Local Geographic Knowledge Research Articles

Local Knowledge for a Prince: A Maqāma on the Miracles of Water

Abstract This article discusses the Maqāma Miyāhiyya (A Maqāma on the Waters) of al-Ḥasan b. Abī Muḥammad al-Ṣafadī as an example of a work that offers geographical knowledge about well-known places to a courtly circle of recipients. The maqāma is found in al-Ṣafadī’s collection of thirty maqāmāt, the Maqāmāt Ǧalāliyya, which was dedicated to the famed ruler of Hama, al-Malik al-Muʾayyad Abū l-Fidāʾ (672/1273–732/1332). The Maqāma Miyāhiyya discusses the rivers of the Mamluk domains in quantitative terms (a comparison of their weights) and then juxtaposes this section with a long poem in raǧaz meter describing the magical properties of springs, lakes, and rivers in Mamluk territory. As such, it represents the way al-Ṣafadī employed local geographical knowledge that he gained through his experience as an administrator in courtly contexts.

Informal groups, disruptive innovations, and industry change in low‐tech peripheries

AbstractPeople often engage in informal activities or personal endeavours that lead to both deliberate and serendipitous disruptive innovation and industry change. Some such innovation and change is found in geographic or other peripheries without corporate research and development budgets or successful track records in inventive activities. Yet little research exists to explain how those peripheral and informal groups and their pursuits contribute to industry development and transformation. This article addresses that gap. Drawing on thematic analyses of 30 interviews with hobbyist and commercial beekeepers in Western Australia, the article examines the beekeeping industry and considers how hobbyists function as industry external knowledge sources and user innovators. Findings suggest that hobbyist–firm interactions are platforms for value creation and appropriation for both groups and their respective local communities, in addition to being based on both competition and collaboration in parallel markets of exchange. In particular, hobbyist innovators are important for low‐tech industry advancement and provide crucial scientific, practical, and local geographic knowledge that changes industry approaches and activities. These findings are likely to be significant to other low‐tech industries with informal local groups acting as sources of knowledge and information for disruptive innovations or industry transformation.

Embodied competences in preparedness for blackouts: Mixed methods insights from rural and urban Norwegian households

As part of governmental risk management policies, households are advised to be aware of local preparedness plans, make a family emergency plan and kit, and stock supplies to increase their level of preparedness. But the sole focus on this ‘formal preparedness competence’ fails to consider the ‘embodied preparedness competence’ that comes into play during a blackout. Drawing on 25 in-depth interviews in Norwegian households and a representative web survey (N = 1,005), this article considers how an embodied competence shape household preparedness for extensive electricity and ICT infrastructure breakdowns. Informed by social practice theory, we define embodied competences as practical knowledge of how to act, and demonstrate the importance of three constituents: (i) previous experience with blackouts or having lived with restricted access to electricity or ICT; (ii) local geographical knowledge of climate and weather conditions and the built environment; and, (iii) mobilising social networks. The analysis shows that the formal preparedness competence was low, while the three constituents of the embodied competence were found to be significant preparedness resources. However, these varied between and within households, and most notably rural households had more experience with blackouts, more extensive social networks and were more engaged in their geographical surroundings than urban households. Our analysis provides important insights for policy in demonstrating that households should be recognized as resourceful through their everyday practices rather than by the level of implementation of formal preparedness resources.

Landscape Fragmentation, Ecosystem Services and Local Knowledge in the Baroro River Watershed, Northern Philippines

Landscape fragmentation, the breaking up of land use type into smaller parcels, isdamaging watersheds worldwide. Without addressing its causes, landscape fragmentation canpermanently destroy habitats and compromise ecosystem services (ES) that a watershed provides.This paper aims to establish associations between watershed landscape fragmentation and ES byintegrating science (satellite imageries and fragmentation analyses) and local geographicknowledge (key informant interviews and focus group discussions) at different time periods. Usingthe case of the Baroro River Watershed in Northern Philippines, this paper posits that localknowledge, when integrated with scientific knowledge, becomes a significant medium throughwhich watershed landscape fragmentation and declining quality of ES can be better understood andaddressed. Results also indicate that people’s experiences and knowledge on ES coincide withwatershed landscape fragmentation as evidenced by satellite images and fragmentation analysesdone at different time periods. This implies that people’s knowledge is well grounded on facts andcomplements scientific knowledge necessary in crafting more effective landscape policies that cantackle watershed fragmentation. Study results are also crucial in providing information to serve asinputs in the development of a more robust watershed management plan; particularly inimplementing sustainable land uses without sacrificing the watershed’s overall integrity.

