Personal/Political/Feminist Maps

Theoretical Reflections on

Spatial Methods for Action Research

Jen Jack Gieseking Bowdoin College

jgieseking.org @jgieseking

What the map cuts up, the story cuts across. - Michel de Certeau

We have very few creative philosophers in our profession, but we do have a number of technical innovators.

- Yi-Fu Tuan

An Introduction to Feminist Mapping

Methods & Analytics I: Mental Mapping

Methods & Analytics II: GIS & Spatial Statistics

Methods & Analytics III: Interactive GeoWeb GIS

An Outline

Discussion: Room for Interventions by Feminist Mapping

Case: Lesbian-Queer New York

Consider the role of feminist geographies in the moment of big data and new geoweb technologies.

Newly apply and reinvigorate the qualitative and participatory action research (PAR) dimensions of the methods and analytics

that are the strong points of feminist geography.

Broaden methodological contributions of geography in mapping as not just GIS.

Interventions

Expand the voice and ability to communicate participants’ stories and experiences.

An Introduction to Feminist Mapping

Theories of Mapping via Mental Mapping

•Tolman’s “Cognitive Maps in Rats & Men” (1948) & Lynch’s The Image of the City (1960)

•1960s & 1970s geographical method mavericks: Downs & Stea, Hart, Saarninen, Gould & White, Devlin, Milgram & Jodelet, Wood

•Dennis Jr.‘s “Prospects for Qualitative GIS at the Intersection of Youth Development and Participatory Urban Planning” (2006)

>> Gardner’s Frames Of Mind: The Theory Of Multiple Intelligences (1993)

Theories of Mapping via Mental Mapping

Mental mapping as the representation of a individual or group’s cognitive map through hand sketching or computer-based design, including information, emotions, and ideas associated with them, whether real and/or imagined -Gieseking (2013)

From Hayden (1997): “Cognitive maps of Los Angeles as perceived by predominantly Anglo American residents of Westwood” from the LA Dept of Planning 1971

Theories of Mapping via GIS

•Kwan’s (2002, 2014) feminist GIS & “feminist visualization”

•Wilson’s (2013) data “mattering”

•Take off of critical GIS: Wilson, Elwood, Burns, Shears, Thatcher, Graham, Zook, Stephens

Theories of Feminist Geography

•Role and place of embodiment and experience

•Strong methodological work in qualitative research and PAR

•Inclusive of scales of home, body, and intimate - refusing binaries in showing the imbrication of the global & the intimate (Pratt & Rosner 2012)

•Women’s Ways of Knowing (1986) + limitations on what women

Images: © Green Monkey, LHA, Vanity Fair, Tattooinque

Case: from Living in an (In)Visible World to Queer New York

• 1979 “ghettos” --> 1983 “neighborhoods”

• Gays linked to patterns of gentrification

• LGBTQ people are most often associated with places such as bars, neighborhoods, and cities

• Consistent claim to territoriality and publics as pathway to LGBTQ liberation

Urban Geographies of Sexualities

Castells (1983)

• “Invisible” • Possess less capital and power • Associated with a narrative of

fear of the city and fear of public space

• Lesbian neighborhoods are more identified as “spatial concentrations” LesbianHerstoryArchives.org. 2012.

Urban Geographies of Women

What do contemporary lesbians’ and queer women’s everyday, urban spaces say about the evolution of

contemporary cities?

How do lesbians’ and queer women’s experiences complicate the narratives of LGBTQ spaces and history?

Image: © Shutterstock

And how do they make us rethink our gendered narratives of cities?

1983-2008 NYC

Images: © Levine Roberts, Keith Haring, n/a, GO, gonyc.gov

• 47 self-identified lesbians & queer women ★ came out between 1983-2008 ★ 1/3 women of color ★ 1/2 from NYC

Alison Bechdel 1987

Methods

• 22 group interviews ★ within & across generation interviews ★ mixed-methods: mental maps, artifact sharing

Alison Bechdel 1987

• Participatory online focus group

• Archival research ★ Lesbian Herstory Archives ★ 382 organizational records ★ 25 years of publications

Methods

Neighborhoods Bars City

& Bodies

What do contemporary lesbians’ and queer women’s everyday, urban spaces say about their history and

culture?

Methods & Analytics I: Mental Mapping

Lesbian-Queer Neighborhoods

Desi ‘91’s Map Sally ‘95’s Map

Color = Participant Year of Coming Out Red = Cassie ’83 (Latina, middle class, from NYC)

Blue = Susan ’92 (white, middle class) Green = Sally ’96 (white, upper-middle class)

Brown = Shawn ’98 (black, middle class, from NYC) Purple = Holly ’03 (white, working-middle class) Orange = Beth ’06 (white, working-middle class)

MANHATTANQUEENS

BROOKLYNWest

Village

East Village

Park Slope

Bed-Stuy

Central Park

WilliamsburgChelsea

Lesbian-Queer Gentrification

Methods & Analytics II: GIS & Spatial Statistics

QGIS Is…

•Quantum GIS can be found at qgis.org

•F/OSS is free & open source software - accessible by and for public

•Fills gap between ArcGIS and GMaps

•Free and smart GIS practicum: http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/geoportal/practicum/ ℅ Frank Donnelly - taught in six 1.5 hour classes

QGIS: Mapping Whiteness

1980 2010

QGIS: Mapping Housing Value

2000 2010

Methods & Analytics III: Interactive GeoWeb GIS

Mapbox Is…

•Mapbox Studio & TileMill can be found at mapbox.com

•F/OSS is free & open source software with pay as you go storage

•Interactive geoweb technologies - fills gap between QGIS & GMaps with heavy design component in CartoCSS & code for participatory qualities

•Google the TileMill “Crashcourse” & teach in one day with learn as you go CSS work

Queer Public Archive at Work

Lesbian Herstory Archives

Queer Public Archive at Work

1983 1998

QPA Contributions

• profound insights into LGBTQ history and culture over place and time

• phased approach to network place-based and period-based scholars

• network LGBTQ individuals, groups, archives, and experiences

• redefine modes of public knowledge production

Discussion: Room for Interventions by Feminist Mapping

Consider the role of feminist geographies in the moment of big data and new geoweb technologies.

Newly apply and reinvigorate the qualitative and participatory action research (PAR) dimensions of the methods and analytics

that are the strong points of feminist geography.

Broaden methodological contributions of geography in mapping as not just GIS.

Interventions for Feminist Mapping

Expand the voice and ability to communicate participants’ stories and experiences.

Seeing Our Voices

Relationships between one users’ 1,512 friends on Facebook. 2013.

Friendships between 7,188 users of the Facebook group “Queer Exchange” over one

year. 2013.

Moment of Big Data

Geography as More than GIS

Consider the role of feminist geographies in the moment of big data and new geoweb technologies.

Newly apply and reinvigorate the qualitative and participatory action research (PAR) dimensions of the methods and analytics

that are the strong points of feminist geography.

Broaden methodological contributions of geography in mapping as not just GIS.

Interventions

Expand the voice and ability to communicate participants’ stories and experiences.

What the map cuts up, the story cuts across. - Michel de Certeau (1984)

We have very few creative philosophers in our profession, but we do have a number of technical innovators.

- Yi-Fu Tuan (1974)

Questions & comments:

@jgieseking jgieseking.org

peopleplacespace.org jgieseking@gmail.com

All papers available on jgieseking.org/publications.

Thank you.