Where? [ruwor]
Russia [ruout] is the world's largest country. Even after the breakup of the Soviet Union, Russia is the largest country in the world (6,592,692 square miles; 17,075,000 square kilometers). Runners up are Canada, China, the United States, and Brazil. Even though it is largest country in the world in terms of area it is unfavorably located in relation to major sea lanes of the world. Also, despite its size, much of the country lacks proper soils [wdarable] and climates [ruclimat] (either too cold or too dry) for agriculture
The Russian Realm [ruwor] includes the country of Russia and the three transcaucasian countries [rucaucl] of Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.
Many geographers identify a Eurasian continent [wweurasm]. Most people divide this large land body into two continents: Europe and Asia with the Ural mountains of Russia [wweuctsm] as the border between them. Russia lies astride this boundary. Therefore you often hear the term "European Russia" for the heavily populated [rupopden] and industrialized Russian plain [ruplain] west of the Ural Mountains.
Finally, many geographers include the former communist countries of Eastern Europe [euregeas] and the new republics of Turkestan [nwregtur] in with the Russian realm because of the historical, political, and economic ties the region had with the Soviet Union [rufrmusr] (Russia) during the cold war.
The authors of our textbook chose to put Eastern Europe [euregeas] back into Europe predicting that the economic and political interactions in the FUTURE will be directed to the west to the rest of Europe, rather than east to Russia. And they chose to include the countries of Turkestan [nwregtur] in the realm of North Africa and Southwest Asia [nwworld] because of the strong cultural ties [nwrelig] that these countries have with the other Islamic countries of this realm
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Geography studies:
We have taken a REGIONAL APPROACH to these three questions. We've divided the world into 12 realms [wwrealsm] and have been studying WHY these 12 by looking at 4 REGIONAL CRITERIA:
Let's now apply these criteria to the Russian realm as we have defined it [wwrealsm] [ruwor]. Use the maps below to identify the physical, cultural, economic, and historical reasons that the authors used to define this realm. Look closely at the realm boundaries looking for physical barriers between realms and for cultural, economic, and historical differences between the Russian realm and its neighboring realms. Finally check to see if the realm boundaries pass through sparsely populated areas.
Physical Geography
[wwclimat]
[wwprec]
[rueleves]
[rupreces]
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Cultural Geography
[wwrelig]
[rurelig]
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Economic Geography
[realmmea.htm]
[wbgnpmap]
[wwhdi]
[ruhdi]
[rulifexp]
[rupopden]
[wrpopgr]
[rupopgr]
[rutransp]
[wrurban]
[ruurban]
[wraglab]
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Historical Geography
[rufrmusr]
[nwmslwor]
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Population Clusters
[wwecumen]
[rupopden]
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