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Urban Geography

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Urban Geography

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The word urban is used to describe a place with high human population density and many built environment features compared to other areas surrounding it while geography is the study of the physical and human or social environments of the Earth. Therefore Urban Geography is concerned with the relations among people, and between people and their environments, in cities and towns across countries in the world (Northam, 1979).
Early Urban civilizations
Civilizations can be defined as a complex way of life that started as people began to develop urban settlements. The early civilization developed after 3000 BCE, when the rise of agriculture allowed people to have food and economic stability. The rise of agriculture made the agricultural population to advance beyond village life and they could no longer practice farming. The first civilization was witnessed in Mesopotamia now called Iraq and then in Egypt. Civilizations mostly thrived in the Indus Valley by 2500 BCE, in China by 1500 BCE and in Central America, what is now Mexico, by 1200 BCE. Civilizations thereafter developed on every continent except Antarctica (Redman, 1978).
Cities
Cities can be either merchant cities, primate cities or industrial cities. A merchant is a businessperson who mainly trades in commodities produced by others in an aim of making profit. Merchant cities existed even in the early years where warehouses of prominent and wealthy merchants ‘tobacco lords’ were built. They mainly prospered in shipping of tobacco amongst other thing like sugar and tea. A primate city is regarded as a major city which works as the political, financial and population hub of a country and cannot be rivaled by any other city in the country on this front. Primate cities normally have a population that is twice that of the second largest city in the country.

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