Branches of Geography (Series 4)

Geography is an integrative science and acts as a bridge between all natural and human sciences in providing a platform to understand the dynamics of the spatial patterns of the earth surface.

Since it is the ‘mother of all sciences’, the content of the subject cuts across various disciplines to analyse the emerging patterns and their implications for man while at the other provides information to other disciplines in their studies.

For example,
The GIS - gathers, integrates, analyse and interpret information from the domain of Space and Engineering technologies to disseminate the generated knowledge, principles and theories to various organisations and departments like the ONGC, OIL, Disaster Management Cells, Agriculture, Country and Town Planning, Transport and Communication etc.

Broadly, geography has two branches, viz.:

Systematic Geography which has sub-branches, like:

• Physical Geography, which further has, Geomorphology; Climatology; Oceanography; Hydrology; Soil Geography; Hazards Geography; Mountain Geography; Cryosphere Geography
• Human Geography has, Population Geography; Settlement Geography; Social Geography; Cultural Geography; Geography of Religions; Military Geography; Economic Geography; Agricultural Geography; Industrial Geography; Political Geography; Geography of Trade and Transport; Recreation, Tourism and Sport Geography
• Biogeography, which has, Plant Geography; Zoo Geography; Human Ecology; Environmental Geography
• Methods and Techniques of Geography has, Quantitative Geography; Field survey; Cartography; Geo-Informatics (GIS)

Regional Geography which has sub-branches, like:

• Regional Planning
• Regional Development
• Regional Analysis
• Regional Studies

At higher level of geographic studies, the branches offer tremendous scope for specialisation in the related and applied fields for which a geographer needs to be thorough in inter-disciplinary understanding of atleast the basic principles and content of subjects like: Cosmology; Physics-Chemistry-Biology; Anthropology; Geology; Meteorology; Maritime Studies; Pedology; Mathematics-Statistics; Engineering; IT; Economics; Political Science; History; Sociology etc.

For more, click 1 & 2