Chapter 4 Lecture

Human Geography: Places and

Regions in Global Context
Sixth Edition

People and Nature

Wendy A. Mitteager
State University of New York, Oneonta

Key Concepts

Nature and Society

Environmental Philosophies
Ecological Imperialism
Energy Needs
Climate Change
Environmental Impacts
Globalization of Environment
Sustainability

Figure: Chapter 4 Opener Rescue workers in Japan

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Nature as a Concept
Relationship between nature and society
Earth Summit
Sustainable future

Environmental
Advocates
Pinchot, Carson,
Shiva

Ecosystem
Figure 4.2 Technology often aggravates rather
than solves environmental problems
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Nature as a Concept, (cont'd)

Technology
Physical artifacts
Activities or processes
Knowledge or know-how

I=PAT

Figure 4.4 Electronic waste

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Impact on earth resources

Population
Affluence
Technology

Nature-Society Interactions
Cultural Ecology
Global climate
change
Hurricane Katrina
Haiti earthquake
Political Ecology

Figure 4.6 Haiti, one year after the earthquake

Apply your knowledge: Give examples of cultural

ecology from your community or campus.
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Climate Change

Figure 4.5 Four elements represent how climate change is affecting the planet
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Water Politics

Figure 4.B Protesters in Bolivia, during the action

against the hike in water rates

Figure 4.A Virtual water expended to

produce foods
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U.S. Environmental Philosophies

Views of nature
Henry David Thoreau
Romanticism

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Transcendentalism

George Perkins Marsh

Humans as significant
agent of environmental
change
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Figure 4.8 Walden Pond today

U.S. Environmental Philosophies, (cont'd)

Gifford Pinchot
Theodore Roosevelt
Conservation &
Preservation
Environmental
organizations

Environmental Ethics
Ecofeminism
Deep Ecology
Environmental Justice
Ecotheology

Apply your knowledge: Provide examples of how

Thoreau's ideas about nature can be understood in terms
of late-twentieth-century environmental philosophies. Apply
the same analysis to Marsh and Emerson.
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European Expansion
Internal, at first
Disease & depopulation
Virgin soil epidemics
Columbian exchange
Demographic collapse

Figure 4.10 Population growth in

Europe
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Ecological Imperialism
Introduction of exotics
into new ecosystems
Intentional and
unintentional
Agriculture and
livestock
Animal power

Figure 4.12 Painting of the capital city of the

Aztecs

Apply your knowledge: Provide examples of plants and

animals in your region that are examples of ecological
imperialism
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European Voyages of Exploration

Figure 4.11 Not all voyages were violent and exploitative many were mutually
beneficial through the exchange of knowledge.
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Recent Environmental Change

Anthropocene
Impact of
energy needs
Nonrenewable
renewable
Figure 4.13 Biomass pyramid

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World Energy, 2008

Figure 4.14
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Peak Oil

Figure 4.C Oil reserves by region,

2007

Figure 4.E Price of crude oil,

19862011

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Figure 4.D Predictions of future oil

production

Energy Needs

Figure 4.16 Surface coal mining in Germany

Figure 4.15 Increase in energy

demand
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World Distribution of Nuclear Reactors,

2011

Figure 4.20
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Global Consumption of Fuelwoods, 2010

Figure 4.21
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Percentage of Hydropower in the Electricity

Supply, 2010

Figure 4.22
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Global Climate Change

Figure 4.F Schematic framework of climate change drivers, impacts,

and responses
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Global Climate Change, (cont'd)

Figure 4.G This graph shows projected sea level rise. The maps show the impact of 5 meters
of sea level rise.
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Three Gorges Dam, China

Figure 4.23
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Global Acid Emissions

Figure 4.24

Apply your knowledge: How do various countries other

than the U.S. address the problem of acid rain?
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Impact of Land-Use Change

Five categories of land
Conversion
Modification

Figure 4.30 Greening of the Sahel

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Global Land Grab

Figure 4.27
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Globalization of the Environment

Global change
Environmental politics
WTO, IMF, G8,
United Nations, NGOs

Environmental
Sustainability
Figure 4.30 Bioprospecting
in the Arctic

Apply your knowledge: Research an international

institution that implements sustainable development
programming.
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Future Geographies
Increase in world
energy consumption
Population growth
Periphery is
industrialized

Global challenges will

require international
political and economic
cooperation

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Figure 4.31 Raw materials are shipped out of the

U.S. to China. Containers from China to the U.S.
are loaded with manufactured commodities

End of Chapter 4

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