DEPT OF GEOGRAPHY AND RURAL

DEVELOPMENT, KNUST
GEOG 253: THEORY AND PRACTICE OF
GEOGRAPHY
PPT LECTURES
THEMES IN GEOGRAPHY

SETH AGYEMANG, PhD

Introduction
• Geography is based on certain key themes.
• For a study to be considered geographical, it
must portray some of these themes.
• These themes were formally put together in
1984 by the National Council for Geographic
Education and the Association of American
Geographers.
• They are location, place, human-environment
interaction, movement, and region.
Location

• Most geographical studies deal with the location of places or

phenomena on the earth’s surface.
• Location is the position of something on the earth’s surface.
• Helps to answer the questions “Where is it” or “Where are things
located?”
• The location of a phenomenon is stated in either of two terms:
absolute location or relative location.
• AL provides a definite reference to locate a place, such as latitudes and
longitudes, the street address or the township and range system.
• RL is the position of an object or feature with reference to something
else. Example to say Kumasi is located 272 km north-west of Accra, or
a place is adjacent or opposite or behind or in front of another place.
• RL is explained by identifying landmarks, direction, time, or distance
from one place to another.
Place

•Describes the physical and human

characteristics of a location that give
meaning to and set it apart from other
locations.
•Helps to answer the question: “What is it
like?-climate, land, vegetation, etc.
•The place theme recognizes that every
location on earth is somehow unique in
certain respects.
Human-environment interaction

•Explores how humans and the environment

interact with each other
•“How do people interact with their
environment?”
•Three outcomes of human interaction with
the environment
•-depending-
•-adapting-
•-modifying the environment.
Flow/Movement

•Concerned with movement, migration

and diffusion of phenomena.
•Question: how do people, goods, and
ideas move from one location to another?
Or how and why are places connected
with one another?
•Movement is important because since all
areas are not equally endowed, there is
the need for places to interact to
complement each other.
•An important driver of globalization
Region

•An area that displays a coherent unity in terms of certain

identified characteristics.
•Answers the question: “How are places similar or different?
What is it about a particular place that unites it with similar
characteristics?
•Regions have some sort of characteristics that unify the
area.
•Contemporary area analysis can be traced to 19th century
French geographers, including Paul Vidal de la Blache
(1845-1918) and Jean Brunhes (1869-1930).
•Regional studies was later adopted by several American
geographers, including Carl Sauer (1889-1975) and Robert
Platt (1880-1950).
• 
THANK YOU