Evaluation and Reflection of Google My Maps as a Digital Mapping Tool

rinsuh — Sat, 28 May 2022 09:30:06 +0000

Why would you use digital mapping?

Utilising digital mapping has several different implementations in digital humanities. It is most often used as a means of data visualisation, but often has its benefits in digitising historical and cultural maps from physical formats and georeferencing locational data. With the recent years of the COVID-19 pandemic, digital mapping has become a vital tool in not only analysing COVID case numbers and tracking transmission, but also as a method to understand how cultural forms of health and resource management have adapted themselves into the digital world. Caquard et. al (2019) for example, make note of Mappingback, an “Indigenous Cartographies of Extractive Industries”, highlighting how digital mapping can be utilised in a context that is mainly revolved around social justice, allowing users and indigenous communities to visualise resource and land conflicts. In this regard, having a general sense and understanding of how digital mapping works firsthand is crucial in navigating our post-colonial landscape, as well as seeing how non-digital formats can be digitised.

The initial decision to utilise Google My Maps as a digital mapping tool was as a continuation of a mapping exercise we as a class worked through a few weeks ago. The appeal of Google My Maps would be the familiarity and the relative accessibility of the mapping tool. By accessibility, I mean to say that Google is already quite well known and accepted as an online with its many functions and applications. As The Economist (2017) asserts, more than 1 billion people utilise Google maps each month; having a name that is widely recognised within the realm of digital humanities lends itself to wider appeal and potentially reaching wider audiences. The existing use of My Maps is primarily to plot personal data points and create custom maps that allows for searching, drawing and personalisation of maps. However, as per the digital mapping exercise, I found that My Maps also had the potential to plot various historically significant datasets, such as witches accused in the Salem Witch Trials.

The difficulties of utilising Google My Maps as a digital mapping tool was mainly understanding the datasets and fiddling around with the data. Granted, the accessibility is straightforward and there isn’t any real technical prerequisite knowledge required to navigate My Maps, but therein lies the main shortcoming of MyMaps. Its digital mapping capabilities fall short to the likes of Recogito and Leaflet, both digital mapping tools that require the knowledge of additional coding languages to be able to use digital mapping to its fullest potential. Visualising and analysing the .csv dataset file through My Maps was not as simple as seeing all observable datapoints in the file on the map. What I found surprising was that My Maps lacked the technical proficiency and power to categorise and annotate across different platforms, i.e Leaflet utilises Javascript, HTML and CSS, whereas My Maps relies mainly upon .csv files and manual data entry.

A few locations of accused “witches”.

Nevertheless, My Maps does offer a nice introduction to the world of digital mapping tools. I found it easy to use, and there is room for creativity to delve deeper within the datasets and spatial data. A thing to be worried in the realms of privacy and personal data is the fact that it is owned and operated by Google, so with our information being visualised and materialised, plotting personal or confidential data should be done with utmost discretion.

References

“Car-Tography; Digital Mapping.” The Economist, vol. 423, no. 9044, Jun 10, 2017, pp. 67. ProQuest, https://www.proquest.com/magazines/car-tography-digital-mapping/docview/1907612184/se-2?accountid=8330.

Caquard, S., Lucchesi, A., Studnicki-Gizbert, D., Temper, L. and Mcgurk, T., 2019. Using maps as a weapon to resist extractive industries on Indigenous territories. [online] Theconversation.com. Available at: [Accessed 28 May 2022].

Play, Experimentation and Collaboration – Reconciling Ecological Conservation through Video Games

rinsuh — Fri, 27 May 2022 07:37:44 +0000

Video games are most often thought of as a source of entertainment, and are often scrutinised for unrealistic, fictionalised portrayals of history, culture, and technology. However, in recent years, as video gaming becomes more ubiquitous, accessible, and diverse in its methods, it becomes crucial for us as students of digital humanities and as the average video game enjoyer to not only understand, but also critique how we play video games. As the nature and medium of video games evolve and adapt, so too does our own awareness and role in becoming more than just a consumer.

As per the digital literacy/fluency dichotomy introduced by Champion et al. (2015), one needs to understand the game designer’s own digital fluency of how they are able to portray their expertise in a medium that is also, able to be literate and understood by the user/player. There is also the issue of when we learn more about history and culture through video games, we need to also gauge whether in that design process and understanding, we are looking at an accurate representation of history or merely a simulated and alternate form that may not teach us anything at all or make use of lessons that have any implications apart from entertainment and enjoyment. Since games are discursive and performative, we form and answer questions about characters and understand actual historical figures through games.

For example, on the depictions of mythology within the games God of War, Hades, and Okami, all of which are critically acclaimed games for entertainment, the argument is that outside of providing a basic outline of characters and plots, they lack the pedagogical design in advancing an understanding about mythology beyond curiosity and a push to learn more. Contrarily, some games are able to reconcile the rift between pedagogy and entertainment, such as Red Dead Redemption and Pokémon Go, on the topic of ecological issues such as conservation.

Video Thumbnail of the Naturalist obtained from: https://www.rockstargames.com/newswire/article/89k8a554551o78/Red-Dead-Online-The-Naturalist-Now-Available, Rockstar Games (2020)

Crowley et al. (2021) has shown that the “realistic” wildlife ecology in Red Dead Redemption 2 was designed in such a way that players who played as the Naturalist class (whose core gameplay quest revolves around either hunting or conserving the ecosystem) within the game found that they were more aware of their ecological impact not just within the game, but also in real life. Contrarily, Pergams and Zaradic (2006) have previously argued that this may not be effective; the growing downward trend of national park attendance with the correlation of increasing electronic media usage has been a cause for concern. However, due to the ever-growing adaptation and evolution of the video game medium, the work shown by Crowley et al. prove that with time, and ecologically conscious game design philosophies, games can have an impact on mobilising individuals, even inadvertently in the case of Pokemon Go.

Dorward et al. (2017) recognise that although apps such as Pokémon Go have incentivised outdoor activity and movement and forced an understanding of species habitat preferences, there is a fundamental disconnect in the game design philosophy of Pokémon Go, between the conservation of real life animal species, and capturing and battling of Pokémon obtained. It is not to say that Pokémon as a series concept is fundamentally flawed; it draws on the creator’s own childhood experiences of catching and recording various insect species, a crucial activity for entomologists and conservationists alike. As Balmford et al. (2002) have posited, children are able and aware of recognising different species, but have better results in differentiating Pokémon (the First Generation, 151).

Although gameplay wise, Red Dead Redemption and Pokemon Go offer two varying experiences, they both have addressed some semblance of learning more about ecological issues through their medium. The main conclusion from this is to gauge whether gamifying ecological concepts lessens their impact, and to figure out a way that can reconcile the disconnect between a game’s design that is entertainment and for pedagogy. Can we learn anything from any of these video game mediums and processes?

rinsuh – MetoDHology

Evaluation and Reflection of Google My Maps as a Digital Mapping Tool

Play, Experimentation and Collaboration – Reconciling Ecological Conservation through Video Games