Spatial Thinking in Environmental Contexts

Maps, Archives, and Timelines

Sandra Lach Arlinghaus, Joseph J. Kerski, Ann Evans Larimore, Matthew Naud, Sandra Lach Arlinghaus, Joseph J. Kerski, Ann Evans Larimore, Matthew Naud

• Publisher: CRC Press
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781138631854
• eBook ISBN: 9781351803908
• Topic: Physical Sciences
• Subtopic: Environmental Science

Spatial Thinking in Environmental Contexts: Maps, Archives, and Timelines cultivates the spatial thinking "habit of mind" as a critical geographical view of how the world works, including how environmental systems function, and how we can approach and solve environmental problems using maps, archives, and timelines. The work explains why spatial thinking matters as it helps readers to integrate a variety of methods to describe and analyze spatial/temporal events and phenomena in disparate environmental contexts. It weaves together maps, GIS, timelines, and storytelling as important strategies in examining concepts and procedures in analyzing real-world data and relationships. The work thus adds significant value to qualitative and quantitative research in environmental (and related) sciences.

Features

• Written by internationally renowned experts known for taking complex ideas and finding accessible ways to more broadly understand and communicate them.
• Includes real-world studies explaining the merging of disparate data in a sensible manner, understandable across several disciplines.
• Unique approach to spatial thinking involving animated maps, 3D maps, GEOMATs, and story maps to integrate maps, archives, and timelines—first across a single environmental example and then through varied examples.
• Merges spatial and temporal views on a broad range of environmental issues from traditional environmental topics to more unusual ones involving urban studies, medicine, municipal/governmental application, and citizen-scientist topics.
• Provides easy to follow step-by-step instructions to complete tasks; no prior experience in data processing is needed.

IV

GEOMATs, 2000s

Chapter 12 Varroa GEOMAT: Honeybee Mite

Chapter 13 Groundwater GEOMAT: Google Earth Applications in a Community Information System

Chapter 14 Pacemaker GEOMAT: My Heart Your Heart: Organization of Efforts Linked by QR Codes

Chapter 15 Detroit GEOMAT: Chene Street History Study: Scale Transformation, Layering, and Nesting

Chapter 16 GEOMAT Guide: Summary: Study the Past, Understand the Present, Prepare for the Future

This section introduces the GEOMAT (Geographic Events Ordering Maps, Archives, and Timelines) tool as a method for integrating space and time in spatial thinking. The first chapter in this section considers the Varroa mite in this context, again for comparing and contrasting with the methods in the two previous sections. It is followed by other examples covering a wide range of applications and concludes with a conceptual summary.

12

Varroa GEOMAT: Honeybee Mite

Sandra L. Arlinghaus and Diana Sammataro

Compression of Information Using GEOMAT

Tracking spatial and temporal information on bee pests, such as the Varroa mite, is of equal importance in developed and developing nations. These insect pests know no national boundaries; software and technological capabilities do, however. Thus, we choose as a primary tracking tactic to use simple software that has been globally available for a while, is free to download, and does not require extensive use of online materials and the associated capability for lengthy connection to the internet (Arlinghaus, Larimore, and Haug, 2016; Larimore, Arlinghaus, and Haug, 2005; 2007; 2008). The GEOMAT in Figure 12.1 shows a calendrical timeline for the entire time, a year at a time, together with brief comments from the field study archive. The following timeline is rooted in a map that combines the images from the animated approach to looking at the Varroa information with the 3D map of that information. The material is all embedded in a ‘Table’ in Microsoft Windows. An alternate strategy might be to create a table in html. Either approach is effective and easy.

Figure 12.0 Spatial word cloud summary, based on word frequency, made using Wordle.

Figure 12.1 The GEOMAT displays a calendrical timeline rising from a map to display events, and gaps between events, simultaneously. (Source: IMaGe, ©2016. http://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/134732. Used with permission.)

1904	Initial recorded sighting of Varroa on the island of Java, Indonesia.
1905	No new sightings recorded.
1906	No new sightings recorded.
1907	No new sightings recorded.
1908	No new sightings recorded.
1909	No new sightings recorded.
1910	No new sightings recorded.
1911	No new sightings recorded.
1912	Next recorded sighting, on nearby Sumatra island, Indonesia.
1913	No new sightings recorded.
1914	No new sightings recorded.
1915	No new sightings recorded.
1916	No new sightings recorded.
1917	No new sightings recorded.
1918	No new sightings recorded.
1919	No new sightings recor...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Editors, Co-Editors, and Principal Contributors
• Contributors
• SECTION I Introductory Matter
• SECTION II Animaps, 1990s
• SECTION III 3D Maps: Georeferencing, Turn of the Millennium
• SECTION IV GEOMATs, 2000s
• SECTION V Story Maps, 2010s
• 21 In Closing: Spatial Thinking, from Evolution to Revolution
• Index