Human Geography Final

Following the rank-size rule, if the population of the largest city in a country or region is 1 million, the fourth-largest city should contain about this many people.

250,000

According to statistics compiled by the World Bank, just over ________ of the world's population today lives in urban areas.

50%

The two largest cities in the U.S. are New York City and Los Angeles. The 2000 Census provides evidence to suggest that cities in the United States tend to follow the rank-size rule. Thus, the actual populations for NYC and LA are, in order,

8 and 3.7 million.

Since the last U.S. census, the population of State A significantly decreased whereas the population of State B significantly increased. What is likely to happen to the size (in terms of area) of the electoral districts in State A and State B?

A: increase; B: decrease

Which region or country has benefited the least from the Green Revolution?

Africa

Which city is the best example of the ways in which social and cultural values are translated into spatial form and the design of the built environment?

Algiers

________ is an interdependent group of urban settlements in a given region.

An urban system

In 2025, 7 of the 10 biggest cities in the world will be in

Asia

Which of the following has the smallest ecological footprint?

Bangladesh

What would it mean if the gross national income (GNI) per capita of the ten most prosperous countries in a certain year was 65 times greater than the ten poorest countries and was 80 times greater than the GNI last year?

Between those two years, the richest countries got even richer while the poorest countries got even poorer.

In reference to the ways that geography influences politics and politics influences geography, what do imperialism and colonialism have in common?

Both involve occupation and authoritative control by one state over another.

In what ways were the conditions leading to urbanization during Europe's feudal period similar to the conditions leading to urbanization in rural areas of the periphery today?

Both regions/times experienced little technological innovation and had limited amounts of cultivable land.

According to the World Bank, ________ has 16 of the 20 most air-polluted cities on earth.

China

In what way was the emerging world economy between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries the beginning of the core-periphery world-system?

Colonizing countries structured their overseas colonies to expand trading networks into the world's peripheral regions, transforming the new market-based economy.

Why do some opponents of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) believe that GMO foods are destined to be consumed by poor people in the periphery, with "real" food becoming available only to the rich in core countries?

Consumers in core countries have already turned to a "postmodern" diet. People in peripheral countries will be able to afford only mass-produced GMO foods.

European planning and construction of cities in the colonies was based on

European concepts, practices, and functional needs.

Relationships between human systems of agriculture and the environment are highly interactive. How does the environment affect agriculture?

Factors such as soil quality, terrain, and water quality limit the range of crops and farm animals.

Why has global cooperation among states become an important aspect of agricultural practices?

Factors such as the price and availability of oil and the stability of the dollar in the global marketplace affect national economies and the sustainability of local farming enterprises.

Manufacturing based on assembly line techniques and high wages, and reliant upon mass consumption, is known as

Fordism.

An organism that has had its DNA modified in a laboratory rather than through cross-pollination or other forms of evolution is known as a(n)

GMO

Why are North American central cities losing revenue?

Growth industries, white-collar jobs, retailing, and more affluent households have moved out to suburbs and exurbs, taking their tax dollars with them.

Country X is moving its capital to sever ties to its colonial roots. The ruling faction is less concerned about efficiency of buildings than about reflecting the capital city's new direction and raising its status among world cities. However, this country of the periphery must minimize building costs. Which architectural style will Country X most likely choose?

International Style

Which of the following is NOT a specific advantage of congregation to urban minority groups?

It helps the minority groups merge with other minority groups.

Which of the following pairs best represent nation-states?

Japan and Iceland

After having been stateless for centuries, this culture group established its own state in 1948—and has been in territorial conflict with its neighbors ever since.

Jews

Population is increasing in countries of the periphery where intensive subsistence agriculture is still practiced. If population is increasing, why is subsistence agriculture on the decline worldwide?

More and more places in the periphery are being incorporated into a global economy that requires a strong commercial agricultural sector.

Why do Western European cities typically have low skylines compared to American cities?

Much urban growth occurred before technology made skyscrapers possible.

Why is New York City not considered a primate city?

New York City is not disproportionately larger than the second- and third-largest cities in the U.S. urban system.

Which of the following trade-facilitating organizations is structured around a commodity rather than a world region?

