Geographical Space Research Articles

Using fossil records to predict short‐term changes in niche and spatial dynamics in a broadly distributed coral reef: Niche conservatism and adaptation

AbstractAimGiven the rapid pace of climate change and its significant impact on species distribution and survival, understanding the dynamics of ecological niches over time becomes imperative. By employing ecological niche models and species distribution models, alongside analyses of historical occurrence records and palaeoclimatic data, we aimed to assess the extent of changes in the niche of Porites astreoides from the Holocene to the present. Specifically, we quantified the amount of: (1) niche stability, (2) niche expansion, (3) niche decline and (4) niche overlap in both the environmental and geographical space.LocationAtlantic Ocean.TaxonCnidarian, Scleractinia.Materials and MethodsThrough fossil and current records and environmental variables from the same periods, we use two ecological niche modelling approaches (overlap and maximum entropy) to analyse niche dynamics in environmental and geographical space, specifically the degree of expansion, stability and loss of niches over the last ~8000 years. We used a principal component analysis to build the models within two different calibration areas (minimum convex polygon and buffer).ResultsOur results were similar, except for the loss of habitat, across the calibration areas used to build the models. The PCA used to build the models accounts for more than 65% of the variation in the data. Most of the environmental niche remained stable with an increase of almost a third and a negligible loss. Models in geographical space showed that most of the suitable area remained stable, but the species expanded its range from the Caribbean to the coast of Brazil. The analysis also showed a high value of niche overlap in environmental and geographical spaces.Main ConclusionsThe species studied is one of the corals with the greatest capacity to adapt to new environments and locations, but it also has a high tendency to preserve niche traits. These characteristics helped the species to expand its environmental and geographical niche in a period of relative climatic stability. On the other hand, these same characteristics of niche conservatism can lead the species to population decline and habitat loss, if the speed of adaptation is lower than the rapid climate changes predicted for the middle and end of the 21st century.

Constitution and Jurisdiction in Neal Stephenson’s Speculative Fiction

A common feature of Neal Stephenson’s speculative fiction is the richly imagined political communities inhabited by his characters. Geographically defined constitutional states are reimagined, often with a focus on associations based on shared social identity or beliefs, as opposed to nation-state citizenship. Stephenson’s works offer an imaginative space for exploring possibilities of alternative political communities, and questions of constitution and jurisdiction. Modern territorially sovereign nation-states have presented constitutional scholars with a fixed framework. People sharing physical space constitute a political association stemming from a moment of legal constitution. Thus constituted, the nation-state authorises governmental entities to oversee the populace within the shared geographical space. Stephenson’s rich imagination offers constitutional scholarship an imaginary for exploring alternative conceptualisations of constitution and jurisdiction. This article proposes that recovery of medieval conceptualisations of overlapping networked jurisdictions might aid in sensemaking of models of political communities beyond the territorially sovereign nation-state.

근대지리공간의 표상으로서 지형도의 기호와 실제

This study conducts a comprehensive survey of the symbols in the ‘Joseon Basemap’ produced in the 1910s, constructs a database(DB) from them, and spatially analyzes the status of symbols nationwide based on this database. Utilizing the methodology of HGIS(Historical Geographic Information Systems), the locations and characteristics of symbols in modern topographic maps were designed and constructed as GIS layers. The study targeted 58 types of symbols, gathering information on 12,343 features. The spatial distribution analysis revealed that among the 13 provinces, Gyeonggi-do had the highest number of symbols with 1,575 entries(12.8%). It was also found that while large administrative centers(大邑) from the Joseon Dynasty had a high number of symbols per administrative area, modern cities at the bu(府) level showed greater density of symbols. Administrative, industrial, and religious facilities constituted a significant proportion of the total symbols. These results will serve as important foundational data for analyzing relationships with place names, detailed analysis by type, cartographic representation of symbols, and thematic distribution. By laying the foundation for the study of symbols on modern topographic maps, this study provides the necessary groundwork for future research on time series data and line and polygon symbols for the reconstruction of historical geographic environments.