The Negotiated Geography of the Treaty of Nerchinsk (1689) and the Role of the Jesuits

The 1689 peace negotiations in Nerchinsk between Muscovite Russia and Qing China resulted in the first bilateral settlement of the territorial disputes between the two empires and led to extensive surveys in the frontier region. More importantly, the surviving textual and material evidence qualifies this encounter as a site of knowledge exchange that provides exemplary insights into the Jesuits' activities as knowledge brokers in late imperial China. By using Jesuit, Russian, and Qing sources, this article reconstructs the exchange of geographic information in Nerchinsk and traces the knowledge fragments that made up the Jesuits' new spatial imagination of these lands. In arguing that their European cartographic training ultimately prevented them from successfully integrating the fragments of local geographic knowledge that were exchanged at the negotiations, it presents the Jesuits as highly problematic go-betweens and their allegedly "superior" knowledge as essentially refracted.

A Citizen Science Approach for Collecting Toponyms

The emerging trends and technologies of surveying and mapping potentially enable local experts to contribute and share their local geographical knowledge of place names (toponyms). We can see the increasing numbers of toponyms in digital platforms, such as OpenStreetMap, Facebook Place Editor, Swarm Foursquare, and Google Local Guide. On the other hand, government agencies keep working to produce concise and complete gazetteers. Crowdsourced geographic information and citizen science approaches offer a new paradigm of toponym collection. This paper addresses issues in the advancing toponym practice. First, we systematically examined the current state of toponym collection and handling practice by multiple stakeholders, and we identified a recurring set of problems. Secondly, we developed a citizen science approach, based on a crowdsourcing level of participation, to collect toponyms. Thirdly, we examined the implementation in the context of an Indonesian case study. The results show that public participation in toponym collection is an approach with the potential to solve problems in toponym handling, such as limited human resources, accessibility, and completeness of toponym information. The lessons learnt include the knowledge that the success of this approach depends on the willingness of the government to advance their workflow, the degree of collaboration between stakeholders, and the presence of a communicative approach in introducing and sharing toponym guidelines with the community.

Geographical locational knowledge as an indicator of children's views of the world: research from Sweden and Australia

Children's locational knowledge is often used to clarify underlying conceptual understandings of the world in which they live. Although there has been some exploration of how European children view their world there is little recent research on Scandinavian children's knowledge and associated perceptions of the wider world, or about Australian children's views. Coming from opposite parts of the globe it could be expected that children from Sweden and Australia would view the world in a very different manner. This study compared children's knowledge of countries in the world from comparable schools in both nations and found the expected influence of local geographic knowledge and social and economic place in the world on their skills and knowledge. They were influenced by their national space. However, media and popular culture also impacted on their views on the world and this impact was quite similar between the two nations.

A boat perspective: local geographic knowledge of fish harvesters in Change Islands, Newfoundland

People whose livelihoods depend on the natural environment have detailed knowledge of the lands and waters surrounding their communities. This paper presents research on the traditional geographic knowledge of fish harvesters in Change Islands, Newfoundland. Our findings, based on “kitchen table mapping” and other ethnographic methods, demonstrate that residents of coastal communities have extensive geographic knowledge associated with a way of life centred on fishing. This knowledge is reflected in a “namescape” that includes hundreds of toponyms that are not present on existing maps and that reflect meaningful connections with local history and cultural heritage. Fish harvesters also have distinctive ways of conceptualizing the landscape and the seascape, which is reflected in the geographic terminology they use. Overall, their way of looking at the environment, in contrast to the bird's-eye perspective that prevails in western cartography, can be characterized as a “boat perspective”. Their geographic knowledge has practical value for improving existing cartographic information and developing sustainable resource use strategies. At a broader level, their distinctive ways of interpreting the “earthscape” provide alternative ways of understanding space and place, and can help us identify our assumptions about how we define geographic features and represent them on maps.

Measure of Landmark Semantic Salience through Geosocial Data Streams

Research in the area of spatial cognition demonstrated that references to landmarks are essential in the communication and the interpretation of wayfinding instructions for human being. In order to detect landmarks, a model for the assessment of their salience has been previously developed by Raubal and Winter. According to their model, landmark salience is divided into three categories: visual, structural, and semantic. Several solutions have been proposed to automatically detect landmarks on the basis of these categories. Due to a lack of relevant data, semantic salience has been frequently reduced to objects’ historical and cultural significance. Social dimension (i.e., the way an object is practiced and recognized by a person or a group of people) is systematically excluded from the measure of landmark semantic salience even though it represents an important component. Since the advent of mobile Internet and smartphones, the production of geolocated content from social web platforms—also described as geosocial data—became commonplace. Actually, these data allow us to have a better understanding of the local geographic knowledge. Therefore, we argue that geosocial data, especially Social Location Sharing datasets, represent a reliable source of information to precisely measure landmark semantic salience in urban area.