OPEC

________ occur(s) when cities grow faster than their ability to provide jobs, housing and other basic needs.

Overurbanization

To most equitably compare the relative levels of economic development of different countries, and to adjust for their different currencies, it is best to use

Purchasing Power Parity.

________ is the strong devotion to local interests and customs and has been used to explain the Civil War as the Union's effort to make sure that the strong attachment to the institution of slavery would not take priority over the unity of the whole.

Sectionalism

Why are the terms of trade stacked against countries specializing in primary goods?

The elasticity of demand for primary goods is low.

A typical city in a core country corresponds to the idealized city model except in which of the following ways?

The poorest households have the least accessibility to the city's center, because they are located in the suburbs.

Which of the following is true of stable urban systems in core countries today?

Their patterns and processes of urbanization constantly change in adjusting to new technologies.

How does totalitarianism differ from a dictatorship?

Totalitarianism concerns the scope of the governing powers, whereas dictatorships are defined by the source of the governing power.

Which is the most inclusive organization (has most members) and has as a primary goal the maintenance of international peace and security?

United Nations

Among the following, the best example of an inclusionary boundary is the boundary between

Wisconsin and Minnesota.

With a few small exceptions, the countries of the European Union share all of the following except

a European Union Constitution.

The dramatic increase in yields associated with the second agricultural revolution coincided with

a commercial market for food created by the growing urban labor force.

The industrialization of agriculture has made the farm

a component in the agro-commodity production system.

A company has reorganized to utilize the cheapest labor force and the least expensive way to process raw materials wherever they are located, while still assembling the product close to its market to reduce costs. It is, in effect, taking advantage of what type of business structure?

a global assembly line

The Zapatista rebellion in Chiapas (Mexico) coincided with the beginning of NAFTA and concerned the issue of

a peasant way of life, indigenous rights, globalization, and exploitation.

Which of the following is NOT a common and important element of cities in the periphery?

a zone devoted to tourism

One of the most important factors in the development of regional webs of functional interdependence that characterize economic cores is _______.

agglomeration effects

The specific roles of prominent urban settlements of medieval Europe include all of the following except the role of

agricultural center.

In the context of agribusiness and the globalization of agriculture, the food supply chain is a way of understanding complex connections between

agricultural producers and food consumers.

An agrarian culture is one (in) which

agricultural production is predominant in daily life.

The interdependent relationship between cities and settlements of different sizes and functions within a given region is known as

an urban system.

In what way do geographers most commonly express the unevenness of economic development at a global or regional scale?

as core-periphery contrasts within the evolving world-system

Compared to large, industrial farms, traditional intensive subsistence farms tend to

be a more sustainable form of production.

With globalization and the increasing importance of trade-facilitating organizations, states are

becoming sites of transnational flows and connections.

Creative destruction refers to the withdrawal of ________ from declining areas and activities for use in new areas and activities.

capital

What were the key factors that led to global state divisions described as East/West and North/South divides?

capitalist colonialism and imperialism

The functional dominance (cultural, economic, political) of a city within an urban system is known as

centrality

Which of the following would one expect to find in a peripheral country with a large primary sector?

coffee and cocoa bean trees

The East/West divide refers to the divide between

communist and noncommunist countries during the Cold War.

Large retail chains such as McDonald's and big-box stores such as Walmart have driven down prices as well as cost of labor. As these businesses have spread around the world, they have also _______.

contributed to the homogenization of consumer markets

Primate cities are found in the world's

core and peripheral countries, both.

In the 1970s and 1980s, the United States entered a period of ________, during which time there was a net loss of population from big cities to smaller towns and rural areas.

counterurbanization

As used in our text, the term state is closest in meaning to

country

In the United States, the closing of call centers provided the capital and locational flexibility for firms to relocate these call centers to semiperipheral countries such as India. What is this process called?

creative destruction

The spiral of economic growth and advantage that emerges as external economies, agglomeration and localization economies develop in a place is called

cumulative causation.

Pastoralism

depends on animals rather than crops for their livelihood.

What is a key role in the organization of global economics and culture today?

development of control centers for the flow of information, cultural products, and finance

Which of the following was not one of the initial conditions for urbanization?

development of marginal lands

The British presence in India

did not formally end until just after World War II.

Though congregation can be voluntary, segregation is when congregation is combined with

discrimination

Agricultural subsidies

distort the true market value of the agricultural products being subsidized.