Introduction

This themed issue of RISE seeks to remap the Irish literary and cultural landscapes in the middle decades of the twentieth century. It defines this period as from the 1930s to the 1970s — roughly coinciding with the conservative years of ‘de Valera’s Ireland’, starting from the ratification of Bunreacht na hÉireann in 1937 supervised by de Valera through Seán Lemass’ programmes of economic expansion which led to Ireland’s European Economic Community membership in 1973. It understands literary and cultural landscapes in the broadest terms: horizontally as a geographic space with borders real and imagined; vertically as a space where high and low cultures clash and commingle. This issue includes six essays by contributors based across the globe. They show us the various forms of border-crossing — geographic, linguistic, generic — that contribute to a fuller map of Irish literature and culture in the mid-twentieth century.

“Sindhi literature in post-partition India: marginalization, challenges, and digital interventions”

ABSTRACT Sindhi, both as language and literature, has had a precarious position in the Indian literary canon. In the aftermath of Partition, various social, educational, and political realities resulted in Sindhi being on the periphery of literary scholarship. Given the historical background of Partition and resettlement in a new social and geographical space, this article aims to explore the current status of Sindhi literature produced and distributed in India. Specifically, it seeks to assess the readability and dissemination of Sindhi literature, particularly among the post-Partition generations within the Sindhi community. To uncover the present ground realities in the canon of Indian Sindhi literature, the research incorporates deep-focused interviews with Sindhi intelligentsia, mainly comprised of Sindhi writers, scholars, and publishers. The selected interviewees represent the last Sindhi generation of writers and scholars that is entirely conversant with the practices of Sindhi culture and literature due to their educational and historical background; they articulate their first-hand experiences and perceptions concerning the challenges in the overall expansion and development of Sindhi literature in post-Partition India. The research employs an autoethnographic approach as it is useful to draw from the personal academic experiences of the researcher, who comes from the third generation of post-partition Sindhis. The autoethnographic approach aids in performing a comprehensive analysis of the interviews, which contributes to locating the challenges restricting the maintenance, accessibility, and utility of Sindhi literature among the young Sindhi generations in India. The interviews underscore irrevocable literary and cultural damage that is being caused due to the marginalization of the Sindhi language and education in India; they also discuss the existing challenges and opportunities in developing Sindhi literature. The study concludes with the possibility of employing digital methods to facilitate access to and comprehension of Sindhi literature and cultural history among the young Sindhi generations.

TURKISH REFUGEES IN BRAZIL AFTER THE 2016 TURKEY COUP ATTEMPT

Population geography is a subdiscipline of Geography devoted to the study of one of the aspects of geographic space, which is population flows. The flow of refugees is a topic of interest. In 2016, Turkey underwent a coup attempt which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of people and increased internal political tension. This study aimed to verify whether Turkey’s internal circumstances impacted the number of Turkish refugee requests in Brazil and if so, to describe these refugees’ general profile and their spatial distribution, without risking their safety. We used data provided by the International Migration Observatory, which is linked to the Brazilian Ministry of Justice. The analyses were performed using descriptive and geospatial statistics and showed a considerable increase in the number of Turkish refugees in Brazil from 2016, as well as their concentration in the richest state of the federation. We believe these results provide relevant information to improve the Brazilian system of recognition and reception of refugees.

El Nacionalismo en la Lucha por la Independencia de las Colonias en África (Angola)

The purpose of this study is to analyze the impact of Nationalism on the struggle for Independence in the colonies in Africa, with particular emphasis on the case of Angola. The objective of this work is to assess the changes that took place on the Continent from 1888 to 1910, marked by the conquest and occupation of almost the entire African Continent by Western imperialist powers; followed by the effective implementation and installation of the colonial system as an administrative system in the second half of the century. XIX, division and definition of geographic spaces. In fact, the year 1910 was essentially characterized by the consolidation and exploitation of that system, causing major distortions in the economic, social and cultural structures of the dominated territories. The appeal written at the Manchester Congress (1945) to the colonized peoples, expressly advised that all colonies should be freed from foreign imperialist control, both political and economic, and fight by all means to achieve these objectives. The use of qualitative research based on bibliography related to these themes, the inductive-deductive method allowed the (construction) of ideas of a passive Africa, embodied in the emergence of movements that aimed at the overthrow of the colonial system. In effect, with the end of World War II, the process of decolonization began, resulting in a more reinvigorated, radical and consequential African nationalism. This means a more conscious, enlightened and enlightening continental nationalism, better structured and politically framed and represented internationally and with qualitatively higher levels of political and cultural organization, with the year 1960 being marked as the year of Africa, with the outbreak of the various independence of respective African countries and consequent recovery and affirmation of socio-historical, political and cultural identity, hidden by colonization.

