Cultural Geography Blog Post
When people migrate from one place to another, they bring aspects of their culture and traditions with them which can affect the sense of place of a location. This can be studied through cultural geography. Cultural geography focuses on ‘the cultural values, practice […] the cultural diversity and plurality of society’ (Balasubramanian, 2018). Although cultural geography is a part of human geography, it is affected by physical aspects including the topography of the land and the climate in the location. These factors affect how people socialise with each other and the types of work that people can have. For example, in warmer countries, people typically stay outside socialising until early in the mornings whereas, in the United Kingdom, people tend to go back to their homes before midnight as it is too cold to stay outside at nights.
Some human factors that impact the cultural geography of a location are the economy of the area, the job market, and migration. Many people tend to move to places that have better employment opportunities so they can provide a better lifestyle for themselves and their families. When people migrate from different countries, they typically relocate to areas where other people from their country of origin have moved to before. This is so that they have people around them who share similar traditions and cultures as them making their new location have a sense of place. Sharing a culture can create a sense of place as ‘the world is known through the senses’ (Tuan, 1979, p387-427) therefore as people can relate their feelings to a location, it turns from just a space into a place for them.
An example of where this can be seen is in Chinatown in London. During the 1900s, the Chinese population in London was mainly concentrated in one area of the city. The job market in this area started to increase when the British soldiers came back to the United Kingdom after fighting in East Asia, therefore many Chinese families migrated to the area to create a successful career (Chinatown, 2021). Now there are thousands of Chinese families who live in this area and have changed the culture of the area to reflect Chinese culture instead of British Culture. This can be seen through the types of food as well as the celebration of Chinese holidays here, such as Chinese New Year.
References –
Reference:
Balasubramanian, A. (2018). Basics of Cultural Geography. University of Mysore. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325781826_Basics_of_Cultural_Geography
Chinatown. (2021). Chinatown London: A Potted History. https://chinatown.co.uk/en/culture/chinatown-london-potted-history/
Pixabay. (2021). Chinese New Year. https://pixabay.com/photos/chinese-new-year-chinese-lanterns-1605900/
Tuan, Y,F. (1979). Space and Place: Humanistic Perspective. Philosophy in Geography, 20, 387-427. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-9394-5_19
