Peace mapping

               

Image above: The Global Peace Index map

Related links to Spatialworlds
GeogSplace (a teaching blog for Year 12 geography)
Geogaction
Spatialworlds website
GeogSpace
Australian Geography Teachers' Association website

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manning@chariot.net.au

Where am I??
Adelaide, Australia: S: 34º 55' E: 138º 36'


 Using maps to analyse peace

After the Lindt Cafe siege in Sydney and terror attacks in Paris and Denmark, acts of terror continue to be at the centre of much of our news in 2015. The Vision of Humanity mapping initiative helps us to get an understanding of the relative danger of such attacks across the world. 

The Vision of Humanity site also provides maps showing a Global Peace Index, as well as peace information specifically for the United States, Mexico and the United Kingdom. Click here to watch a brief video on the Peace Index Project.

 Vision of Humanity is a strong proponent of the need to further study, advocate and act on peace. The website focusses on the major issues facing the 21st century and aims to  bring a balanced approach with factual information that is positive and solution based.

As seen above, the site provides a huge amount of information on countries,  in terms of peace indicators such as violent crime, homicide, military expenditure etc. Just click on the "Specify Indicator" button. The site also enables you to see the change in peace status between 2009-2014 by using the date slider below the map. It is worth spending some time navigating around this amazingly rich site to see what it offers your political/social geography studies.

 Some information gleaned from analysing the Terrorism Index map

  The Global Terrorism Index map
 

"Of the 17,958 people who died in terrorist attacks in 2013, 82 percent were in one of five countries: Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Syria. That's one finding from this year's Global Terrorism Index report, published by the Institute for Economics and Peace. The report is based on data from the University of Maryland's Global Terrorism Database, which has information on more than 125,000 terrorist attacks between 1970 and 2013.
The report found a 61-percent jump in terrorism fatalities between 2012 and 2013. "Over the same period," the authors wrote, "the number of countries that experienced more than 50 [terrorism-related] deaths rose from 15 to 24"—an indication that the problem of terrorism was getting both more fatal and more widespread a year before ISIS declared a new caliphate. But it's also striking where terrorism didn't occur. Much of the increase in terrorism-related fatalities in 2013 took place in Iraq, where terrorists claimed nearly 4,000 lives—a 168-percent increase over 2012. Worldwide, Iraq was the worst-affected country, accounting for 34 percent of terrorism-related fatalities in 2013, with Afghanistan ranked next with 17.3 percent. Meanwhile, between 2000 and 2013, the report found, around 5 percent of terrorism-related fatalities occurred in the 34 wealthy countries of the OECD. In 2013 specifically, there were 113 terrorism-related deaths in OECD countries—0.6 percent of the worldwide total. Six of these took place in the United States."

A geography hero of the highest order

Image above: A famous geographer: A recent photograph of Professor Graeme Hugo near Rundle Mall, Adelaide (Adelaide Now website).

Related links to Spatialworlds
GeogSplace (a teaching blog for Year 12 geography)
Geogaction
Spatialworlds website
GeogSpace
Australian Geography Teachers' Association website

Geographical thinking Scoop.it

Spatial literacy Scoop.it

History and geography Scoop.it

Spatial Education and technology Scoop.it
Just real interesting Scoop.it

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Email contact:

manning@chariot.net.au

Where am I??
Adelaide, Australia: S: 34º 55' E: 138º 36'

 A true Geography hero - "He is a serious loss to Australia."

One of the questions I ask in my workshops is to name a famous geographer. Not surprisingly I usually get blank stares, or at the best names such as Captain Cook, Douglas Mawson and even Christopher Columbus. Certainly such explorers did geographical things and used geographical skills but are they geographers? In a previous Spatialworlds posting I explored the idea of what makes a famous geographer and listed many famous world geographers. In this posting I would like to focus on one Australian geographer I think should be famous. Sadly this geographical hero passed away last month and not one of 200 students I lectured to yesterday at Flinders University had heard of him - even though the university was the one he spent many years researching and teaching. 