SPACE-TIME CONTINUUM OF PRZEMYSLAW LIS-MARKIEWICZ’S NOVELS

The work outlines the artistic space-time as an author's model of the world, its main features and functioning in the works of the contemporary Polish writer Przemysław Lis‑Markiewicz. The paradigm of space-time discourse is studied on the basis of the novels "Confession of the Spirit" and "Moskal". The article indicates that the plot of novels by Przemysław Lis‑Markiewicz, which also depict Ukrainian history, unfolds in a linear perspective, each chapter is marked with dates according to the calendar time. The works synthesize calendar, event and perceptual time. The spatial picture of the works is built on open and closed models of the world, macro- and microcosm. The study of the implementation specifics for the concepts of time and space made it possible to point out the relationship between the historical / character chronotope, the role of retrospection and prospection in the novels of the Polish artist. The chronotope of novels is determined by the narrative strategy, the author's intention, and the genre structure. "Confession of the Spirit" is perceived as the author's attempt to understand the formation of personality in the complex period of social and political events of the late 19th – 20th centuries and is defined as a novel-biography. The novel "Moskal" is considered as a synthesis of documentary and psychological, which testified the author's attention to social and political, spiritual problems of a person in a border situation, a historical and political novel. The article traces peculiarities of the artistic interpretation of Ukrainian geographical and cultural spaces, realized in artistic works. The space-time in the author's novels reflects the essence of the spiritual and material world of the inhabitants of the Ukrainian-Polish border, acts as a marker of the identity of the inhabitants of the region, which appears as a certain palimpsest construction, signifying the memory of Ukrainians and Poles, their narratives. In his novels, Przemysław Lis-Markiewicz unfolds the space of Ukraine in the days of wars or political vicissitudes, emphasizing the tragic pages of history.

Envisioning the future in the light of climatic and non-climatic riskscapes: lessons from KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

The concept of a ‘Riskscape’ serves as a proactive framework intertwining risk, geographical space, and human practices. It sheds light on how diverse stakeholders perceive phenomena and take action to navigate the future and address emerging risks. This study applies the riskscape concept to comprehend the impact of climate change, coupled with non-climatic risks, on vulnerable households in KwaMaye village, rural KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), South Africa. The research also explores how local farmers envision their future amidst the prevailing conditions. Qualitative methods were employed to gather primary data from purposefully selected participants in KwaMaye. The findings reveal that climatic risks contributing to households’ vulnerability include droughts, heavy rainfall, and flooding, among other factors. Non-climatic risks emanate from issues such as an increasing livestock population, diminishing grazing fields, and delays in provincial government assistance. The convergence of climatic and non-climatic risks forms riskscapes that significantly impede most households’ ability to engage effectively in livestock and food production. This is partly due to the lack of nutritious pastures during droughts. In response to the scarcity of nutritious pastures during extreme droughts, resource-constrained farmers resort to illegally accessing nearby commercial irrigated farmlands to allow their livestock to forage. However, this action carries a substantial fine if they are caught. Despite the challenges, respondents express reluctance to reduce their livestock numbers in the face of frequent droughts. However, many argue that they may be compelled to abandon food production if the issues related to these riskscapes are not promptly addressed.

Niche-based approach to explore the impacts of environmental disturbances on biodiversity.

