Why study Geography

Many times people tend to wonder what's the point of studying geography when history and social studies seems a bit more ground based. It is a complicated system but geography provides a holistic understanding of our planet and systems. Studying geography is important because it not only helps us to understand our environment, appreciate it and create awareness, but also help ourselves in understanding how we create, evaluate and hopefully be in control of and improve our living conditions. Geography actually affects us not just on the physical note, but also socially, environmentally, politically and culturally.

For example, should we not have taken geography, we wouldn't have learn about the indigenous people, their way of living and the evolution of human beings. We wouldn't have understood how we ourselves came about, how did the human race disperse around through the years, our changes and revolution, and studies of history and anthropology wouldn't have happened.

Another reason to study geography is because the planet that we are living in is changing everyday. For millions of years all the living things walking on this earth has been taking a lot of resources and depending heavily on Earth and in the first place, we wouldn't even have known about it if it wasn't for an in-depth study of our mother nature and hence sprouts geography. And through learning geography and having much better understanding of the way nature works, we are now able to understand and even estimate and predict phenomenons or possible natural disasters so as to be prepared for them.

People are able to have better communications through geography too, but on a stricter term, Political Geography. We understand and learn about different cultures and traditions, open up our minds and knowledge and help make the world a smaller place for everyone. Through the past world wars I personally think that all of those wouldn't have happened, if only people had studied geography and thoroughly understand that there are races and cultures outside of our own ones and accept them. Instead of viewing foreign cultures as territories to be conquered or people who are different, studying geography might actually help us not just understand and accept them, but eventually learn to live in harmony together.

All in all, it is very important to study geography as it helps us to think critically, learn to research and communicate better with each other and enables us to improve and resolve issues and problems in a much better way.

What is Geography?

"Geography is the science of our world, and using and sharing geographic knowledge is the key to our future."

—Jack Dangermond, Esri President

So according to previous lesson notes, classmates has stated that geography is about the interaction between human and environment, understanding different countries, cultures and their issues, natural phenomenon, physical aspects of the world and humanity. To be honest so far my knowledge on geography is very limited. I thought it's all about studying maps, learning about some fishing issues in Ireland and how to grow rice, all thanks to secondary school. However coming into college, it became more and more apparent to me that geography is much more than that.

There's 2 kinds of geography: Human Geography and Physics Geography. Personally I find Human geography way more interesting as it focus more on human activities and sounds definitely much more appealing than the studying of the environment, that is Physical geography. Although there are times when I do find physical geography interesting, such as articles like huge cracks discovered in Antarctic Glacier stuffs like that but I do feel that sometimes they can get too intense or even too mathematical and heavy in text. Human geography just provides that human touch and feels more directly related to well, humans.

I do feel that it is important that we all study geography to understand human dynamics better. As mentioned above, geography does help us understand better about other regions of the world and that will both direct and indirectly affect ourselves, in terms of economy and relations. Without geography, we wouldn't be able to predict or understand what our Earth current situation is or how exactly does Mother nature operates. We also wouldn't be able to understand other cultures and beliefs and hence weaken mutual understanding among humans. And we'll definitely suffer greatly from natural disasters should we not attempt to study it at all.

Although I have to admit that I myself tend to lump social studies and history together with geography all the time, i think it is important that we learn bout geography and understand our living environment more. Anyway really look forward to learning more about geography this term!