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What is Geography?

Foremost among educational needs today is the ability to cope with life on a rapidly shrinking planet, where population is exploding, resources are dwindling, and where pressures on the most elementary creature comforts (food and space) are mounting dangerously. Most of the problems, which this generation will be called upon to face, have strong geographic overtones. Where (physically) will we put another 30 million people in the United States during this decade? Where will we find the resources to feed, clothe, house, and educate these new Americans, much less the 6.5 billion additional neighbors they will acquire? Where will the levels of pollution and human attrition become most serious? These questions are precisely the type which modern geographers are addressing.

Geographers ask three essential questions about the phenomena they study: "WHERE are things located?" but even more importantly, "WHY are they located where they are?" and "WHERE should they be located?" The answers to these questions are both descriptive and analytical; the first is primarily descriptive, and the second and third are primarily analytical. Geography tries to provide explanations about our world and the ways in which we live, work, and carry on social and economic activities. In short, geography is a science that investigates our cultural and natural environments, how we affect them, and how they affect us.

Thus modern geographers interpret and explain the occurrence, distribution, and interrelationship of the physical and cultural patterns on the Earth's surface. They analyze these patterns according to the attributes of location, extent, and density. As they continue the analysis over time their study assumes a fourth dimension – succession.

The constantly changing physical and human landscapes on the Earth's surface challenge the geographer to provide continuing interpretations of all parts of the world from the spatial point of view. Geography is the original environmental science and continues to be the most comprehensive of all environmental studies as it deals with both the natural and cultural worlds.

If you are interested in knowing more about geography and the wide latitude of opportunities that it provides students, you are invited to explore the other sections of this Web site.