Globally, species are increasingly at risk from compounding threatening processes, an increasingly prominent driver of which is environmental disturbances. To facilitate effective conservation efforts following such events, methods that evaluate potential impacts across multiple species and provide landscape-scale information are needed to guide targeted responses. Often, the geographic overlap between a disturbance and species' distribution is calculated and then used as a proxy for potential impact. However, such methods do not account for the important influence of environmental heterogeneity throughout species' ranges. To address this shortcoming, we quantified the effects of environmental disturbances on species' environmental niche space. Using the Australian 2019 and 2020 Black Summer fires as a case study, we applied a niche-centric approach to examine the potential impacts of these fires on 387 vertebrate species. We examined the utility of established and novel niche metrics to assess the potential impacts of large-scale disturbance events on species by comparing the potential effects of the fires as determined by our various niche measures to those derived from geographic-based measures of impact. We examined the quality of environmental space affected by the disturbance by quantifying the position in niche space where the disturbance occurred (center or margin), the uniqueness of the environmental space that was burned, and the degree to which the remaining, unburned portion of the niche differed from a species' original prefire niche. There was limited congruence between the proportion of geographic and niche space affected, which showed that geographic-based approaches in isolation may have underestimated the impact of the fires for 56% of modeled species. For each species, when combined, these metrics provided a greater indication of postdisturbance recovery potential than geographic-based measures alone. Accordingly, the integration of niche-based analyses into conservation assessments following large-scale disturbance events will lead to a more nuanced understanding of potential impacts and guide more informed and effective conservation actions.

From the Elm to the Church – How Space Influences Sandy’s Identity Construction

Muriel Spark depicts a unique image of teacher in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie with the character of Jean Brodie, utilizing the change in teacher-student relationship between Miss Brodie and her student, Sandy, as a cue for identity construction of the latter. This thesis intends to adopt Henry Lefebvre’s space theory to analyze this relationship and Sandy’s growth from the spatial perspective, discussing the active role played by space in the establishment of hegemony. Spark cares about the suffering among hypocrisy and autocracy in the special geographical space of Edinburgh and points out a tough but promising way for the strugglers.

Diachronic research on the time of internet use for academic tasks by Spanish-speaking university students in the pre-COVID era

The COVID-19 pandemic forced the digitalization of education to be accelerated to continue the teaching–learning processes in confined populations. The irruption of this fact caused the evolution that had previously been occurring in the integration of digital technologies, and in general information and communication technologies (ICT), in education to be distorted, as their use multiplied exponentially in a few months. However, it is interesting to know how integrating these media and tools in the educational world evolved without having mediated an anomalous event such as the pandemic. This article studies the time university students in Spanish-speaking countries spent using the Internet for educational tasks in the pre-COVID era to determine whether this use was homogeneous in this common geographical and cultural space. Knowledge of these behaviors is valuable for analyzing their relationship with the then-current processes of ICT integration in higher education. It can serve as a basis for comparative studies of these trends and what happened during and after the pandemic. Among them is determining whether specific ICT integration strategies were not pedagogically adequate due to the situation’s urgency. The analysis of this study was descriptive and inferential statistics, based on the survey method with the application of data mining using software R. It was carried out over seven years (2012–2018) and applied to a sample of 2482 students from seven countries. The findings obtained have allowed us to determine that the use of the Internet by Spanish-speaking university students, in general, increased significantly over time in the pre-COVID era, in parallel to a more significant presence in educational processes, with conditioning factors in each country depending on its economy and political and social situation.

Professional Training of future Chinese Specialists in the Educational space of a Russian university: Phonation-Phonetic Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

In the conditions of modern international cooperation, the importance of the Russian language in the global geographical space is growing and expanding. Today, the Russian language is becoming one of the main foreign languages studied in world culture in general and in the Chinese educational space in particular. To develop full-fledged and mutually beneficial relations between Russia and China, the need for Chinese specialists who speak Russian has increased. Russian and Chinese languages belong to different language groups: Russian belongs to the Slavic languages of the Indo-European language group, and Chinese belongs to the Sino-Tibetan language group, therefore, the Chinese, when mastering Russian sound formation, assume difficulties associated, for example, with stress in words, with pronouncing voiced consonants, with intonation in a sentence, etc. The first difficulty that future Chinese specialists face at a Russian university is a lack of understanding of oral Russian speech and the lack of developed pronunciation skills related to the perception and production of Russian words. The purpose of the article is to show the importance of phonation-phonetic knowledge, skills and abilities of the Russian language for the professional training of future Chinese specialists in the educational space of a Russian university. Methodology. The article is based on the study of works (V. I. Zagvyazinsky, G. K. Parinova, V. A. Slastenin, etc.) that define the general theoretical provisions of professional training (L. B. Dmitriev, N. I. Zhinkin, I. A. Zimnyaya, etc.), forming knowledge about speech and vocal training, as well as methodological research (Xing Zhao, Zhang Xiaohui, etc.) on the training of future Chinese specialists in Russian. Conclusion. Phonation-phonetic knowledge, skills and abilities in Russian not only contribute to the effectiveness of professional training of future Chinese specialists in the educational space of a Russian university, but also increase the level of phonation-phonetic competence in general.

