Aardrijkskunde Atlasgebruik

Geography : using an atlas

Aardrijkskunde: gebruik van een atlas

Questions, questions and questions!

• Have you ever used an atlas before?

• What were you looking for?

Understanding an atlas

The maps in an atlas are grouped together to make it easier to find a particular map. The Bosatlas starts with maps in a large scale. The first maps you come across are all about The Netherlands. The scale gets smaller, the further you browse through the atlas. Next you will find maps about Europe, followed by the other continents. Finally, there are maps about the whole world.When opening the Bosatlas, the first thing you see is the main legend. In section 2, you have learned what a legend is. The main legend in an atlas shows you what all the colours, letters and symbols mean on maps that don’t have their own legend.

"Men hoeft de wereld niet te begrijpen, men hoeft alleen zijn plaats erin weten te vinden."

Albert Einstein 1879-1955

you need.On the inside of the back cover of an atlas there is a bookmark. The bookmark shows the world map, map of Europe and a map of The Netherlands. Different countries or regions are shown inside squares. Searching here is the quickest way to find the page numbers of maps, if you already know which country or region you want to locate.

Pieter Roelf Bos, who made the first Bosatlas.

Finding a location in an atlas

To find a specific location, you sometimes need more information than just a page or a map number. To help you, most maps in an atlas contain sections. A section is a square on a map, made out of vertical and horizontal lines. Between the lines there are letters and numbers to specify a certain section. Between the vertical lines, you will find letters; while between the horizontal lines you will find numbers. Tim has to find the location of Rimini in Italy. He finds it in the index, in this format: Rimini 96 D2. It means he can find Rimini on page 96 and has to look in section D2. It is shown in figure 1.22. The D is between the vertical lines on the map. The number 2 is in between the horizontal lines. You can compare this to the game Zeeslag.

The game zeeslag

Charts in an atlas

In an atlas, you can also find information about places in the world. For example, you can find information about climates, economy and even where most potatoes come from! Most of that information will be provided in the form of charts.The most common charts are circle charts and bar charts. A circle chart is divided into slices to show the proportion of something. A bar chart uses bars to show you the proportion of something. The height of the bar is equal to the quantity within a category.

Circle chart

Statistics in an atlas

Behind the last world map in the atlas and in front of the index pages, you will find statistics; these give information in the form of numbers, about specific subjects like the population and economy of most countries in the world. For example, you can find exactly how many people were living in Italy in a certain year or how many kilos of grain are produced in Italy.

Statistic

Different atlases around the world

Not all atlases around the world are the same; different countries use different ones. The people who make atlases are influenced by cultural and political views. That means the maps in different atlases will also have a different focus. Countries will most likely show their own land in the centre of the map. All other countries and continents will therefore look different from the way we are used to seeing them. Another difference can be the borders shown between countries: in some conflict areas, the borders of countries are not agreed upon. Since the Crimean conflict, Crimea is shown as part of Russia on Russian maps, while it is still part of Ukraine on maps from most other countries.

A map of China showing Taiwan as a region of China; however, Taiwan considers itself as an indepent country.

Essence

There are four methods to find the information you seek in an atlas. You can use the table of contents, the index, the keyword index or the bookmark. On the cover page at the front of the atlas you will find the main legend. A circle chart and a bar chart and the statistics give detailed information about a specific topic. The statistics shows numerical facts about the countries of the world.