GEOG 101 AMU Introduction to Geography American Military University Week 8 assistance is available at Domyclass

WEEK 8: Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Realm
Lesson Overview

The Austral and Pacific realms are unique in almost all respects. Not only is the Austral realm located exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere, it’s also completely unconnected to any larger landmass. These factors have led to the evolution of many species of plants and animals found nowhere else. The Pacific realm consists entirely of islands scattered about an ocean that’s larger the all of Earth’s landmasses combined. Many of these islands face significant challenges, not the least of which is sea level rise caused by warming temperatures.

Students will be able to:

Recognize the major geographic qualities of the Austral and Pacific Realms. (CO-2, CO-3)
Identify the major climate types associated with each realm. (CO-3)
Recognize the nature and elements of the physical setting. (CO-1, CO-3)
Review the characteristics of cultural landscape. (CO-2, CO-5, CO-7)
Name the geographic realms and recognize their regional components. CO-2, CO-3, CO-7)

In this lesson, we will discuss:

Geographic Qualites
Major Climate Types
Cultural Landscape

The following activities and assessments need to be completed this week:

Reading:
- World Regional Geography: People, Places, Globalization – Chapters 12 and 13
Forum #8
Quiz 8

The Austral Realm – Pacific Realm and Polar Futures

In this final lesson, we focus on three of the world’s vast expanses that are so different from those discussed in previous lessons that an entirely new perspective is required to consider them. Water and ice, not land and soil, dominate their physiography. These are places where the environmental changes that occur have consequences for the entire planet.

Topics covered will include:

Physical Geography of the Austral Realm
Australia
New Zealand
The Austral Realm’s Colonial History
The Pacific Realm
Three Island Regions
Antarctica

Introduction

The first of the two realms we will consider in this lesson is the geographically unique Austral realm. It is the only geographic realm that lies entirely in the Southern Hemisphere, and the only realm that has no land link of any kind to a neighboring realm and is thus completely surrounded by ocean and sea. It is the world’s second least populous realm. Appropriately, its name refers to its location (the word austral comes from the Latin for south)—a location far from the sources of its dominant cultural heritage, but close to its newfound economic partners on the Asian Pacific Rim.

The discussion of the Pacific realm and Antarctica wraps up our tour of the world. The Pacific realm is divided into three regions: Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. This final lesson also includes an overview of Antarctica. Given its unique status in the world, this southernmost realm is an extremely interesting one to study.

Physical Geography of the Austral Realm

Whitsunday Island from Melbourne, Australia

Australia and New Zealand’s identity as a realm is based on many criteria. Chief among these involves their large European populations and cultures, an anomaly in this historically inaccessible portion of the world. Yet this peripheral global location, historically perceived as unfavorable, has not hindered progress in these two highly developed nations. Their “absolute” locations puts these countries in the Southeast Asian realm, while their “relative” locations includes them as an historical core area with strong ties to Europe.

Australia consists of two islands: its large main landmass and the much smaller island of Tasmania to the south. The main physical area of New Zealand also consists of two main islands separated from Australia’s southeastern region by the Tasman Sea. The Indian Ocean surrounds the realm to the west and the Southern ocean lies to the realm’s south. Indonesia and Papua New Guinea are its northern neighbors, separated by the Timor and Arafura seas.

One of the world’s great geographic marvels, the Great Barrier Reef, runs over 1,600 miles off Australia’s northeastern shores. TThe Coral Sea, part of the South Pacific, takes its name in part from the Great Barrier Reef from the South Pacific. Further south of Australia and New Zealand is Antarctica.

While Australia and New Zealand are often grouped together in geographic terms, the two countries are extremely different in terms of physical geographies. Australia has a mostly flat terrain with low elevation highlands and an extensive dry interior, while New Zealand has high mountains and receives plentiful precipitation.

Since New Zealand and Australia have been historically isolated from the rest of the world, animals and other organisms that are found nowhere else on Earth have evolved and thrived in these two countries. These include a large number of unique marsupials, such as kangaroos, wallabies, koalas, and bandicoots. Other animal and plant species are also unique to this realm.

