Northern America, Second Edition

Charles Gritzner, Kristi Desaulniers

Description

This eBook introduces readers to the geography of northern America, covering the culture region as a whole rather than individual countries. The volume emphasizes the region's people and their various ways of life, considering how they have adapted to, used, and changed the natural environments in which they live.

Like other titles in the 10-volume Modern World Cultures set, Northern America, Second Edition explores the geographical features, climate, and ecosystems; population, settlement, and culture; and the history and economy of the region at hand. Also covered are the region’s diversity, challenges, and prospects.

Illustrated with full-color maps and photographs, and accompanied by a chronology, glossary, and further readings, these accessible titles offer an ideal starting point for research on the culture regions of the world.

Sujets

• Social Science
• Sociologie, société et politique
• América del Norte
• Lifestyle
• Geography
• Demography
• Politics
• North America
• Climate
• Anthropology
• History
• Social
• Population
• Culture

Informations

• Publié par: Infobase Publishing
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781438199481
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

Northern America, Second Edition
Copyright © 2021 by Infobase
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher. For more information, contact:
Chelsea House An imprint of Infobase 132 West 31st Street New York NY 10001
ISBN 978-1-4381-9948-1
You can find Chelsea House on the World Wide Web at http://www.infobase.com
Contents Preface Chapters Introducing Northern America Physical Geography Historical Geography Population and Settlement Geography Cultural Geography Political Geography Economic Geography Regional Geography Northern America Looks Ahead Support Materials Glossary Chronology Further Reading About the Authors Index
Preface

Geography provides a key that unlocks the door to the world's wonders. There are, of course, many ways of viewing the world and its people, places, and environments. In this series—Modern World Cultures—the emphasis is on people and their varied ways of life. As you step through the geographic door into the 10 world cultures featured in this set, you will come to better know, understand, and appreciate the world's mosaic of peoples and how they live. You will see how different peoples adapt to, use, and change the natural environments in which they live. And you will be amazed at the vast differences in thinking, doing, and living practiced around the world. The Modern World Cultures series was developed in response to many requests from librarians and teachers throughout the United States and Canada.

This is what the Earth looks like at night. This image is a composite of hundreds of pictures made by orbiting satellites. Human-made lights highlight the developed or populated areas of the Earth's surface.
Source: NASA.
As you begin your reading visits to the world's major cultures, it is important that you understand three terms that are used throughout the series: geography, culture, and region. These words and their meanings are often misunderstood. Geography is an age-old way of viewing the varied features of Earth's surface. In fact, it is the oldest of the existing sciences! People have always had a need to know about and understand their surroundings. In times past, a people's world was their immediate surroundings; today, our world is global in scope. Events happening half a world away can and often do have an immediate impact on our lives. If we, either individually or as a nation of peoples, are to be successful in the global community, it is essential that we know and understand our neighbors, regardless of who they are or where they live.
Geography and history are similar in many ways; both are methodologies—distinct ways of viewing things and events. Historians are concerned with time, or when events happened. Geographers, on the other hand, are concerned with space, or where things are located. In essence, geographers ask: "What is where, why there, and why care?" in regard to various physical and human features of Earth's surface.
Culture has many definitions. For this series and for most geographers and anthropologists, it refers to a people's way of life. It includes everything we possess because we are human, such as our ideas, beliefs, and customs, including language, religious beliefs, and all knowledge. Tools and skills also are an important aspect of culture. Different cultures, after all, have different types of technology and levels of technological attainment that they can use in performing various tasks. Finally, culture includes social interactions—the ways different people interact with one another individually and as groups.
Finally, the idea of region is one geographers use to organize and analyze geographic information spatially. A region is an area that is set apart from others on the basis of one or more unifying elements. Language, religion, and major types of economic activity are traits that often are used by geographers to separate one region from another. Most geographers, for example, see a cultural division between Northern, or Anglo, America and Latin America. That "line" is usually drawn at the U.S.-Mexico boundary, although there is a broad area of transition and no actual cultural line exists.
The 10 culture regions presented in this series have been selected on the basis of their individuality, or uniqueness. As you tour the world's culture realms, you will learn something of their natural environment, history, and way of living. You will also learn about their population and settlement, how they govern themselves, and how they make their living. Finally, you will take a peek into the future in the hope of identifying each region's challenges and prospects. Enjoy your trip!
Entry Author: Gritzner, Charles F.
Chapters
Introducing Northern America

