A Comparative Historical-Geographical Study on the diffusion and change of 'town ships'

“乡镇”一词有多种含义。当“乡”在英国获得新的功能和意义时，“乡”一词的混乱或混合用法被带入新英格兰。包含规划元素的新英格兰乡有一个独立的扩散和发展过程，同时也反映了与英国乡的联系。新英格兰乡镇与原来的乡镇发展不同的一个主要原因是，当这个词被引入新英格兰时，英国乡镇仍在完善其要素的过程中。在这两个地区，乡镇是同时形成的，两种乡镇类型后来都影响了其他地区的乡镇，有些是独立的，有些是相互依存的。乡镇向南方殖民地和加拿大殖民地的扩散是新英格兰乡镇的典型模式，其中包括一些与英国乡镇的联系。西部土地和新南威尔士州的乡镇显示出另一种发展模式或进一步专业化的要素。相比之下，从约克公爵和威廉佩恩的城镇转移到大西洋中部殖民地的过程似乎是17世纪英国所确定的先前过程的再现。这大概是因为包含了行政因素的英国城镇是这些殖民地思想的主要模式或起源。这一过程既代表了一种扩散模式，也代表了作为一种文化和社会现象的乡镇概念的变化。

The term "township" had various meanings. When the township was gaining a new function and obtaining another meaning in Britain, that chaotic or mixed usage of the term was brought into New EnglandThe New England township incorporating the planning element had an independent diffusion and development process, as well as reflecting a link with the British township. One of the main reasons why the New England township could have developed differently from the original one is that the British township was still on the way to completing its elements, when the term was taken into New England. In both regions the township crystallized simultaneously and both township types subsequently influenced the townships of other regions, some independently and sometimes inter-dependently.The diffusion of township into the southern colonies and Canadian colonies was realized as typical patterns in terms of the New England townships, including some links through those in Britain. Thetownships in the Western Lands and in New South Wales show another pattern of the development or further specialization of the element.By contrast, the process shifting from the townships of the Duke of York's Laws and William Penn to those of the Middle-Atlantic colonies seems to be a reappearance of the previous process identified in Britain in the seventeenth century. It is presumably because the British township, which had contained the administrative element, was a principal model or origin of idea in those colonies.This process represented both a diffusion pattern and changes in the concept of a township as a cultural and social phenomenon.