Multi-representation Databases with Explicitly Modeled Horizontal, Vertical, and Update Relations

Matthias Bobzien, Dirk Burghardt, Ingo Petzold, Moritz Neun, and Robert Weibel

This paper presents a new approach to combining multi-representation databases with the generalization and update processes. It leads to a tightly integrated model which is a part of the existing cartographic GIS axpand. The approach is based on the mathematical concept of relations and, in particular, on three different types of relations: horizontal (within one resolution), vertical (between different resolutions), and update. Horizontal relations allow the representation of relationships between features within one resolution. Examples are partitions, neighborhoods, and topology. The vertical relation represents the relationship between features of different resolutions. This originates from a generalization or matching process. The update relation describes temporal changes of features. After a detailed theory about the relation types introduced, the paper continues with a discussion of their similarities and differences, with a focus on implementation in a multi-representation database. A prototype demonstrates the generalization of buildings and roads from vector data at 1: 25,000 to 1: 50,000 scales. The paper ends with conclusions and an outlook on further research tasks.

Framing the Days: Place and Narrative in Cartography

Margaret Wickens Pearce

One of the themes of critical cartography is the question of how to map space as it is experienced. The conventions of Western cartographic language—the visual variables and their grammar—are structured to communicate spaces of homogeneity and modernity, not the spaces shaped by human experience. How then can we map place? I review some of the ways in which mapmakers have addressed this question in their visual and written works and propose another technique for uncovering place, using narrativity. Through the example of a historical map project, I consider the dialectic of place and narrative and demonstrate how this dialectic can be encoded in cartographic language.

KEYWORDS: Place, narrative, cartographic language, graphic variables

Supporting the Process of Exploring and Interpreting Space–Time Multivariate Patterns: The Visual Inquiry Toolkit

Jin Chen, Alan M. MacEachren, and Diansheng Guo

While many data sets carry geographic and temporal references, our ability to analyze these datasets lags behind our ability to collect them because of the challenges posed by both data complexity and tool scalability issues. This study develops a visual analytics approach that leverages human expertise with visual, computational, and cartographic methods to support the application of visual analytics to relatively large spatio-temporal, multivariate data sets. We develop and apply a variety of methods for data clustering, pattern searching, information visualization, and synthesis. By combining both human and machine strengths, this approach has a better chance to discover novel, relevant, and potentially useful information that is difficult to detect by any of the methods used in isolation. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach by applying the Visual Inquiry Toolkit we developed to analyze a data set containing geographically referenced, time-varying and multivariate data for U.S. technology industries.

Humorous Maps: Explorations of an Alternative Cartography

Sébastien Caquard and Claire Dormann

Maps are generally viewed as functional artefacts. They are considered accurate and useful conveyors of information, helping individuals find their way, understand environments, and inform decisions. However, maps also have a strongly pleasurable component. They generate and support narratives, they are tied to emotions, memories and adventures, and sometimes they make people laugh. In this paper, we engage with a very specific form of alternative cartography: humorous maps. We begin with an interdisciplinary review of the general theories and functions of humor to discuss the three major impediments of the use of humor in cartography: (1) the lack of recognition of the potential of humor; (2) the complexity of humor creation; and (3) the scientific orientation of modern cartography. We then turn to alternative forms of cartography to emphasize the function of humor in mapmaking through a chronological review of some examples of humorous maps. Through this review, we demonstrate that humorous maps caricature scientific cartography by drawing on the latter’s persuasive power. In this sense, humorous maps can destabilize the scientific and technological bases of contemporary cartography. Freed from scientific constraints, humorous maps provide societal commentaries rather than geospatial facts. We conclude by arguing that humor—along with other forms of expression—can be combined with scientific maps to generate hybrid forms of cartography; these new representations could help us to represent anew the worlds we inhabit.

Literature review

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