It is believed that creatures such as these evolved separately after the islands of Australia and New Zealand broke away from the Eurasian landmass over two hundred million years ago. During the Ice Age, the sea level of the oceans was lower, and the many islands of Southeast Asia were connected by land to the mainland. During this time, Papua New Guinea was connected to Australia. The following separation caused creatures in the southern mass to develop independently from those in the north.

Large in area but sparse in population, Australia is only slightly smaller in area than the continental United States. The Tropic of Capricorn runs right through the middle of this country. A low-lying island, it is also is the flattest of all continents. Its chief mountain range, the Great Dividing Range, extends along the continent’s eastern coast from Melbourne in the southeast to the Cape York peninsula in the far northeast. This low-lying range averages about four thousand feet above sea level, with its highest peaks just over seven thousand feet.

The Darling-Murray River, Australia’s largest river system, begins in the highlands of the Great Dividing Range. It flows inward through New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, and South Australia, its basin covering most of the southeast quadrant of the continent.

The continent’s interior is known as the outback. Extending west from the Great Dividing Range to the western coast of the continent, this region receives far less rainfall than the coastal areas. Deserts and semiarid plateaus with rough grasses and scrublands characterize its terrain. Many of the people who live in this extremely sparsely populated area are members of aboriginal groups, who have inhabited the outback since long before European explorers arrived.

Western Australia has three large deserts: the Gibson Desert, Great Victoria Desert, and Great Sandy Desert. The Simpson Desert is located in the border region between the Northern Territory, Queensland, and South Australia. For the most part, these deserts are characterized by coarse grassland rather than sand. The grassy plateaus and shrublands provide grazing for domesticated cattle and sheep. Much of the economy of Australia’s interior is based upon livestock herding.

Also in western Australia is Mount Augustus National Park. Mount Augustus, as it is called, rises 2,352 feet above the desert landscape and is about five miles long. Mt. Augustus is more than twice the size of the more famous Uluru (Ayers Rock), which is located about two hundred miles southwest of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. Uluru rises 1,142 feet above the outback and is about 2.2 miles long. Both features are greatly valued for their cultural merits by the Aborigines in Australia, by whom they are considered sacred sites.

Politically, Australia is divided into six states (Western Australia, Tasmania, South Australia, Queensland, Victoria and New South Wales) and two territories (the Northern Territory, Australian Capital Territory). A number of small islands around Australia are held as protectorates. Australia has two core regions, one in the west and one in the east. The city of Perth anchors the small core area on the continent’s west coast. But most of Australia’s people live in the much larger core region along its east coast, which extends from Brisbane to Adelaide and holds most of the country’s population.

Overall, about 232 million make Australia their home, fewer than in the metropolis of Mexico City. Over 90 percent of these people are of European and mostly British heritage, with English is its official language and Christianity its dominant religion. One quarter of Australia’s population is foreign born, and another quarter consists of first generation Australians. Somewhat less than half of Australia’s foreign born population is from the UK and New Zealand, but the number of non-European immigrants continues to grow. As the number of immigrants to Australia has grown, so has the number of both immigrant and native-born residents who speak two languages fluently—English and the language of their birthplace or national heritage. About 70 Aboriginal languages are also spoken, a drastic reduction from the over 300 languages that were present in Australia before the arrival of the Europeans.

Australia’s population is concentrated mostly in its urban areas, with over 90 percent of the population inhabiting its cities. Most of these cities are in coastal areas. The largest city, Sydney, is positioned at the heart of the main core area. To the south of Sydney is the Australian Capital Territory, home to the planned capital city of Canberra. Other major Australian cities include Melbourne, Perth, Adelaide, and Brisbane.

Australia is resource-rich and has incredible economic potential. It is home to more sheep than humans, accounting for one-fifth of the world’s wool production. The western sector of the Great Dividing Range is home to large grain production operations. Crops such as sugarcane are grown in the coastal region of Queensland. Many regions of southern Australia are excellent for grape production, and Australian wine production has risen to compete with the U.S. and European markets.

