Is this a harmless cultural tradition or is it racist?   Why might some Dutch not see this as offensive?  Why might someone not from there react so strongly to this caricature? What do you think?  (Note: a Dutch friend of mine was quick respond: "Sinterklaas' helpers are black because of the ashes in the chimney."  I'm curious to know whether that was always the case or if it's a way to 'whitewash' an old tradition from a bygone era.  And yes, this is an annual controversy). 

Zwarte Piet remains a staple of Dutch culture, but today people are enraged by the racist connotations that the character portrays. Zwarte Piet was brought back from Spain by Santa. At the time of the traditional story, the Dutch, along with much of Europe, was exploring and exploiting the continent of Africa. Many people believe that "Black Pete" is a racist representation of black people, and that the tradition should end. Others argue that a tradition is a tradition.

Can traditions be considered racist? Or are they historical anecdotes chronicling the development of a culture, thus unable to make a modern stance? 

It's almost ironic that the Western World has chosen to wait so long to get involved and now because of it's spread fear has begun that Ebola might travel to the United States. By not sending aid in a timely fashion the US has allowed the virus to grow to a point that now the US finds itself in danger. To make a historical comparison it's almost akin to the Munich Agreements, France and England chose not to stop a growing and dangerous Germany out of fear of conflict only to find war on their door steps because of it. Why did the western world wait so long? Euro-centric bias or racism? Short sightedness? Regardless of the reason the United States and Western Europe are at risk from a nearly untreatable disease primarily through negligence.

This article shows how the Ebola virus began to spread in many of the countries on Africa and how likely the virus will arrive in the United States. The virus has crossed many borders in Africa already and, according to the article, has infected five people in the United States, but has been quarantined and is currently being treated.  The Ebola virus outbreak has shown how ill equipped certain parts of the world are, in terms of, having the necessary tools for combating a deadly disease. For example, the article provides a map that shows the areas in Africa are more infected with Ebola than others, illustrating how certain parts of the country are becoming more susceptible to the outbreak than others. So geographically, the Ebola virus has gone from a regional outbreak into a potentially global epidemic, what with the cases in the United States.

Ebola started in western Africa and it spread overseas to the United States more specifically than any other country. It currently affects over 23,200 people in western Africa. To make sure that Ebola is not being spread throughout the whole United States, eastern United States quarantines any visitors or immigrants from West Africa. Eastern United States seems to have the highest rate of ebola because it is closer to Africa. In that case, it can spread westerly un the United States. Perhaps, it could spread to Canada, Mexico or any other country.

The story of your food is not a simple thing. There are lots of steps in the commodity chain that take a piece of every dollar. Subsidies and allotments keep prices up or down depending.

Europe's landscape is still scared by World War I. Many photographs are shown in this article of abandoned battlefields that reveal the trenches scars. It has been at least a century since the Great War, yet the country is still buried with scars. In this image by Irish landscape photographer Michael St. Maur Sheil, you can trace grass-covered trenches and pockmarks from exploded bombshells. Millions of men were injured or even killed right in this very spot, which was the first major British offensive of the war. Artists take these photographs to document the legacy that was left on that battlefield. Sheil was very famous for photographs such as these. He includes seventy-nine contemporary photographs of World War I battlefields and has them on display in Paris along the wrought-iron fence of Luxembourg Gardens.

People often forget that the world doesn't reset after a major war. World War I was one of the most destructive wars in Europe's long history, not only in terms of human casualties, but also in terms of physical destruction. The heavy use of trench warfare left an everlasting mark on the landscape. Soldiers dug trenches that were miles long and use them for protection from enemy fire. Any observer can see that bullets do not turn corners and that a soldier can hide within the trench and be impervious to gunfire. There is one major weakness in this tactic that explains the dips in the landscape surrounding the trenches. In order to reach the enemy soldiers, bomb and mortar attacks were very effective. The everlasting geographical scaring of the land tells the history of what took place in an area, from wars in Europe to glacial movement in Alaska. The landscape never forgets.

This particular landscape shows trenches and the remains of bombed out fields where one million British soldiers where either killed or wounded by the Germans. I cannot fathom the heartache and loss that these families must have experienced and in some cases still are. How many future leaders or scientists or Nobel Peace Prize winners were killed here? How might the world be a better place but for the butchering of these soldiers? Multiply that though by the hundreds of wars fought throughout civilization. We could be so far advanced as a society, instead we chose and continue to choose wars that contain costs we can't even quantify. I'd like to see cancer cells being destroyed, not people, housing being built instead of propaganda, education instead of anarchy. No more scars, let's build beautiful monuments to society, like peace.

