Local degree of a continuous map (${\mathrm{deg}}_{x}f$)

Let $f:M\to N$ be a continuous map between oriented $d$-dimensional manifolds, with $d\ge 1$. Suppose $x$ is an isolated point of the fiber over $y=f(x)$. Choose an open neighborhood $U$ with $U\cap f^{-1}(y)=\{x\}$. The map of pairsinduces a map between rank-one degree-$d$ local homology groups. Relative to the local orientation of a manifold, this map is multiplication by an integer, the local degree. Excision makes it independent of the neighborhood. A smooth map between manifolds with invertible derivative at $x$ has local degree $\mathrm{sign}\det D{f}_x$, by the inverse function theorem and the chosen orientations.

In dimension two, $z\mapsto z^k$ for positive $k$ has local degree $k$ at zero, and $z\mapsto {\overline{z}}^{|k|}$ has degree $k$ for negative $k$. The proper map $z\mapsto |z{|}^2\in \mathbb{C}$ has isolated zero fiber and local degree zero, since its image misses every nearby nonreal target. These proper maps extend to the two-sphere. Taking their product with the identity of ${\mathbb{R}}^{n-2}$ realizes the same local degrees in every dimension $n\ge 2$. In dimension one an isolated local degree is restricted to $0,1,-1$.

For a continuous map $f:M\to N$ of closed connected oriented $d$-dimensional manifolds, suppose $f^{-1}(y)=\{x_1,\dots ,x_s\}$ is finite. ThenBy excision, the degree-$d$ relative homology group $H_d(M,M\setminus f^{-1}(y);\mathbb{Z})$ is the direct sum of the local groups at $x_j$. The fundamental class maps to the tuple of local orientation generators. Mapping this tuple to $H_d(N,N\setminus \{y\};\mathbb{Z})$ adds their local degrees. Naturality identifies the result with the image of $(\mathrm{deg}f)[N]$. If the fiber is empty, the same argument gives degree zero.