Only the dry central desert regions in the center of the continent are not favorable for agriculture. In the early twentieth century, Australia became wealthy by exporting food products to the rest of the world. Today, with the profit margin on food goods not what it used to be, the country has had to look elsewhere to gain wealth. One of these places has been its iron ore mines and abundant coal reserves. Minerals such as zinc, copper, gold, silver, tungsten, and nickel are found in parts of the country, and oil and natural gas fields can be found in other regions.

However, today Australia’s chief industry is tourism. Its biodiversity and general uniqueness has created an international attraction to the island continent of Australia, which has only grown in the past few decades. Sites such as Uluru and the Great Barrier Reef have made Australia a top destination for those wishing to see a geography that is unlike any other in the world.

New Zealand: South Island

The South Island is far more mountainous than its northern companion. The Southern Alps divide the South Island lengthwise, and many of its peaks reach over 10,000 feet. The highest is Mount Cook, which reaches over 12,000 feet above sea level. Like the North Island’s volcanoes, the Southern Alps are also formed by the area’s tectonic situation. New Zealand’s location places it along one of the edges of the Ring of Fire, which encircles the Pacific Ocean basin and along which more than 75 percent of the world’s volcanoes are found.

Hundreds of millions of years ago, New Zealand was a part of Gondwanaland, the southern portion of the supercontinent of Pangaea that included most of the land in what is the Southern Hemisphere today. Over time, as a result of tectonic activity, the earth’s plates shifted and the supercontinent of Gondwanaland broke apart. This left New Zealand geographically isolated for thousands of years. The unique species of plants and animals found in New Zealand evolved from the species found on Gondwanaland. This unique and fascinating geological history has produced more than fifteen hundred plant and animal species that are found nowhere else in the world. The biomes of the North Island include a subtropical area, an evergreen forest, and a small grasslands area. The South Island biomes include extensive grasslands in the east, forest areas, and an alpine vegetation zone in the Southern Alps.

New Zealand’s fertile soils, mild climate, and ample sunlight create ideal conditions for agriculture. Sheep and other livestock graze upon the grasslands, which grow healthily all year long. Wool, meat, and butter are important exports. Some of New Zealand’s natural resources are found underground, including coal, natural gas, and precious metals such as gold.

The nation’s primary city, Auckland, has 1.2 million people and is located on the North Island. Wellington, on the South Island, is only one-fourth the size of Auckland but is New Zealand’s capital. Christchurch, the largest city of the South Island, is located along the eastern seaboard on the productive Canterbury Plain, where soils and conditions are excellent for productive agriculture of all types. These modern cities are home to the centers that prepare New Zealand’s agricultural products for domestic use and for export.

The ever-growing populations of Asia and the rest of the world welcome New Zealand’s agricultural exports. New Zealand does not gain a large part of its national income from its mining or manufacturing industries, but from agricultural ones. Since its population is not very large, its national wealth can be distributed via the private sector economy and allow the people of New Zealand to enjoy a high standard of living.

New Zealand’s market economy has long had a productive agricultural sector geared toward export profits. A “wool boom” in the 1950s helped create this wave of prosperity that continues today, though the economy has diversified into other areas such as tourism and exploitation of natural resources, especially natural gas and hydroelectricity generation.

Many islands and island groups are found in the Pacific realm. This realm encompasses most of the Pacific Ocean, making it the largest of all geographic realms in its physical scope; however, in terms of actual land area it is the smallest, and also has the smallest human population. Its largest island in both area and population is New Guinea, where over 90 percent of its people live.

Many of the Pacific islands have become independent, sovereign nations. Others are still controlled by the same powers that colonized them decades or centuries earlier. Many of these islands played a large role in the fight between the United States and Japan in World War II, and the legacy of this devastating conflict lingers today. The United States has been a major player in the post–World War II domination and control of many islands, with the Hawaiian Islands becoming the fiftieth U.S. state in 1959.

The cultural heritage of the many indigenous groups in the realm remains strong, but Western culture has also left an impact on the people of this part of the world. Globalization has greatly influenced many aspects of Pacific life, and these cultural forces have taken the focus away from the traditional indigenous culture and heritage.