Bias correction in species distribution models based on geographic and environmental characteristics

Correcting sampling bias in species distribution models (SDMs) is challenging. The difficulty lies in accurately identifying and quantifying bias and the scarcity of samples, which greatly impedes the implementation of bias correction. Current methods often adjust the distribution of presence or background points within geographic or environmental spaces to correct the sampling bias in probability estimation within SDMs. However, these methods may lead to information loss, rely on subjective assumptions, and often separate geography and environment when correcting for bias. This study proposes a novel and easily implementable method termed “aggregation background.” This method selects background data based on the aggregation degree of presence points in the geographic and environmental feature space, thereby approximating the representation and correction of sampling bias in the presence samples. We compared this new method with other prevalent sampling bias correction methods in the existing literature by analyzing ecological authenticity. Under varying biases and sample sizes, the aggregation background and geographic filtering methods achieved more accurate species distribution predictions compared to the target group background and other methods. Notably, when the sample size was small (≤70), the aggregation background was superior to that obtained using the geographic filtering method. These findings underscore the effectiveness of the aggregation background in improving bias correction using limited available presence sample data, without relying on assumptions about sampling bias. Our method provides a new approach for correcting complex unknown biases in SDMs.

National-scale digital soil mapping performances are related to covariates and sampling density: Lessons from France

Accurate soil property and class predictions through spatial modelling necessitate a thoughtful selection of explanatory variables and sample size, as their choice greatly impacts model performance. Within the framework of Global Soil Nutrient and Nutrient Budget maps (GSNmap), the FAO Global Soil Partnership (GSP) launched a country-driven digital soil mapping (DSM) approach. The GSP asked the countries if they could implement the DSM prediction of ten soil properties, using their national point data and a set of widely available covariates (GSP_Cov). In this study, we examined the effect of including additional national-based covariates and soil observations on the performance of the prediction models using mainland France as a pilot. The learning soil dataset was based on a systematic 16-to-16 km grid. For a subset of soil properties, we also assessed using repeated k-fold cross-validation the effect of adding to this dataset many other irregularly spread measurements. The GSP_Cov included common widely available covariates that represented information about terrain, climate, and organisms. The second set of covariates consisted of the GSP_Cov, extended to extra covariates available at a national level, such as previously existing soil maps, geological maps, remote sensing products and others. Random Forest approach in combination with the Boruta selection method was employed for mapping ten soil properties: soil organic carbon (SOC), pH (water), total nitrogen (N), available phosphorus (P), available potassium (K), cation exchange capacity (CEC), bulk density (BD), and texture (clay, silt, and sand). The results revealed noteworthy enhancements in prediction performance for more than half of the properties, although, for some of them, the improvements were negligible. The most significant improvements were obtained for pH, CEC and texture, where geological variables and a previous pH map significantly contributed to the increase in accuracy. Adding numerous points (around 25,000) to the learning dataset improved the performance of soil particle-size fractions predictions. By broadening the spectrum of covariates and better covering the feature and geographical spaces considered in soil prediction models, this research underscores the importance of implementing a more diverse range of covariates at a national scale and of densifying soil information to enlarge the feature and geographical spaces of multidimensional soil/covariates combinations. This information should be taken into account in national and continental digital soil mapping endeavours.