Professor Graeme Hugo
 
 "A man of enormous intellect and vision, Professor Hugo shared his knowledge so generously — his unique contribution to the way we understand our society, in Australia and internationally, is a remarkable and enduring legacy.” The Australian  20 February 2015

The geography community around Australia and across the world was terribly saddened on 17 January this year when they heard that Professor Graeme Hugo had passed away. Recognised as a world leader in the geographical field of demography, the loss of this colossus of the geography scene is a great loss and his work and quality as a man and geographer should be recognised by the South Australian community - maybe students in schools should see that heroes can be more than actors and sports people! To give an indication of his recognition in South Australia and and how Graeme democratised geography in the State, on the day of his death his passing was one of the lead items on the hourly news broadcasts on radio. I certainly can't remember any other academics death being reported in such a way. 

Graeme was an inspiration to geography teachers in South Australia and regardless of the amazing demands on him from around the world to talk he found time over the past 12 years to deliver every year an hour lecture to Year 12 Geography students at the Adelaide University - always fascinating and well received by the students (the lectures are on the GTASA website to view).

As reported in the Advertiser on 20 January 2015:


“A man of enormous intellect and vision, Professor Hugo shared his knowledge so generously — his unique contribution to the way we understand our society, in Australia and internationally, is a remarkable and enduring legacy."

The 21 January press release from the Federal Government described his work as contributing "enormously to the body of evidence and analysis of migrant settlement and outcomes in Australia. In recent years he worked on ground-breaking research into the economic, social and civic contributions of first and second generation humanitarian entrants. He contributed to the understanding of the experiences of youth of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds in Australia. His particular area of interest was humanitarian migration to Australia and the economic contribution of those Australians."

Premier Jay Weatherill also expressed his sadness, calling Professor Hugo's death an "enormous loss to South Australia and the nation ... he was an international thinker of the highest calibre and was greatly respected."

The Australian headlined their article on Professor Hugo as the "Passing of an intellectual giant and thinker of highest calibre." and highlighted his enormous contribution as the Director of the Australian Migration and Population Research Centre at the Adelaide University to understanding the nature and impact of migration in Australia and beyond.

Graeme was named an Officer of the Order of Australia for his services to population research in 2012. He authored more than 400 books, journal articles and book chapters — many of which recently focused on problems faced by job seekers from non-English speaking backgrounds.

Probably the best way to really get an idea of Graeme's influence on the views of the community and government is to listen to this brief interview on ABC radio. If interested in reading the work of Graeme, go to the Adelaide University site to find references to his papers.

As one of our geographical heroes we are saddened by his passing  but his influence will live on in so many ways.

 "I think his legacy will live on through his students and that's not such a bad way to be remembered in this world."                                   University of Adelaide spokesperson


Footnote: Graeme Hugo at Findon High School in 2004

Professor Graeme Hugo was a proud ex-student of Findon High School in South Australia and as the Director of the University of Adelaide GIS centre (GISCA) he was pleased to see that Findon High was one of the first schools in Australia to integrate the use of GIS into the curriculum. This aspect of the Findon High School's curriculum was recognised across Australia by winning an Australian newspaper 'Best Australian School Award' for innovation in 2004. When Findon High was planning to open a 'state of the art' GIS dedicated classroom in 2004 I asked Graeme if he would open the room - named the 'Hugo GIS Room' to this day. As always Graeme happily obliged and I was amazed to find out when he arrived that the room to be named after him was in fact his Year 12 classroom at Findon High - I had no idea! It was a nice co-incidence and as the pictures above and below show, it was a really memorable and happy occasion for the students, teachers and South Australian Department of Education leaders who attended - and hopefully also for Graeme.

Graeme cutting the wall plaque ribbon for the opening of the ''Hugo GIS Room' at Findon High School in 2004.

Where am I? The puzzle of how spatial literacy works

Image above: Solving the issue of spatial memory and orientation. Our internal GPS and compass!

