Social Sciences and History / Unit 10 SSH 0905 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Projection: The Sphere Onto the Page
Captions available
The idea
A projection transfers locations from the Earth's curved surface to a flat map, and distortion is unavoidable, as flattening an orange peel shows. Area, shape, distance or direction suffer. On the Mercator projection Greenland appears larger than South America though it is much smaller.
In practice
The anchor names Mercator alone.
Where people slip
Every projection trades one accuracy for another.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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