Its interesting to me how the primary source of immigrants only shifts from Germany to Mexico in the 1990's, as opposed to when the country was cut in half in the fifties or during WWII. I had always thought that those events would limit German immigration more, however it appears that the primary reason for the shift is more due to the recent (relatively) drug war which erupted in Mexico.

Observing the demographic change in the origin of immigrants to the US shed some light on how both domestic policy and global events have impacted which types of peoples immigrated. Seeing how Ireland was the primary immigrant group in most of the country during the potato famine if the 1840s-1870s, and then Mexico following the opening of borders in the latter hald of the 20th century showed how both types of events impacted immigration. Also, understanding immigration patterns and common destinations of immigrants can shed light on modern demographic patterns. It is important to note the role transportation played in early immigration. For example, the Trans-continental railroad allowed the Irish to settle on both coasts of America instead of just the east coast, which would have been the case prior to the railroad.

In the current political climate, this article with maps is a great resource for people concerned with immigration.  The statistic that stood out the most to me was that only 28% of all immigrants in the U.S. were born in Mexico in 2013.  Certain members of the government make it sound like Mexicans are literally going to take over the country if we don’t stop them.  When reality, not even a third of all immigrants are Mexican.  This puts into perspective that Mexicans are not “swarming and overwhelming” the U.S. as people make it seem.  Americans have always had a hard time accepting immigrants, which is ironic because unless one is Native American, their ancestors immigrated from somewhere.  Chinese and Irish are other major groups who were undesirable immigrants at one point in time and Mexicans seem to be taking the heat on immigration today.  Americans will likely always oppose immigration for whatever reason, but the argument against immigrants now seems to be overblown and based on fear.

This map also points out that in 2010 a majority of immigrants to Rhode Island were from the Dominican Republic.  It leads to the question, what is drawing Domicans to the state?

Add water to geography education curriculum? You better believe it. The crisis of the 21st century is and will be water.  

summer reading KQ2: How have humans altered the Earth's environment?  Water Security

We tend to forget how easy it is to compare the sizes and distances, especially when considering the move form 3D to 2D. Something to consider when reading and interpreting maps.

A central theme of geography is place and the spacial organization of it. The USA is an extremely large area and its citizens often don't recognize this fact. Manifest destiny was a concept that stated that it was an American's duty to expand into the frontier to further the dominion of the American government. This imperialistic tendency ended when the US reached the Atlantic Ocean, but the land conquered was vast. Many countries in the world can fit many times over into the continental United States, but the citizens of the states take this fact for granted. This article serves as a needed reminder of this fact, and helps people put America's spacial consumption into perspective. 

Really puts the size of countries into perspective... 

This interactive it worth your time...it won't make you feel all sunshine and rainbows, but the hard truth rarely does. 

Re-scooped from Professor Dixon, pretty cool story on the formation of islands in the south Pacific. A couple of them look like the island visible from the beach in Rincon, Puerto Rico where I stayed. The island is one giant rock so nobody lives there and it's a naval base for the U.S. military. This, however, is a different situation when you realize that not only do people live here, but kind of a lot of people live here.

What causes the death and the caldera in a volcano? One thing that happens in a deceased volcano is the center of the volcano starts to either erode or the inside finally caves in. Once this happen a caldera takes shape and the ocean starts to take over. As the waves eat away at the shores it will eventually create a island that is shaped like a "U". After this happens that island will someday retreat back into the ocean and someday form a barrier reef.

Based on general knowledge, I know that the taller a volcano is, the younger it is and the shorter it is, the older it is. The reason they start to get short is from erosion. Hot spots in the Earth's crust make small islands from molten rock. Young islands can be very dangerous, because if they are inhabited, they have the possibility of erupting, whereas an old island does not since the volcano is lnactice and eroding. Over time the inactive volcano will crumble and a caldera will take shape and after even more time, that caldera will slip under the ocean and become a reef. 

unit 3

state or not a state? Good for the Political unint

What constitutes a "state?"  Watch this video and make a determination.

Country or not?? Interesting/confusing question! 

APHG-U4

Use in Political Geo unit, or for Canada and US region

I honestly feel like we are never taught about these areas ever in US schools. We are always drilled about the 50 states and that's it. I would be interested in learning the history behind why this is still the case and what is keeping our government from considering them part of the states. The fact that they wont even consider American Samoa's citizens is a disgrace.