The industrialization of food has resulted in a complex food system that prioritizes and emphasizes

distribution and marketing.

Contributing to the conflicts and tensions in Africa is the colonial legacy of borders that doesn't include

dividing people by religion.

On the outskirts of a major metropolis in a peripheral country, you would see densely compacted shantytowns and evidence of an informal economy. Facing the city center, you would see a skyline of gleaming high-rise buildings and evidence of a robust formal economy. This pattern is an example of which of the following?

dualism

The stark contrast of high-rise modern office buildings and luxury housing with the slums and shantytowns of unintended metropolises is visual evidence of their

dualism

U.S. suburbanization is associated with all of the following except

efficient use of space.

Whereas most North American cities are designed for accessibility, traditional Islamic cities are designed to _______.

emphasize personal privacy and communal well-being

The fall of the Berlin Wall symbolizes the

end of the Cold War, the beginning of the "new world order," and the triumph of capitalism over communism.

Which of the following is NOT characteristic of the Third Agricultural Revolution?

ended with the arrival of the Green Revolution

The Berlin Wall and the Mexican border are good examples of ________ boundaries.

exclusionary

According to our text, imperialism begins with

exploration

Urban settlements

facilitate decision-making by public policymakers and private institutions.

In which form of government is significant power given to smaller units of government within the State?

federal State

Shifting cultivation is characterized by the practice of rotating ________ to maintain soil fertility.

fields

From the following, the most characteristic product of the Blue Revolution is

fish

Which phase of the third agricultural revolution affected agricultural outputs rather than inputs?

food manufacturing

The primary worldwide benefit of the Green Revolution has been an increase in

food production

The invasion of older, centrally-located working-class neighborhoods by higher-income professionals in search of character and convenience is called

gentrification.

The purpose of redistricting is to ensure the equal probability of representation among all groups. What is essentially the opposite of redistricting?

gerrymandering

Places of economic activity organized around one or more high-growth industries are known as

growth poles.

In the context of economic development over the last 30 years, regional inequality across the globe

has increased with increasing globalization.

Which of the following is NOT true? Gateway cities

have become the urban centers of the world's core.

European cities are different from North American cities largely because European cities

have long histories of numerous periods of urban development.

As accessibility and utility decline in a concentric zone model of the city, land use generally changes from

high-volume retailing to residential.

Which of the following goods and services is most likely to be found in the largest settlement?

hospital

The recent division of Sudan into two states is a good example of _______.

how geography shapes politics and politics shapes geography, resulting in regionalism and sectionalism

Growing sugar beets for sugar, as an alternative to importing sugar made from sugar cane, is an example of

import substitution.

Maquiladoras (manufacturing firms that import components for assembly and re-export) are found

in Mexico, clustered near the U.S. border.

A federal state (or federation) is one

in which governmental power is disbursed to local units.

Which of the following is NOT one of the major changes occurring globally in agriculture?

increase in the number of people employed in agriculture

The benefits of intertillage include all except

increased ability to replace people with equipment, like tractors.

The growth of cities in the nineteenth century was most closely linked with the

increased importance of industrialization.

Increasingly, families in peripheral countries are losing their farms as a result of what external condition?

increased production of biofuels

The true nation-state

is relatively uncommon.

"Dependency" for peripheral countries means that they are dependent on core countries for all of the following except

labor.

One of the huge benefits of just-in-time production is that the need for ________ is eliminated.

large inventories

Gentrification typically

leads to the renovation of older buildings, raises property values, and displaces original occupants.

The urban land use model is sometimes referred to as the trade-off model because people make a trade-off between accessibility and

living space.

The cost savings and/or advantages that individual firms get when they are located in the same area as other firms of the same industry is known as a(n) ________ economy.

localization

The Modern movement of the early 20th century was based on the idea that cities should be designed and run like

machines

The practice of land grabbing — foreign investment in agricultural land in the world's periphery — is designed to

make profit and feed the core

Frontier regions, where territoriality is underdeveloped, are known for their

marginality

Central place theory explains the relative size and spacing of urban centers based on

markets and consumer behavior.

