| A | B |
|---|
| culture | The way of life that distinguishes a people, for example, government, language, religion, customs, and beliefs. |
| population density | The average number of people living in a given area. |
| birthrate | The number of live births each year per 1000 people. |
| immigrant | A person who moves into a country. |
| emigrant | A person that leaves a country to live elsewhere. |
| urbanization | The growth of city populations. |
| rural | Of, or characteristic of, the countryside. |
| culture hearth | A place in which important ideas begin and thereafter spread to surrounding cultures. |
| cultural convergence | The contact and interaction of one culture with another. |
| diffusion | Process by which a cultural element is transmitted from one group or individual to another. |
| cultural divergence | The restriction of a culture from outside influences. |
| sovereignty | A country's freedom and power to decide on policies and actions. |
| unitary system | A system of government in which one central government holds most of the political power. |
| federation | A government structure in which some powers are given to the national government and other powers are reserved for more local governments. |
| confederation | A system of government in which individual political units keep their sovereignty but give limited power to a central government. |
| authoritarian | Descriptive of a system of government in which the leaders hold all the political power. |
| dictatorship | A system of government in which absolute power is held by a small group or one person. |
| totalitarianism | A system of government in which a central authority controls all aspects of society. |
| monarchy | A system of authoritarian government headed by a monarch-a king,queen, shah,or sultan-whose position is usually inherited. |
| democracy | A system of government in which the people are invested with the power to choose their leaders and determine government policy. |
| traditional economy | An economic system in which families produce goods and services for their own use, with little surplus and exchange of goods; also known as subsistence economy. |
| market economy | An economic system in which decisions about production, price, and other economic factors are determined by the law of supply and demand. |
| command economy | An economic system that is controlled by a single central government. |