An advertising campaign hopes to show the differences of income and living standards between neighborhoods in Mexico.

The place of these areas are so vastly different as well as there interactions as the lower class makes shanty architecture and the upper class develops large condos and buildings just for residence.

The pictures show the deep divide between rich and poor in Mexico. These settlements are built to the point where luxurious condos share a wall with decaying slum housing. The roads do not connect the areas, showing how these places were constructed separately by to distinctly different communities. While the proximity between sections shows that sights, sounds, and smells most likely carry across the two sections, the rich area looks as if it has no idea what lies directly beyond their walls. The fact that the rich areas are literally walled off from the rest of the surrounding area says a lot about the deep economic divides found around the world today.

Right away from looking at this picture, you can tell which side is which. I didn't even have to read the article yet to find out where the wealthier people lived and where the not so wealthy lived. The colors stood out the most to me. In the picture on the left, it is clear that this is the not so wealthy part in Mexico. The color is just filled with dark and gloominess, mostly shown in gray. The houses are also pushed very closely together. On the right side, it appears that this is the richer side of Mexico. Although the houses are closer together like the picture on the left, they are colorful. They have firm built roofs and appear to be built and taken care of much better. Something else that gives you the sense of which community is more rich is the cars. There is a whole line of cars in the right picture while in the left picture we see a few here and there. The right picture also illustrates lawns. We slightly see some grass in the left, but it is clearly not as well taken care of as the lawns in the right picture. This picture was done as an advertisement to draw attention to the gap between the two different communities. The campaign goes by the name "Erase the Differences" and hopes to get people to realize the differences in poverty that are right in front of them.

APHG-Unit 2 & Unit 6

\I guess it's true what they say; a picture is worth a thousand words. Before even opening this article, you could get a sense from the picture that it wasn't going to be a good one. You can tell by their facial expressions and the environment that surrounds them. Even the colors that are portrayed in the picture send off meaning. The picture is not very bright. It sends off a sad image with all the brown everywhere. However, we do see a little peek of sunlight shining through. Before reading this, one might see this as a good sign from God, or someone watching over these people. Once I opened the article, there were many more pictures describing their lifestyles. You can tell that they don't make much money by the way they live. There was another picture in the article with a dark tint to it, representing a negative atmosphere, including one girl folding her arms and one girl with tears running down her face . There are no pictures were everyone in the images have smiles on their faces.

These picture paint a very sad and very real truth. Many of the people in the pictures are caring for children and barely have enough to make it through the day. One woman works long hours for about 50 cents a day and that is horrible, another woman is 40 years old and works at a construction site, which is obviously not the norm. These people, mainly the children, have hope of going to school, but for most of them that is just a dream that will never come true.

Just because we build retaining walls, fences, storm drains and other features, it doesn't mean that erosion will stop being a major and consistent force shaping the landscape.   I don't think they got their money's worth on there environmental impact statement, but I'm sure the real estate agent really sold them on the beautiful view.  For more local news on this home, read and watch here, for stunning images, see here.     

Questions to Ponder: Why do we build homes where we do?  How is this different across cultures (hint-Brazil)?

Tags: physical, geomorphology, erosion, landforms.

Natural hazards

E la prospezione geologica da presentare al Comune? Era prevista nel PRG del comune? Esisteva un VIA?

A good teaching tool for explaining the diversity of languages.

Geografia Cultural

Summary- This video explains how so many languages came to be and why. By the early existence of human there was a such smaller variety of languages. Tribes that spoke one language would often split in search of new recourses. Searching tribe would develop in many new different ways than the original tribe. new foods, land, and other elements created a radically different language than the original. 

Insight- In unit 3 we study language as a big element of out chapter. One key question in chapter 6 was why are languages distributed the way they are. It is obvious from the video that languages are distributed they way they are is because of the breaking up from people which forced people to develop differently thus creating a different language. As this process continues, there become more and more branches of a language family.  

I'm sharing this article with the idea that we all consider how we think about places and analyze the generalizations and stereotypes that might be embedded in our thinking.  No one can know everything about every place, and we create this mental constructs called regions to lump together bits of information to fill the gaps in our understanding.  Sometimes this serves us well, but often, we are fall for overused tropes.  

He's really quite good, and the seamless change of dialect is quite impressive!

The diversity of the English language is amazing.  Even in the "motherland" it changes from location to location...aye bay goom.

This is a really interesting video for understanding regional dialect differences!