Related links to Spatialworlds
GeogSplace (a teaching blog for Year 12 geography)
Geogaction
Spatialworlds website
GeogSpace
Australian Geography Teachers' Association website

Geographical thinking Scoop.it

Spatial literacy Scoop.it

History and geography Scoop.it

Spatial Education and technology Scoop.it
Just real interesting Scoop.it

Follow Spatialworlds on Twitter

Email contact:

manning@chariot.net.au

Where am I??
Adelaide, Australia: S: 34º 55' E: 138º 36'

How does the brain create a map of the space surrounding us and how can we navigate our way through a complex environment?

"The sense of place and the ability to navigate are fundamental to our existence. The sense of place gives a perception of position in the environment. During navigation, it is interlinked with a sense of distance that is based on motion and knowledge of previous positions.

Questions about place and navigation have engaged philosophers and scientists for a long time."

Have you ever wondered, How do we know where we are? How can we find the way from one place to another? And how can we store this information in such a way that we can immediately find the way the next time we trace the same path? These questions of spatial literacy have certainly fascinated me as a geography teacher and spatial technology user over the years and was the basis of my Churchill trip in 2007. Unfortunately I did not find as many answers to these questions as I would have liked during that experience.

 In cognitive psychology and neuroscience, spatial memory is the part of memory responsible for recording information about one's environment and its spatial orientation.

There is a long history of scientists and philosophers trying to unravel the question of spatial memory (we tend to relate to the term spatial literacy). More than 200 years ago, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant argued that some mental abilities exist as a prior knowledge, independent of experience. He considered the concept of space as an inbuilt principle of the mind, one through which the world is and must be perceived. With the advent of behavioural psychology in the mid-20th century, these questions could be addressed experimentally. When Edward Tolman examined rats moving through labyrinths, he found that they could learn how to navigate, and proposed that a "cognitive map" formed in the brain allowed them to find their way. But questions still lingered - how would such a map be represented in the brain?

Well, maybe we are on the verge of understanding the variance of spatial literacy between individuals and finally answering these questions.That is, why can some people navigate their world effortless and rarely need directions and maps (or their Google maps/GPS), whilst others are continually lost and have no idea of their orientation or the route they need to take or have taken?  For many years scientist have been working at explaining through neuroscience the answers to the question of the variance of spatial literacy between individuals.

In 2014 the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was jointly awarded to John O'Keefe,  May-Britt Moser and Edvard Moser for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain. These amazing scientist claim to have discovered a positioning system, an "inner GPS" in the brain that makes it possible to orient ourselves in space, demonstrating a cellular basis for higher cognitive function.

The location of the hippocampus

Place cells! 

In 1971, John O'Keefe discovered that a type of nerve cell in an area of the brain called the hippocampus was always activated when a rat was at a certain place in a room. Other nerve cells were activated when the rat was at other places. O'Keefe concluded that these "place cells" formed a map of the room - they were not merely registering visual input, but were building up an inner map of the environment. O'Keefe concluded that the hippocampus generates numerous maps, represented by the collective activity of place cells that are activated in different environments. Therefore, the memory of an environment could be stored as a specific combination of place cell activities in the hippocampus.

 The hippocampus

Grid cells!

More than three decades later, in 2005, May-Britt Moser and Edvard Moser furthered O'Keefe's work by identifying another type of nerve cell, which they called "grid cells", that generate a coordinate system and allow for precise positioning and pathfinding. Their subsequent research showed how place and grid cells make it possible to determine position and to navigate. May-Britt and Edvard Moser were mapping the connections to the hippocampus in rats moving in a room when they discovered an astonishing pattern of activity in a nearby part of the brain called the entorhinal cortex. Here, certain cells were activated when the rat passed multiple locations arranged in a hexagonal grid. Each of these cells was activated in a unique spatial pattern and collectively these "grid cells" constitute a coordinate system that allows for spatial navigation. Together with other cells of the entorhinal cortex that recognize the direction of the head and the border of the room, they form circuits with the place cells in the hippocampus. This circuitry constitutes a comprehensive positioning system, an inner GPS, in the brain.