Times and spaces of crime in the Historic Centre of Porto: Evidence from official data

The analysis of official data is a traditional strategy to study criminality in a geographic space (e.g., city, country). This work focuses on the analysis of the official statistics of crime against property at the Historic Centre of Porto, Portugal, in 2018. It addresses temporal (i.e., by period of the week, time of day) and spatial patterns (i.e., spatial analysis, typology of spaces) of crime occurrences. The database was analyzed through descriptive and inferential statistics, and by spatial density analysis. Theft was the most common type of crime, although crime types varied greatly with location, and time of the day. There were no significant differences on crime occurrences by days of the week and most crimes were reported in the afternoon. Concerning typology of spaces, most crimes occurred at linear spaces, especially robberies. Findings can be very useful for sustainable and considered urban planning, by aligning the location of material and human resources with the detection of seasonal and comparable crime patterns, enabling more efficient crime prevention in urban areas.

Locality, Personal Ties, and Efficiency in a Food Security Network

Food sharing and distribution organization systems provide critical resources for local communities and food-insecure households. In this article, we investigate a newly collected data set of the Thrive Network in southwestern Virginia, which links forty food security organizations through fifty-one connections, using a theoretical framework of organization science within geographic space. We first test whether more central and higher degree organizations are toward the geographic center of the network, near convenient points of interest. We then measure whether organizations are likely to form connections based on nearness and logistical effectiveness of moving goods, and where this occurs. Finally, we find “missed connections,” defined as sets of organizations that are nearby but highly disconnected in the network. We find that important nodes are not necessarily in the center of the network, but are located on the periphery, and that relatively few organizations are connected to their nearby neighbors. We find that important nodes are not necessarily in the center of the network, but are located on the periphery, and that relatively few organizations are connected to their nearby neighbors. As such, this system could be predicated on bottom-up personal relationships rather than a hub-and-spoke supply chain configuration, and new ties might make the system more effective. We use our findings to help the Thrive Network build a more resilient food-sharing system and better serve vulnerable clients.

Research On the Path of High Quality Development Enabled by Big Data Technology in the Curved Area of The Yellow River

Big data is a key factor of production to promote the current social development, and the good use of big data technology is a must to achieve high-quality development. Jiziwan of the Yellow River is a strategic overlapping area of the western development and the overland Silk Road, which has very important strategic value both in terms of geographical space and historical development. Therefore, it is particularly important to enable the high-quality development of the Yellow River Jiziwan region with big data technology. By analyzing the relevant data of the high-quality development of the main provinces of the Yellow River Bend in recent years, this paper makes a comparison of the gross product of the region in recent years, the added value of the three major industries, and the R&D investment of the industrial enterprises, so as to get the results of the high-quality development of the Yellow River Bend area and the existing problems. Through these analysis results, this paper puts forward some solutions: using big data technology to optimize regional industrial structure, promote high-quality ecological development and promote innovative development. These optimization paths help promote the importance of the digital economy and promote high-quality, sustainable and coordinated development in the region.

Mitigating local bias in equity crowdfunding: a financial ecology perspective

Abstract This study analyses the relationship between geographic space, social networks, and financial knowledge in interregional equity crowdfunding flows based on the concept of financial ecology. Using data from a leading Dutch equity crowdfunding platform, we find that interregional crowdfunding investment decreases with geographic distance. Furthermore, the negative effect of distance is weaker if interregional social networks are strong and if the investor region has a high concentration of the financial industry. The results extend the conceptual foundation of financial ecology by explaining how individual behaviors affect the macro-level output of a financial ecology.

Making Memory: Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland

This is a study of how collective memory forms out of traumatic experience. It addresses questions about the formation of collective identity out of individual trauma, and, in turn, how individual and collective trauma intertwine. This process of memory formation is illustrated through the example of an incident that took place in Northern Ireland on 30 January 1972, an event that came to be known as Bloody Sunday. A lawyer representing the families of the victims once succinctly described it as a ‘mass murder perpetrated before the world’s media [. . . which] took place over a period of ten to twelve minutes, within a geographical space not much bigger than two football pitches’. To explain how this ‘ten to twelve’ minutes became a powerful symbol of the excesses of state violence and a memory forever linked to Ireland’s history I apply the theory of cultural trauma. Previous research has identified several arenas of memory, ‘social spaces where different narratives of collective memory interact [. . .] distinct discourses that are tied to specific individuals, organizations, and institutions that advocate specific narratives through specific forms of media’. Four areas were identified, the political, the academic, the artistic, and the community. Along with the theory of cultural trauma, I apply that framework in analyzing the memory and memorialization of Bloody Sunday.