GRID: A Methodology Integrating Witness Testimony and Satellite Imagery Analysis for Documenting Alleged Mass Atrocities

Aim: This article documents the development and initial use case of the GRID (Ground Reporting through Imagery Delivery) methodology by the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI). GRID was created to support corroboration of witness testimony of mass atrocity related-events using satellite imagery analysis. A repeating analytic limitation of employing imagery for this purpose is that differences in the geographic knowledge of a witness and an imagery analyst can limit or impede corroboration. Methods: The primary method used in this article is a case study of HHI’s development and use of GRID. The GRID methodology was designed during HHI’s work with the Satellite Sentinel Project. It was deployed to corroborate reports that mass graves were being created in Sudan in the summer of 2011. Results: The results of this specific case study are examined, step-by-step guidelines for using GRID are provided, and possible areas for further research are discussed. This case demonstrates that the GRID methodology facilitates corroboration when differences exist between the local geographic knowledge of a witness and the more cursory geographic knowledge of an analyst. Conclusions: The initial use of GRID warrants further research into potential applications in other regional and operational contexts. Future use cases will help advance GRID as a standardized methodology for use by different types of groups that utilize satellite imagery. Distinct research should also focus on operational, cultural, psychological, and ethical impacts of this methodology due to its involvement of the witness in the imagery analysis process.

Using Participatory Research Mapping and GIS to Explore Local Geographic Knowledge of Indigenous Landscapes in Mexico

Using Participatory Research Mapping and GIS to Explore Local Geographic Knowledge of Indigenous Landscapes in Mexico

Disease Maps as Context for Community Mapping: A Methodological Approach for Linking Confidential Health Information with Local Geographical Knowledge for Community Health Research

Health is increasingly understood as a product of multiple levels of influence, from individual biological and behavioral influences to community and societal level contextual influences. In understanding these contextual influences, community health researchers have increasingly employed both geographic methodologies, including Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and community participatory approaches. However, despite growing interest in the role for community participation and local knowledge in community health investigations, and the use of geographical methods and datasets in characterizing community environments, there exist few examples of research projects that incorporate both geographical and participatory approaches in addressing health questions. This is likely due in part to concerns and restrictions regarding community access to confidential health data. In order to overcome this barrier, we present a method for linking confidential, geocoded health information with community-generated experiential geographical information in a GIS environment. We use sophisticated disease mapping methodologies to create continuously defined maps of colorectal cancer in Iowa, then incorporate these layers in an open source GIS application as the context for a participatory community mapping exercise with participants from a rural Iowa town. Our method allows participants to interact directly with health information at a fine geographical scale, facilitating hypothesis generation regarding contextual influences on health, while simultaneously protecting data confidentiality. Participants are able to use their local, geographical knowledge to generate hypotheses about factors influencing colorectal cancer risk in the community and opportunities for risk reduction. This work opens the door for future efforts to integrate empirical epidemiological data with community generated experiential information to inform community health research and practice.

A community-based toolkit for designing ride-sharing services: the case of a virtual network of ride access points in Germany

Transport by private car has been challenged due to its high environmental impacts. Ride sharing (i.e. people with the same routes sharing a car) contributes to sustainable mobility by increasing the capacity use of cars. Still, when arranging 'Ride Access Points' (RAPs), intense communication and coordination between drivers and riders is necessary and thus transaction costs arise. Based on the fact that information and communication technologies can reduce transaction costs and that local geographical knowledge is distributed across distant individuals, we focus on community–based toolkits for user innovation and design to improve ride access. A case study at the German ride sharing service provider Momax GmbH shows how a toolkit has been used for crowdsourcing a virtual mobility network consisting of RAPs. Based on this example from the service industry, we argue that real–time translation of user content into service production is crucial for increasing the intrinsic motivation of lead users.

Classifying physical geographic features: the case of maninka farmers in southwestern mali

.This article argues that understanding how people classify physical geographic features is necessary for identifying fundamental, cross‐cultural geographic concepts that are required for successful communication of geographic knowledge. Academic geographers have not given sufficient attention to systems of local geographic knowledge, even though promising theoretical frameworks exist, particularly in the field of ethnoecology. However, the research approach that has characterized ethnoecology is insufficient to develop ethnogeography as a field of inquiry, because ethnoecologists have overemphasized limited aspects of local knowledge systems, such as soils, which has often led researchers to incompletely sample local knowledge systems. Using ethnographic methods, this article analyses the content and structure of physical geographic knowledge in the Maninka language as spoken in southwestern Mali, and compares Maninka knowledge to that of other cultural groups. The results suggest that broad physical geographic concepts may be shared pan‐environmentally, but that most physical geographic knowledge is contained in culturally specific classifications embedded within a broad cross‐cultural framework. Academic geographers should expect only broad correspondence between their categories of physical geographic variation and those of people who classify biophysical features according to local knowledge systems. Finally, this article also shows that ethnoecological research will be advanced if geographic theories of place are given more prominence in ethnoecological studies.