The Geographical Legacies of Mountains: Impacts on Cultural Difference Landscapes. Issue 1 (2nd January 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Wu, Wenjie; Wang, Jianghao; Dai, Tianshi; Wang, Xin (Mark)
• Is Part Of: Annals of the American Association of Geographers. Volume 108:Issue 1(2018)
• Page Start: 277
• Page End: 290
• Publication Date: 2018-01-02
• Subjects: cultural difference -- geocomputation -- geographic contextual -- spatial econometrics; 文化差异, 地理计算, 地理脉络, 空间计量经济。; diferencia cultural, geocomputación, contexto geográfico, econometría espacial; Geography -- Periodicals; Environmental sciences -- Periodicals; Geography; Electronic journals; Periodicals; 550
• DOI: 10.1080/24694452.2017.1352481
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2469-4452

Abstract

Abstract : Large-scale mountains that affect civilized linguistic exchanges over space offer potentially profound cultural difference landscape implications. This article uses China's national trunk mountain system as a natural experiment to explore the connection between spatial adjacency of mountains and cultural difference landscapes. Our spatial design documents that the presence of mountains widens the linguistic difference between two cities located on the opposite mountain sides, particularly when they are adjacent to administrative borders. The effect dwindles as spatial contiguity margins between city pairs increases. The results shed light on the importance of conceptualizing geographic contextual constraints to the configuration of cultural difference landscapes.