These islands were economically self-sufficient for centuries, with fishing and farming as the main economic activities. Neighboring islands often had thriving trade relationships with each other, trading their natural resources. Changes in national boundaries have often served the purpose of protecting each nation’s offshore fishing rights as overfishing reduces an island’s ability to provide food for its own people.

In recent decades, some wealth has been gained from the mining of phosphates and other substances on some islands, but overall the Pacific realm has had little to offer colonial powers in terms of exploitable resources. But the pleasant climates, beautiful beaches, and tropical island terrains of many of these islands have attracted tourists from throughout the world. Tourism is a growing sector of the service industry, and one that has required investments in airports, hotels, and public services. Many islands have been unable to afford the expenditures involved in growing a tourism-based economy.

Antarctica, larger than Australia and 1.3 times larger than Europe, is located entirely south of 60° latitude and is surrounded by the Southern Ocean, where the cold waters off its coast move from west to east in a clockwise rotation around the continent. Its many mountain ranges give it the highest elevation of any continent. The Transantarctic Mountain range stretches for over 2,000 miles, dividing the continent into a small western region and a larger eastern region.

At both ends of the Transantarctic Mountains are the continent’s two main ice shelves, the Ross Ice Shelf and the Ronne Ice Shelf. The Ellsworth Mountains are located in the western region and are home to Mount Vinson, the continent’s highest peak. Reaching an elevation of 16,050 feet, Mount Vinson is higher than any mountain in the continental United States, Europe, or Australia.

The Antarctic Peninsula, actually an extension of the Andes Mountains of South America, is home to many active volcanoes. One of these erupted in the late 1960s, destroying research stations in the area. The volcano remains active, and sightings of lava flows continue to be reported. An underwater volcano in the Antarctic Peninsula was discovered in 2004. Mount Erebus, located on Ross Island on the other side of Antarctica, is the world’s southernmost active volcano. Mt. Erebus has been active since 1972 and has a large lava lake in its inner crater.

An ice sheet covers about 98 percent of Antarctica. This ice sheet’s average thickness is over a mile and in some areas is nearly three miles deep. It holds about 70 percent of the earth’s fresh water. If this entire ice sheet were to melt, the Earth’s sea levels could rise 190 feet high enough cover many of the earth’s low-lying islands, peninsulas, and coastal regions.

Antarctica is considered a desert because it usually averages fewer than 10 inches of precipitation per year. It is the world’s driest continent with the least average annual precipitation as well its highest continent in average elevation. Not surprisingly, it is also the coldest of the continents. Temperatures reach a minimum of less than −110 °F in winter in the interior and greater than 55 °F near the coast in summer. The only human populations live in the research centers that have been established by several countries.

No one government politically controls the continent. Various explorers have laid claim to sections it since it was first sighted by Europeans in 1820 and the South Pole was first reached in 1911. Forty-six countries have signed the Antarctic Treaty, which prohibits military activities, mineral mining, and the disposal of waste products in Antarctica. Countries with original claims include Norway, New Zealand, France, the United Kingdom, Chile, Australia, and Argentina.

As mentioned before, if the ice covering Antarctica were to melt, the effects on the environment would be catastrophic. Recently, the effects of climate change on Antarctica have raised concerns throughout the world. The concept of global warming is one aspect of climate change, involving an increase in greenhouse gasses such as carbon dioxide, which help regulate the temperature of the earth’s atmosphere. The end result is warmer temperatures on the earth’s surface. The burning of fossil fuels is a main source of carbon dioxide that enters the atmosphere. Climate change may result in the melting of the polar ice sheet over Antarctica, which could raise sea levels considerably.

Another concern involves the layer of ozone in the Earth’s atmosphere. This layer protects the earth from harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun. Various chemicals reduce the amount of protective ozone in the stratosphere, which allows more of this radiation to reach the Earth. A seasonal cycle varies the amount of ozone in the stratosphere over the South Pole, causing an ozone hole when ozone is not abundant.