The culture region of Northern America has been blessed in countless ways. It is blessed by nature: No area of comparable size in the world exhibits greater environmental diversity or abundance in terms of resource wealth. It has been blessed by history: Although no stranger to human strife, the region has been less ravaged by conflict than any area of comparable size in the world. It has been blessed culturally: Never in all of human history have more people of diverse ways of living mixed together to create a colorful, yet relatively unified, cultural "salad bowl."
Northern America is unique among the world's cultural realms in many other ways. It is composed of only two countries, Canada and the United States. Although both countries have substantial minority populations, throughout the region the fundamental culture (way of life) is quite similar. In Canada, for example, people of French heritage take great pride in their cultural uniqueness, but the way they live on a day-to-day basis differs little from that of Anglo (English-speaking) or most other Canadians.


Source: Infobase.
Someone who travels between the United States and Canada will note few differences and feel little discomfort. To appreciate this relative homogeneity, one must have traveled in other culture realms. In the European culture region, for example, it is possible to travel through a half-dozen or more cultural microrealms, each with its own language, diet, architectural style, and other observable traits, in a single day! In Northern America, one can travel from the remote shores of the Arctic Ocean to Miami, Florida, or Honolulu, Hawaii, and feel "at home" in a cultural sense.
Culture Regions
Culture is a word with many different meanings. For purposes of this book, it can be defined as learned (rather than biologically acquired) human behavior. What we learn determines the way we live. A culture is a human society that shares a common way of life. Most, if not all, members of the group share a common language and similar ideas, outlooks, values, institutions, technology, behaviors, and other aspects of life.
Regions can best be thought of as geographers' "convenience packages." They are areas that are in some way unique, or set apart, from others. A region must possess one or more similar elements (historians use centuries, periods, and eras in much the same way). In essence, the regional concept allows geographers to say, "this area is like this" and "that area is like that." The Northern American culture region, then, is an area in which most people share a somewhat similar way of life. The differences between the Western Hemisphere's two culture regions—Anglo (or Northern) America and Latin America—illustrate the point. Simply stated, people who live in Edmonton, Alberta, and Orlando, Florida, will have much more in common with one another than they will with residents of Mexico City or Lima, Peru.
At best, regions are abstractions that are often based upon little more than stereotypical or "average" conditions. Throughout this book, the authors often write in very general and broadly sweeping terms. For every "rule," however, geographically there are often one or more "exceptions." This illustrates both a major strength and a primary weakness of the regional concept. Using the idea of regions allows the user to identify an area and speak of its primary characteristics in very general terms. In doing so, however, it tends to ignore conditions that do not conform to the generalization. Referring to "Anglo America," for example, ignores the French-speaking Canadians and other non-English-speaking peoples. Readers must recognize and understand this problem.
To the best of the authors' knowledge, this book represents the first use of the term Northern America in reference to this cultural realm. In the past, it has been almost universally recognized as Anglo America, based on the dominance of the English language and other British culture traits (practices) within the region. Clearly, however, this designation ignores the rich diversity of minority cultures that flourish throughout most of the region. These include Native American peoples of numerous individual cultures, French Canadians, the rapidly growing Hispanic and Asian communities, and others. To avoid such conflict, many scholars now use North America. The authors disagree with this emerging practice. Adopting a continental place name to designate a culture region is both confusing and misleading. Geographically, North America and South America are continents, whereas Anglo America and Latin America are culture regions. Latin America, for example, includes all of Middle America—that part of the North American continent located between the U.S.-Mexico border and southern Panama. To avoid confusion and the appearance of cultural bias, the authors have elected to create and use a neutral term: Northern America.
Geographically, the Northern American culture region spans that part of the North American contine