Landscape Sphere Research Articles

Principles of a Landscape Classification

A classification of natural landscapes based on a combination of historical-genetic and structural criteria is offered. The classificatory categories of a higher order are based on genetic and spatial associations of landscapes; the lower taxonomic entities are based largely on internal landscape structure. The taxonomic entities range from division to subspecies. The earth's landscape sphere is first broken down into divisions of terrestrial and water landscapes. Divisions fall into systems based on zonal differences in the heat and water balance (subarctic, boreal, subboreal, etc.). Systems fall into classes (plains and mountain landscapes), and classes break down into groups of landscapes based on geochemical and moisture criteria (eluvial, hydromorphic, etc.). Groups fall into types on the basis of bioclimatic and soils criteria (wooded steppe, steppe, desert etc.). Types break down into genera on the basis of genetic landform types (alluvial plains, colian landforms, etc.). Finally, the genera fall into species and subspecies on the basis of dominant and subordinated morphologic units known in Russian as urochishche. Examples of steppe plains genera might be gently rolling sandy plains with feathergrass on dark chestnut soils, or level plateau with a mantle of loam and fascue grass on dark chestnut carbonate soils.

On the Problems of Geography and the Tasks of Popularizing Geographical Knowledge

AbstractA Moscow University geographer who advocates a unity of geography uses the medium of the Znaniye [Knowledge] Society, an organization for the popularization of scientific knowledge and communist ideology, to review the basic problems confronting geography as a research discipline. He reviews the historical sequence of philosophic concepts relating to the man-environment system in an attempt to justify his approach to the system as one in which both natural and social laws operate. Anuchin stresses the need for pure theoretical research in geography and polemicizes with those who seek prompt practical results. He restates his definition of the geographical environment as that part of the earth's landscape sphere in which nature and society interact as two parts of a single whole governed by distinctive laws. The metachronous character of development of the landscape sphere, with several parts formed at various times, is cited as an example of such a universal law. Anuchin agrees with the authors of...

The Scientific Basis for Presentation of the General Geographical Relations of the Landscape Sphere in an Exhibit of the Museum of Earth Science

AbstractThe author, a curator of the Earth Science Museum of Moscow University and an advocate of a general geography, reviews the methodological dispute in Soviet geography. He urges official status in education and research for a general geography that would be concerned with establishing the general geographic laws of the man-nature relationship and would delimit natural-social regions and zones. Such a general geography, in the author's view, would not supersede or dominate the other branches of geography, but would function side by side with the particular disciplines. Proposals made by I. P. Gerasimov in 1966 to restructure geography into basic problem areas instead of the traditional subdivisions are said to be in line with the efforts of those advocating a general geography.

The Landscape Sphere and the Geographical Environment

AbstractAn advocate of a unified geography adopts a biosocial, or natural-social, approach to the definition of several concepts in geography, distinguishing the landscape sphere and the geographical environment. The landscape sphere of the earth consists of the sphere of the natural landscape (comprising both untouched and man-altered nature) and the sphere of human activity, or sociosphere, which includes the sphere of the cultural landscape (agrosphere plus technosphere) and mankind itself. The geographical environment includes the natural environment (man-altered nature plus parts of untouched nature), the material results of the labor of past generations and geographical manifestations of the social environment.

The Subject of Geography and the Science of the Man-Nature Relationship

AbstractA philosopher views the geographical environment as a natural-social concept, in which individual elements function simultaneously in a system of natural and social relationships. The geographical environment should be the province of a discipline called general geography, which would exist in addition to specialized physical and social geography. However, since general geography is limited spatially to the earth's landscape sphere, it cannot deal with the broader aspects of the man-nature relationship now that man's influence extends increasingly beyond the earth into outer space. A new discipline called “noology” is proposed to deal with the interplay between human society and all of nature.

The Concept of Landscape and Landscapes of Different Orders

The paper is an expanded version of a Lomonosov lecture given April 12, 1956, in the Earth Science Museum of Moscow University. Yefremov criticizes the confusion derived from the dual meaning of “landscape” as used by Soviet geographers: (1) landscape as an areal unit of varying taxonomic rank constituting a complex of all components that interact within the earth's surficial sphere (or landscape sphere), and (2) landscape as an indivisible basic areal unit, or “molecule,” or “cell” of physical geography. Yefremov defends the first and assails the second point of view.