Grid cells derive their name from the fact that connecting the centers of their firing fields gives a triangular grid.

It is concluded  that place and grid cells exist in humans since the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex are found to be frequently affected in Alzheimer's patients at an early stage, and these individuals often lose their way and cannot recognize the environment. Knowledge about the brain's positioning system may, therefore, help us understand the mechanism underpinning the devastating spatial memory loss that affects people with this disease.

We have always known that we are not all alike in our ability to locate place and navigate our world, now we have the scientific theory to explain the phenomena of spatial literacy. Not sure how it helps us to teach geography but gee, it is interesting to know why some students just get spatial thinking and others struggle. What I am not doing in this posting in relation to this research is highlighting in any detail the oft-quoted differences between male and female spatial memory. However I found the following neuroscience summation from the Noble Prize winners research of interest and maybe a basis for a future (contentious) posting on the differences between male and female spatial memory/literacy.

"When it comes to performing activities that require spatial skills, like navigating directions, men generally do better. Women use the cerebral cortex for solving problems that require navigational skills. Men use an entirely different area, mainly the left hippocampus -- a nucleus deep inside the brain that's not activated in the women's brains during navigational tasks, the hippocampus, automatically codes where you are in space. As a result, women are more likely to rely on landmark cues: they might suggest you turn at the 7-11 and make a right at the church, whereas men are more likely to navigate via depth reckoning -- go east, then west, etc." 

Thanks to Rachel Crees from SSSI SA for these links and also the following fascinating podcast about recent science that's helping unlock how our brains make maps from moment to moment

Comparison across the cities of the world

Image above: The fantastic for comparison Urban Observatory site.

Related links to Spatialworlds
GeogSplace (a teaching blog for Year 12 geography)
Geogaction
Spatialworlds website
GeogSpace
Australian Geography Teachers' Association website

Geographical thinking Scoop.it

Spatial literacy Scoop.it

History and geography Scoop.it

Spatial Education and technology Scoop.it
Just real interesting Scoop.it

Follow Spatialworlds on Twitter

Email contact:

manning@chariot.net.au

Where am I??
Adelaide, Australia: S: 34º 55' E: 138º 36'


The comparison skill

"Anyone could enjoy playing with the data—and that’s the point. "This isn’t an esoteric thing for city planners. It’s meant for the population to understand themselves." says Wurman.

The Urban Observatory gives students the chance to compare and contrast maps of cities around the world–all from one location. It aims to make the world’s data both understandable and useful. The Urban Observatory at http://www.urbanobservatory.org/preview/uo//preview/uo/ (paste this link into your browser) has been brought to life by TED creator Richard Saul Wurman, RadicalMedia, and Esri, and is the first of its kind.

The creators of the interactive site say that:

"We live in a world of easily accessible maps; just tap your smartphone and you have instant access to directions, public transportation information, locations of landmarks, crime data, and neighborhood facts. But our map knowledge is limited by the fact that no two cities collect data the same way. Maps often aren’t drawn to the same scale, and up until now, there hasn’t been a way to compare data on things like income, cost of living, water distribution, and power grids."

Here are some instructions for the site - a really interesting and useful addition to the plethora of great free spatial sites available for the classroom. Click here to go directly to the comparison section of the site

The Urban Observatory city comparison app enables you to explore the living fabric of great cities by browsing a variety of cities and themes.

To change Themes, click on a theme name in the Themes list.

To change Cities, click on the city name in the Cities list, or drag-and-drop it over a map.

The TED creator has big plans for the Observatory in the future. 

"It should be 100 cities, connected to a source that updates it like an app," he says. "Cities could learn from the mistakes and failures of others."

For now, check out the Urban Observatory website, which features most of the exhibit’s city comparison functionality. Here’s a look at the youth population of Abu Dhabi, New York, and Tokyo, emphasizing areas where youth make up over 33% of the total population.

                           

And here’s a housing density comparison between Chicago, Rio de Janeiro, and Milan.