The population of the world's economically developed areas (the core) consume noticeably more ________ on a per person basis than do the people of the world's periphery.

meat and milk

Edge cities, "edgeless cities," micropolitan centers, criss-crossing freeways, and interspersed residences with office employment and high-end retailing in polycentric networks characterize

megapolitan regions.

Plantations—from coffee, cocoa and tea to rubber, palm oil and bananas—typically practice

monoculture

How can food security worldwide be dramatically improved?

more efficient transportation and distribution systems

A cultural group with a territorial identity is known as a

nation

The Green Revolution innovations in agriculture are based on a package of inputs including all of the following except

natural fertilizers (compost, green manure, animal manure).

Contract farming—whereby production in the periphery is for consumption in the core—is one example of

neocolonialism.

In contrast to the first two agricultural revolutions, the third one originated in the

new world

The informal economies of peripheral cities

often benefit consumers in the core.

The postcolonial history of India has included

partition, regional conflicts, and ethnic conflicts.

North America is about 80% urbanized. This mean that 80% of North American

people live in cities.

The megalopolis that extends from Washington, D.C. to Boston is best exemplified by which of the following explanations of urban structure?

polycentric metropolis

The beneficiaries of the community revitalization that accompanies gentrification include all of the following except

poorer households.

Most gateway cities were

ports

In the world system, highest levels of per capita GDP are found in economies where the tertiary and quaternary sectors dominate the workforce. These economies are known as

postindustrial.

As a whole, the core cause of global undernutrition is

poverty

Shantytowns and squatter housing are growing in the unintended metropolises of the periphery due to

poverty and the lack of affordable housing.

Logging is a ________ sector activity.

primary

Countries with the lowest GDP per capita have work forces engaged for the most part in

primary activities.

In the United States, the smallest percentage of the labor force is engaged in

primary activities.

Cities in the world's core have the potential to contribute significantly to the mitigation of pollution and climate change because core cities

produce such huge amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that small changes can have comparatively big results.

Subsistence agriculture

produces food for the direct consumption of the growers and their families.

The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of a region or country includes the total value (in a given year) of all but which of the following?

profits from abroad (overseas)

The process of allocating electoral seats to geographical areas is known as

reapportionment.

By making loans unattainable to people in certain neighborhoods, the practice of ________ compounds the difficulty in achieving inner city improvements.

redlining

The territorially-based sense of identity in groups like the Basques, Kurds and Quebec's French-speaking population is referred to as

regionalism

According to our understanding of urban accessibility and land use, which of the following is located farthest from the city center?

residences

Nationalists that want an independent state of Quebec are properly described as

secessionists

Which agricultural revolution is characterized by the emergence of a commercial market for food and the beginnings of the industrialization of agriculture?

second

The people living in Galicia, in northwestern Spain, have periodically threatened to secede from Spain in part to preserve their language, an important factor of their cultural identity. This is an example of ______.

sectionalism

People would most likely travel the farthest to

see a professional sports event.

The forced consolidation of a group's identity that restricts their territory and their assimilation into the host society leads to which of the following?

segregation

To be considered a nation, a group of people must

share cultural elements like religion, language, history, politics.

Manchester, England and Chicago, USA are both good examples of

shock cities.

Dubai, of the United Arab Emirates, embodies surprising and disturbing changes in economic, social, and cultural life. Thus, it is a good example of a

shock city.

A small population has settled in a fragile tropical rainforest environment. The community has very limited access to fertilizers but wants to reuse the same area for crops season after season. Which cultivation method would be the best for them?

slash and burn

What is the most pressing environmental issue facing agricultural producers today in both the core and the periphery?

soil degradation and denudation

The Kurds, Roma, Bedoon of Kuwait, and Palestinians have this in common—they are

stateless peoples.

Megacities are determined by all of the following except their

status as world city.

Economic development that meets the needs and aspirations of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs is the classic definition for

sustainable development.

From the following, the best example of a supranational organization is (are)

the European Union.

The values that shape the layout and design of Islamic cities derive from

the Qur'an.

