What does Migration Mean?
Migrations are permanent moves to new locations that have
occurred on local, regional, and global levels. There are countless reasons why
people voluntarily migrate, but most of them are economic. A push factor encourages
people to move from the region that they live in, and a pull factor attracts
them to a new region. For example, push factors force refugees to migrate from
their homes because of persecution based on religion, race, nationality, or
political opinions. Pull factors for these refugees may bring them to an area
that has better jobs and a more democratic government. Environmental factors
influence migrations greatly, sometimes as intervening obstacles, or
physical features that halt or slow migration from one place to another. Over
time, these obstacles may have different meanings: an ocean that separated
lands no longer prevents migrations once the technology to cross the ocean
develops.
With population movement,
people spread their cultures to new areas through a process called cultural
diffusion, including innovations, technology, religion, language, food and
clothing styles, and disease. Throughout history diseases have spread as human
interactions have increased: Famous examples include the 14th century plague
that spread from Asia to Europe, and the contagious diseases that spread
rapidly through the Native American populations that came into contact with
Europeans in the New World during the 15th
and 16th
centuries. During prehistoric times,
human beings migrated to many parts of the globe, setting the stage for human
domination of other species on earth. Although we cannot pin these prehistoric
migrations to a single "marker event" because they took place
gradually over long periods of time, without them humans might not have
survived those early years.
Question 1: Define Migrations and Explain why people move from region to region?
Question 2: What is cultural diffusion? Provide a modern example!
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