Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
two extremes to more sophisticated types of analyses that would allow
us to explore change over space and time simultaneously. There have
been some developments in this that are driven, to a great extent, by the
needs of the HGIS community.
2
It should be remembered, however, that
within the GISc (Geographical Information Science) community there
have been calls for improved temporal functionality for some consider-
able time.
3
The extent to which progress is likely to be made in the form
of technical fixes is open to debate.
Error and uncertainty have also been long-standing research issues
within the wider GISc community.
4
They have a particular relevance
to humanities sources, where inaccuracy, ambiguity, and incomplete-
ness are common. W hile progress has been made and further improve-
ments can be expected, there are limitations to what technical fixes de-
veloped by GISc can be expected to achieve. Many technical solutions
involve increasingly statistical approaches that quantify uncertainty
and its effects and are thus a long way from the types of approaches
typically used within the humanities.
5
The more traditional humani-
ties solutions - close reading and careful interpretation of results and
paterns - are also relevant and should not be overlooked. Metadata are
also important here.
A final issue with quantitative HGIS is that the major challenge in
conducting research used to be building databases. Many very rich data
resources now exist, and, rather than building more, a major emphasis
should be placed on using existing ones. There are technical and insti-
tutional barriers to this, but there is currently great potential in using,
repurposing, and integrating these resources to conduct new research
that provide opportunities to make rapid progress on applied research
questions.
Qualitative Humanities GIS
An issue that clearly emerges from the last two chapters of this volume
is that GIS has much to offer to the study of qualitative sources in dis-
ciplines within and beyond history, but there is still much work to be
done before this reaches the same level of maturity as some of the more
quantitative work. The rise of the use of qualitative sources within HGIS
