First, we focus on environment and human activity identifying those features of the natural environment -- climate and other features driven by climate are -- of salient significance for human activity. Local seasonal patterns of precipitation and temperature are identified as the most important manifestations of "climate" for our purposes. A discussion of global climate identifies the major global determiners of local climate and its change over time. The focus narrows to the climate of North America and successively to regions, sub-regions and localities that concern us in this course. As the geographical focus narrows, the interaction of global climatic features with topography and other surface geological features plays an increasingly significant role in determining environmental features of interest.
Since this perspective is somewhat lengthy, a table of contents is provided.
