This book's cover is an aerial photo of a market in the Xochimilco district of Mexico City. This mosaic of brightly colored parasols hides a bustling market that offers fresh fruits arid vegetables, a selection of handmade local products, plus small household items of both local and foreign manufacture. Mexico boasts a vigorous international economy, with exports growing at a rate of 18 percent every year. Nevertheless, economic inequality is growing, and in some areas average earnings are as little as a quarter of the national average. Mexico's participation in the global economy exemplifies the global connections and farces that trigger constant and dynamic change everywhere on Earth. The study of these forces is one of modern geography's central missions. This book develops the idea that modern geography explores and explains the forces behind today's world. The book organizes its coverage around several main themes and ideas: Exploring the forces at work behind constantly evolving maps. In today's interconnected world, what happens at places depends more and more on what happens among places. Therefore, we can understand maps of economic or cultural activity only if we understand the activities and movements that create them. Understanding contemporary issues bar applying geographic concepts. What you read in your geography text and learn in your geography classroom will help you understand current events and form your own well-informed ideas about issues. Each chapter in this book uses the geographic concepts under discussion to help you understand current affairs. Highlighting important spatial relationships with a rich and diverse cartographic program. This book features many different types of maps and cartograms, as well as graphs, charts, and carefully chosen photographs. All are designed to clarify and illustrate the concepts under discussion. The book features contributions to the field made by new techniques in Geographic Information Science. Exploring the relationships between humans and their environment. Earth's physical environment sets the stage upon which humans act out their lives. The theme of human-environmental interaction is woven throughout the book.