week 1: geospatial humanities
introduction to geospatial humanities • CLS-0125 • tufts university • prof. ian spangler
1. what is a “map?”
write down your definition.
Oxford English Dictionary, I.1.a
A drawing or other representation of the earth's surface or a part of it made on a flat surface, showing the distribution of physical or geographical features (and often also including socio-economic, political, agricultural, meteorological, etc., information), with each point in the representation corresponding to an actual geographical position according to a fixed scale or projection; a similar representation of the positions of stars in the sky, the surface of a planet, or the like. Also: a plan of the form or layout of something, as a route, a building, etc.
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
1
Map of the Boston & Maine Railroad, showing its relative position & connection with other railroads (1849), from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
2
Selected land use in oblique perspective�[ca. 1986], from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
3
Bird’s eye view of Boston (1850),�from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
4
A view of Boston taken on the road to Dorchester (1776),�from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
5
Railroad Jubilee on Boston Common (1851), from Wikimedia Commons
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
6
New Orleans (1986), from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
7
Satellite imagery of New Orleans and Lake Ponchartrain area (2017), from USGS
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
8
Satellite imagery of New England displayed in ArcGIS Online (2021), from MassGIS
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
9
Aerial oblique photo looking east (1944), from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
10
Little Round Top, Gettysburg, July 1863 (1863), from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
11
Panoramic view of Boston centered on the Prudential Tower [ca. 1968],�from LMEC
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
12
Tetris (1984), from
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
13
is this a map?
Oxford English Dictionary, I.3.a
A diagram or collection of data showing the spatial distribution of something or the relative positions of its components.
13
“We Put 700 Red Dots On A Map” (2014), Clickhole
Crampton, Jeremy W. 2009. Mapping: A Critical Introduction to Cartography and GIS. 1st ed. Wiley.
2. what are “geospatial humanities?”
… to answer, we actually need to
start with a different question
2. what are “digital humanities?”
digital humanities
from the digital humanities manifesto 2.0. (ca. 2011)
“first wave”
from Presner 2009
“While the first wave of Digital Humanities tended to focus, perhaps somewhat narrowly, on text analysis (such as classification systems, mark-up, text encoding, and scholarly editing) within established disciplines…
“second wave”
from Presner 2009
… Digital Humanities 2.0 introduces entirely new disciplinary paradigms, convergent fields, hybrid methodologies, and even new publication models that are often not derived from or limited to print culture.”
digital
humanities
geospatial humanities
“first wave”
a bunch of urban atlases from LMEC collections
“first wave”
Boston Public Library’s�digitizing lab
“first wave”
urban atlas of Medford in
LMEC digital collections
“second wave”
the Allmaps project
“second wave”
the Medford atlas <> Allmaps
“second wave”
LMEC’s Atlascope tool for exploring historic urban atlases
key components of digital humanities
Key components:
MacFadyen, Joshua, Benjamin Hoy, and Jim Clifford. 2022. The Geospatial Humanities. Vol. 1. Pressbooks. https://pressbooks.library.upei.ca/geospatialhumanities/front-matter/introduction/.
key components
key components
key components
key components
key components
key components
key components
key components
key components
key components
digital, collaborative, visualization, data creation, openness, identifying absences, storytelling & discovery
… does this schema actually make sense?
digital, collaborative, visualization, data creation, openness, identifying absences, storytelling & discovery
what’s your framework?
what’s your question?
can it be enriched through geospatial inquiry?
can it be answered?
can it raise a whole set of new questions? (very worthwhile)
why do you care about it?
3. (the rise of) gis
geographic�information�systems
gis are like onions
they both have
layers
Left: “composite physiographic obstructions” from Design With Nature, McHarg 1969.
Right: Ian McHarg, from The McHarg Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
This 1831 color lithograph by Robert Seymour depicts cholera as a robed, skeletal creature emanating a deadly black cloud. Courtesy of U.S. National Library of Medicine Collections.
Course of cholera in Boston (1849), from Leventhal Map & Education Center.
Course of cholera in London (1854), from Wikimedia Commons.
what makes gis different?
John Snow’s cholera map, verticalized (2023), by John Nelson
Remapping John Snow’s cholera map (2013), by leah meisterlin.
gis allows us to perform statistical analyses and mathematical computations on spatial data
this is a radical shift from the social and scientific function of maps in a pre-gis world
… but there’s more to the rise of gis than these white (and green) guys
Blanchard, C. P. (Charles Pinkney), 1843-1895. Abby Francis Blanchard operating a card punching machine, ca. 1890. Blanchard-Means Family Papers (MS 830). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries
Top: Nationalities and wage maps from Chicago’s Hull House ([1895]), Agnes Sinclair Holbrook & Samuel S. Greeley
Bottom: “The Seventh Ward of Philadelphia : the distribution of Negro inhabitants throughout the ward, and their social conditions” ([1889]), W.E.B. Du Bois
Top: “Brainy Boston Women Learn Sky’s Profoundest Secrets,” Boston Sunday Journal, 10 July 1904. From Zrull, Lindsay Smith. 2021. “Women in Glass: Women at the Harvard Observatory during the Era of Astronomical Glass Plate Photography, 1875–1975.” Journal for the History of Astronomy 52 (2): 115–46.
“The Map Maker in a Changing World. A draftsman is here shown making preliminary corrections in Sudetenland on a wall map of Europe. Such correction maps are kept up-to-date from day to day and when official data is finally released by the government whose political boundaries are involved. The work of seriously correcting the map plates begin ([1938]), from Boston Public Library Arts Department
“War Increases Map-Makers' Work. Hours of painstaking work go into the making of National Geographic Society maps used by the Army, Navy, governmental agencies and others. The hands shown pasting names on an original draft of a map of North America in this picture belong to Ann McTigue, draftsman. By coincidence she is pasting the name "Martinique" to the map to indicate the location of the French-owned Island in the Caribbean Sea over which the United States has expressed concern since the rise of Pierre Laval to control in France” (ca. May 1942]), from Boston Public Library Arts Department
Glenn A. Beck (background) and Betty Snyder (foreground) program ENIAC in BRL building 328. (U.S. Army photo, c. 1947–1955). Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
National Test Exercise - Operation Ivy (April 5, 1954), from National Archives at Boston
Boat on spot where Elugelab once stood (1972), from University of Hawaii-Manoa Special Collections
“Where Commuters Run Over Black Children on the Pointes-Downtown Track” (late 1960s), by the Detroit Geographical Expedition
“What was most radical about the DGEI was not the data collection or techniques (though those were extremely advanced for the time) but who was making the maps and the urgency felt by those mapmakers. How can maps get closer to the people who live in them, to whom the lines, shapes and patterns are of the utmost importance?”
Student going through the steps of creating a map with SYMAP, from the establishment of coordinate points, to keypunching, and printing, c. 1967 / Special Collections, Loeb Library, Harvard Graduate School of Design. From Evangelos Kotsioris’s The Computer Misfits (2022)
digital, collaborative, visualization, data creation, openness, identifying absences, storytelling & discovery
syllabus & course logistics