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If you left school a decade ago, chances are much of what you learned about geography is no longer valid. More than thirty new countries have made their appearance on the geographic scene since 1990. Do you know where Namibia is? Eritrea? Kosovo? When we send troops to fight and perhaps die, do you know where in the world they are going? When the names of these distant and exotic lands lead news stories, do they mean anything to you? One needs a dictionary for geography to learn how the world changes from year to year–or week to week. But the geo-political climate isn’t all there is–or even a fraction of what there is–to know about geography. Geography seeks to answer questions about how mountains grow, why they blow their tops, what causes hurricanes, why rivers flow to the ocean, why undersea tectonic plate clashes cause tidal waves and earthquakes. Geography is the study of the world, its structures, its oceans, its faults, its people, even its weather. Geography is the science of studying the planet. The geographic dictionary supplements the abundance of scientific studies that compose geography. Geography is an attempt to describe or define the earth (graph=write) and includes or is directly related to geology, climatography, sociology, paleontology, and more. A dictionary of world geography can define the words with which we describe our planet and its inhabitants.Like every human endeavor, the study of geography has developed its own language, or jargon. If we’re going to undertake to describe our world, it behooves us to understand the words, or terms, from which that language is constructed. The geography dictionary aims to be a perfect resource for meanings of terms, a world geography dictionary that defines the language used to define the planet.The dictionary of geography home page links to fourteen appropriate divisions: World Fact book, Physical Geography Dictionary, Geography Dictionary, Cartography Dictionary, among others. Three of these hold meteorological definitions.Why is the jargon associated with geography different from that of everyday language? Don’t we all, or most of us, speak English in this country? In different fields of study, the same word may take on several meanings. Take ICON, for example. In religion, an icon is an artifact, statue or other object that inspires devotion: to a computer user an icon is a small visual aid that may be used to move from one program or page to another. To a geographer, an ICON is an acronym for “Integrated Cobweb Of Natural and Social trends.” In your Webster’s, it’s an image or representation.The geographic dictionary version will not be found in Webster’s New Riverside University Dictionary. Neither will ACCLAIM, which means to applaud to most people. The Geographer will recognize it as “Antarctic Circumpolar Current Levels by Altimetry and Island Measurements,” and relates to measurements from coastal tide gauges and bottom pressure stations. On the Home Page of Geography Dictionary.org, a Term of the Day is a handy little learning tool.

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