme 5 Movement | The mobility of people, goods and ideas across the surface of the planet |
| Absolute Location | Position or place of a certain item on the surface of the Earth as expressed in degrees, minutes, and seconds of latitude 0 to 90 degrees North of equator |
| Relative location | The regional position or situation of a place relative to the position of other places. Distance, accessibility and connectivity affect relative location |
| Mental Map | Image or picture of the way space is organized as determined by an individual's perception, impression and knowledge of that place |
| Cultural hearth | Heartland, source area, innovation center, place of origin of a major culture |
| Cultural landscape | Visible imprint of human activity and culture on the landscape. The layers of buildings, forms, and artifacts sequentially imprinted on the landscape by the activities of various human occupants. |
| Sequent occupance | The notion that successive societies leave their cultural imprints on a place, each contributing to the cumulative cultural landscape. |
| Cultural diffusion | Expansion and adoption of a cultural element, from its place of origin to a wider area |
| Independent invention | The term for a trait with many cultural hearths that developed independent of each other |
| Expansion diffusion | The spread of an innovation or an idea through a population in an area in such a way that the number of those influenced grows continuously larger, resulting in an expanding area of dissemination. |
| Stimulus diffusion | A form of diffusion in which a cultural adaptation is created as a result of the introduction of a cultural trait from another place |
| Contagious diffusion | The distance-controlled spreading of an idea, innovation, or some other item through a local population by contact from person to person -analogous to the communication of a contagious illness. |
| Hierarchical diffusion | Form of diffusion in which an idea or innovation spreads by passing first among the most connected places or people. An urban hierarchy is usually involved, encouraging the leapfrogging of innovations over wide areas, with geographic distance a less impor |
| Relocation diffusion | diffusion process in which items diffused are transmitted by their carrier agents as they evacuate the old areas and relocate to new ones. Eg. spreading of innovations by a migrating population |
| Assimilation | people lose originally differentiating traits such as dress, speech or mannerisms when they come into contact with another society or culture.Describes mostly immigrant adaptation to new places of residence |
| Environmental determinism | The view that the natural environment has a controlling influence over various aspects of human life, including cultural development. Also referred to as environmentalism |
| Cultural ecology | The multiple interactions and relationships between a culture and the natural environment. |
| Possibilism | Geographic viewpoint- that holds that human decision making, not the environment, is the crucial factor in cultural development.Proponents view environment as providing a set of broad constraints that limits the possibilities of human choice |
| Interglaciation | Sustained warming phase between glaciations during an ice age. |
| First Agricultural Revolution | The innovation of the city, which occurred independently in five separate hearths. |
| Plant domestication | Genetic modification of a plant such that its reproductive success depends on human intervention |
| Animal domestication | Genetic modification of an animal such that it is rendered more amenable to human control |
| Social stratification | One of two components, together with agricultural surplus, which enables the formation of cities; the differentiation of society into classes based on wealth, power, production, and prestige |
| Cultural hearths | Fertile Crescent, Indus Valle, Chang & Yellow River Valley (China), Nile River Valley and Delta, Meso-America |
| Fertile Crescent | zone of productive lands from SE Mediterranean coast through Lebanon and Syria to the alluvial lowlands of Mesopotamia (in Iraq). One of world's great source areas of agricultural and other innovations. |
| Indus Valley | Chronologically, the third urban hearth, dating to 2200 BCE |
| Nile River Valley | Chronologically the second urban hearth, dating to 3200 BCE |
| Meso-America | Chronologically the 5th urban heart, dating to 200 BCE |
