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whether it's religion or agriculture or
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bananas in human geography we love
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exploring diffusion or the spread of
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ideas and innovations we want to know
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why something exists here and not there
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and how it got there which is probably
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why we've kind of gone bananas for the
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silk roads in multiple episodes these
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trade routes at times passed goods and
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ideas all the way from portugal to tokyo
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which might make us wonder what happened
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to all the stops along the silk roads
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many of these hubs wielded tremendous
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power over their regions a legacy which
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in many places still continues today
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take guangzhou which is an ancient
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chinese city which european traders knew
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as canton
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once a major part of the maritime
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portion of the silk roads today its
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creative experimental architecture has
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almost completely replaced the old city
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the population of the city and the
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surrounding urban area has skyrocketed
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from about 2 million in 1980 to nearly
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13 million in 2022
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which helps make guangzhou and its
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ferocious economic activity part of one
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of the fastest growing urban regions in
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the world
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the pearl river delta what's happening
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in guangzhou is part of a global
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phenomenon we're living in an
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increasingly urban world and according
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to u.n estimates people living in urban
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places outnumber those in rural areas
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which is actually new for most parts of
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the world i'm ali zay carrere and this
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is crash course geography
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[Music]
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though i've already said it a bunch of
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times the word urban is actually pretty
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hard to define in geography because what
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counts as urban changes depending on
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what country or region you're in
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for instance some countries define it
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based on population numbers or
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population density but we could also use
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infrastructure development or the type
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of employment the people living there
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have even still studying urban places
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like towns and cities is important in
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many social sciences in geography we're
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particularly interested in how urban
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places are related to each other as
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points in space and how they're laid out
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internally we call this urban geography
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which is a subfield of human geography
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that focuses on urban spaces
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urban geographers want to know why towns
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and cities are where they are and why
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some cities are so much larger than
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others
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we want to describe understand and
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explain the patterns of cities and the
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arrangement of different activities
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within them so we ask questions like
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what causes some cities to decline and
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some to grow rapidly why do some have
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suburbs and others are just one large
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city how are cities planned and laid out
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and what are some of the environmental
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impacts of cities
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and how and why do cities become
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segregated by race or income that's a
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lot of questions and this is why we at
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crash course are taking four episodes to
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talk about some of the basics of urban
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geography which means we better clearly
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establish and define the space where all
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of this studying is taking place
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we all know a city when we see one but
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what are cities really turns out there's
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no universal definition of one
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historically cities were differentiated
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from other forms of settlement by their
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larger population size and if the people
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living in them weren't directly involved
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in agriculture
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cities were centers of political
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economic and social power and were
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generally places with a high population
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density or the number of people
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occupying an area of land today we have
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many different places of many different
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sizes lumped under the word city this
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includes places like jakarta a mega city
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with over 10 million people that
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dominates its national economy and when
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a city's population grows to more than
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20 million it's called a meta city like
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mumbai dhaka or shanghai
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and when multiple cities interconnect to
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form a dense urban corridor like the one
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that extends from boston to washington
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dc we have a megalopolis but regardless
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of how we define it it's the social
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function of the city how central it is
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to so many human interactions and
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endeavors that's key to its existence
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cities have developed essential points
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within various economic systems like
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agrarian merchant industrial and
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capitalist economies for instance take
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china's southern coastline where many
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protected bays suitable for harbors
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allowed for a series of ports to develop
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in the late 1970s when china adopted an
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open door policy
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this encouraged foreign investment into
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the country and allowed more trade with
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the rest of the world while no actual
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doors were opened almost overnight
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tranquil rural areas were transformed
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into factories and apartment buildings
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and other urban land uses the cities of
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the pearl river delta became part of
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special economic zones and were designed
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to attract the foreign capital and
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technology to manufacture goods for
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export take guangzhou as an export
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processing zone with plenty of cheap
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labor and land national regional and
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local governments have made enormous
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investments in transportation and
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communication infrastructure to make it
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competitive and more prominent in the
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global economy so the open door policy
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the industrialization of the pearl river
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delta and the government investment all
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accelerated the region's urbanization or
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the shift in residence of population
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from rural to urban areas as urban
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geographers we take skills from both
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physical and human geography and a bunch
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of other fields to study the way people
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and economies move between rural and
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urban living so we care about
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urbanization for the same reasons we
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care about why people migrate because it
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means a change to the structure of the
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human experience and worldwide
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urbanization is kind of on the rampage
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the un estimates that by 2050 two-thirds
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of the world's population will be
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urbanized and that's the inverse of how
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it was just a century ago when less than
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one-third lived in cities
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china itself reflects this dramatic
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shift until the 1990s about 70 percent
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of china's people still lived in the
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countryside today this has almost
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flipped with 61 percent of people living
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in cities china's government has relaxed
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some of the residency laws that
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previously controlled where people could
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live and have also drawn up plans to
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establish hundreds of new cities for
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better or worse they're investing in
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cities as powerful engines of economic
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development that bring higher incomes
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and improved living standards that lead
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to a better quality of life for people