The first agricultural revolution involved the domestication of plants and animals. The third agricultural revolution was based on what?

the application of machines and chemicals to farming and the introduction of off-farm treatments that occur before the products reach the market

Population growth in peripheral regions has put pressure on agricultural regions to increase yields to levels that traditional agricultural practices cannot fulfill. For what other reason have traditional agricultural practices become largely obsolete?

the control of complex food supply chains by agribusiness organizations

One reason the United States fought in the Vietnam War as long as it did was the concern that if South Vietnam fell to the communists, other countries throughout Southeast Asia would follow. This concern is an example of what policy or theory?

the domino theory

A country's ecological footprint is calculated from all but which of the following?

the education of the population

A new international division of labor was initiated in the 1970s as a result of a major wave of corporate globalization. This new international division of labor has resulted in three main changes: (1) the decline of the United States as an industrial producer; (2) the decentralization of manufacturing production from the world's core regions to some semiperipheral and peripheral countries; and (3) .

the emergence of new specializations in high-tech manufacturing and producer services within the core regions of the world-system

Whereas reapportionment adjusts the amount of political representation give to a certain geographical area, redistricting adjusts

the geographical area.

In the typical European city, where would you go for high-end shopping?

the lively downtown

With which urban model are edge cities and back-office complexes associated?

the polycentric new metropolis

Which of the following is not one of the fundamental aspects of the role of towns and cities in economic and social organization?

the population expansion of urban settlement

You want to compare the international division of labor between Country A and Country B. What should you evaluate?

the sector of the economy represented by the majority of each country's exports

Where was the first region of independent urbanism located?

the valleys of the Tigris, Euphrates, and Nile rivers

The ability of a country to explore and exploit its resources is based on all but which of the following?

the value of its resources, technological innovations in the country and around the world, and the political situation and economic conditions in that country.

Which of the following accounts for nearly all of the acute problems experienced in the cities of peripheral countries?

the way demographic growth has outstripped economic growth

In medieval Europe, what prompted the emergence of a more extensive money economy and a trade in basic agricultural produce?

the weakening of the feudal system and the levying of increasingly higher taxes by feudal nobility

Economic development is NOT even over space in

the world systems, core countries, and peripheral countries.

Given that urban populations are growing at twice the general population growth-rate, it is likely that

there is a net movement of people from rural areas to urban areas.

Twentieth-century theorists have presented different approaches to the state as a political entity. For example, Michel Foucault studied the state by exploring the ways that power, knowledge, and discourse operate in concert to produce particular kinds of state subjects. What is a second approach?

to explore the state as a force, best thought of as a machine whose purpose is to regulate and dominate

The cycle of poverty

transmits poverty from one generation to the next.

In core economies, which of the following dominate the food production process?

transnational corporations

The central business district

typically has the tallest buildings.

One contrast between the urban centers of core countries and those of peripheral countries is that _______.

urban centers of the core developed largely in response to economic growth, whereas urban centers of the periphery developed in response to population pressures prior to economic growth

The physical structure and organization of cities is termed

urban form.

The fiscal squeeze has made it extremely difficult for central cities to address a wide variety of urban problems. Which of the following is NOT directly one of such problems faced by central cities?

urban sprawl

Smart growth attempts to address the problem of

urban/suburban sprawl.

The straight-line boundaries that characteristically define countries on the African continent suggest that these boundaries _______.

were established through colonization

The global assembly line refers to consumer goods that are made

with raw materials, components, labor, and manufacture from around the world.

The vast majority of workers in maquiladoras and Export Processing Zones are

women

Intensive subsistence agriculture

involves more human labor than swidden agriculture.

Offshore financial centers are designed to attract

secret, tax-sheltered monies.

Shifting cultivation is most commonly practiced in

tropical and subtropical regions.

For a person, household or country to be food secure means that

access to enough food is assured.

Basic principles of commercial and industrial location are based on

access to suppliers, proximity to markets, the availability of labor, and processing costs.

The negative economic effects can slow or modify the spiral of cumulative causation. What are these effects called?

agglomeration diseconomies

Transnational companies are those that are involved in

international trade, production and manufacturing in multiple countries, and foreign sales and marketing in numerous countries.

Which of the following is a way that governments can promote economic growth in a region?

invest in infrastructure, provide tax breaks that reduce the cost of labor, and provide subsidies for private investment

The term "Third World"

is a Cold War term referring to the periphery.

The debt crisis refers to

the high debt service many peripheral countries must pay on international loans.

The industrialization of agriculture involves all of the following except

the replacement of chemically-oriented agriculture with organic production.