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but studying cities is vital for so many
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reasons cities are also a key part of
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economic development which is a specific
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form of economic growth that increases
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the complexity of an economy
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think of all the different jobs people
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do in any typical large and prosperous
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city like new york london or shanghai in
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rural areas the range of jobs is simpler
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in fact the urbanist jane jacobs who
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specialized in city planning which we'll
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talk about more next time has argued
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that instead of thinking of economic
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development as something that happens to
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countries it's a process that happens in
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and through cities
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unlike countries which are defined by
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their borders cities are economic
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entities geographically defined by their
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connections so for instance shanghai the
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foremost financial and trade center of
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china is as closely tied to another
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preeminent city like singapore as it is
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to almost any other chinese city but
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urbanization isn't just about the
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population growth of towns and cities it
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also means other changes like in the
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sectors of the economy people work in or
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in the makeup of the city's population
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and as some cities decline the relative
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size of an individual city the role it
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plays and its relationship to other
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cities also changes it's a dynamic
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landscape so geographers think through
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the process of urban growth and change
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and the distributions and patterns of
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cities using urban systems or the ways
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in which cities of different sizes are
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connected within a set of urban
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settlements like many cities both old
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and new became central places for the
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surrounding rural areas
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a central place is well centrally
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located so that accessibility from
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surrounding areas is maximized for
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example in the 1930s towns and cities in
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southern germany were still mostly used
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for local markets and shopping
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and this is when economic geographer
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walter chris dollar looked at consumer
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behavior to explain the size and
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distribution of settlements within an
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urban system called central place theory
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chris dollar and later another economist
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august losch wanted to explain why urban
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systems were arranged the way they were
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and they proposed that economics were
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key chris dollar explained that a large
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number of small settlements will be
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situated relatively close to one another
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because people don't want to travel far
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for everyday needs like getting bred
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from a bakery but people would travel
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further for more expensive and
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infrequent purchases or specialized
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goods and services which would be
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located in larger settlements that are
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farther apart but chris dollar explained
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settlement patterns using an idealized
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region with uniform terrain climate and
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soils where everyone could travel easily
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in all directions
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and a model like that doesn't respond
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well as the world changes because today
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we can talk about a global urban system
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where global or world cities sit at the
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very top of the hierarchy regardless of
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whether they're centrally located or not
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these leading cities like new york
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london and tokyo are part of a network
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defined by their connections to each
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other
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and identifying networks of cities of
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different sizes and ranks is fundamental
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to understanding the evolution of the
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contemporary world for instance in
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countries with a high standard of living
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we've noticed a different pattern based
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on population size within the overall
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hierarchy of urban systems the rank size
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distribution basically says that if
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settlements are ranked from largest to
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smallest by population then the
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population of say the second largest
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city will be one half the size of the
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largest and the third largest will be
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one third and the fourth largest will be
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a quarter the size and so on but in many
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parts of the world the rank size rule
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becomes distorted when the population of
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the largest city is wildly large
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especially when compared with the next
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largest city like in 2022 buenos aires
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is 10 times larger than cordoba the
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second largest city in argentina
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geographers call this primacy and
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primate cities like buenos aires can
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also account for such a huge share of
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the economic political and cultural
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activity they dominate within their
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urban systems
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so the rule doesn't hold in all cases
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but it's still valuable to learn about
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and build on these models as we try to
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understand cities and how they grow and
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there are many other models and factors
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that help us understand urban systems
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like most primate cities are found in
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low and middle-income countries where
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many of them were colonial cities at
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some point in their histories and being
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a colonial city has likely contributed
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to the dramatic influence many primate
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cities have on their regions because of
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the key roles they played in the economy
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under colonialism
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for example many primate cities reports
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through which european powers extracted
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raw materials from the rest of the
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region and places like buenos aires grew
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based on dealing in things like wool and
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cereals so there are many ways to
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explain urbanization and how different
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urban systems are structured from
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economic theories like central place
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theory to the lingering influences of
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colonialism ultimately economies
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shifting around the world to be more
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focused on technology industrialization
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and services means that city growth and
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urbanization have become irreversible
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urbanization is one of the most
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important and prolific geographic
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phenomena in today's world which means
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what we've covered so far is just the
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tip of the iceberg
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most of the world lives in an urban area
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and how that happened requires us to
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look at both global forces and local
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factors which we'll do more next time
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when we take a peek inside a city many
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maps and borders represent modern
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geopolitical divisions that have often
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been decided without the consultation
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permission or recognition of the land's
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original inhabitants many geographical
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place names also don't reflect the
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indigenous or aboriginal people's
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languages so we at crash course want to
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acknowledge these people's traditional
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and ongoing relationship with that land
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and all the physical and human
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geographical elements of it we encourage
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you to learn about the history of the
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place you call home through resources
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like nativeland.ca and by engaging with
00:10:49
your local indigenous and aboriginal
00:10:51
nations through the websites and
00:10:52
resources they provide
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thanks for watching this episode of
00:10:55
crash course geography which is filmed
00:10:57
at the team sandoval pier studio and was
00:10:59
made with the help of all these nice
00:11:01
people
00:11:02
if you want to help keep crash course
00:11:03
free for everyone forever you can join
00:11:05
our community on patreon
