The area told as a story
An inquiry into the relationship between verbal and map-based expressions of
geographical information
PhD project 2009–2012
To main research page.
Øyvind Eide, Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
Funded by The
Norwegian Research Council: Project webpage.
Supervisor: Professor Willard McCarty.
The thesis was submitted on August 30, 2012, with viva December 14, 2012. The degree
was officially awarded in February 2013. Link to online version of the thesis (open).
Project abstract
In modern European societies, maps are seen as the natural way to communicate
about geography. This is different in other historical periods. In the project
description I show some examples of historical periods in which maps are not
used very much, although they are known. In my opinion, this lack of use is not
based on a lack of cartographic tools or knowledge only. I think there are other
reasons why people choose to use verbal texts to communicate about geography,
reasons that may be difficult to see for people living in a modern map based
society. In the proposed PhD project, I will look for such reasons by trying to
find examples of verbal texts being superior to maps.
The source material for the project will be a document from the 18th
century: Major Schnitler's border examination protocols. The digitally
available, TEI encoded textual version of this material will be used as the
source for a database. This database will represent a model of the geographical
information I read from the text.
This model will be a version of the geographical information in the source text,
expressed in a formal language. The model will also store contradictory facts if
and when they exist. Possible contradiction can be found using rules of
calculation that will be developed on top of the model. The model will be used
to investigate my hypothesis by trying to express the information in the model
as maps.
Based on the results of this research, I will discuss the possible existence of
geographical structures and features found in the model that can not be
expressed on maps without significant loss of meaning. This way, I hope to gain
new knowledge about how people express themselves in verbal texts about
geography, as opposed to map based expressions. In the longer term, I hope this
will help us understanding more about the reasons why some cultures are very map
oriented, whereas others know about maps, but only use them in very limited
areas.
Book chapters
- Eide, Øyvind. "Verbal Expressions of Geographical Information." New
Worlds out of Old Texts: Developing Techniques for the Spatial Analysis
of Ancient Narratives. Elton Barker, Stefan Buzar, Chris Pelling,
and Leif Isaksen (eds). Oxford: Oxford University Press, Forthcoming.
Presentations
- INKE 2009, Vicoria, BC, Canada October 23–24 2009: Abstract. Presentation. Conference webpage.
Participation supported by the INKE project.
- Seminar at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, UK October 30 2009: Abstract. Presentation.
- PhD seminar at the Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College
London, UK December 16 2009: Presentation.
- Transcending the Boundaries: doctoral research across disciplines. Workshop
at the School of Historical Studies at the University of Leicester, UK
January 30 2010: Presentation. Workshop webpage.
- Invited presentation at the seminar for the Research Group for Lexicography,
Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies, University of Oslo,
Norway February 19 2010: Presentation
(in Norwegian). Research Group webpage (in Norwegian).
- Presentation at the Humanities + digital Visual Interpretations conference
at MIT, May 20-22 2010. Presentation. Video of the presentation. Conference
webpage.
- Presentation at the colloquium New worlds out of old texts: interrogating
new techniques for the spatial analysis of ancient narratives in Oxford July
1-3 2010. Abstract. Presentation. Colloquium
webpage.
- ICLA 2010, Seoul, South Korea August 15–21 2010: Abstract. Presentation. Conference webpage.
- So What? King's College London's Graduate Research Forum February 14 2011:
Presentation. Event web
page.
- PhD seminar at the Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
February 16 2011: Presentation.
- Comparative Literature Research Seminar, King's College London March 9 2011:
Breaking Lessing’s Rules? Maps, Documents and Defoe.
- SDH-SEMI 2011, Fredericton, Canada, May 30 –June 1 2011: Abstract. Presentation.
- Interface 2011, University College London, July 27–29 2011: Short
presentation.
- NorSIS2011—Media Acts, Trondheim, Norway, October 26–28 2011: Abstract. Presentation. Conference webpage.
- PhD seminar at the Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
November 23 2011: Presentation.
- MLA Annual Convention, Seattle, USA, January 5–8 2012. Abstract. Presentation.
- Digital Humanities Australasia, Canberra, Australia, March 27–30 2012.
Abstract. Presentation. Conference webpage.
- Digital Humanities, Hamburg, Germany, July 16–22 2012. Abstract. Presentation. Conference webpage.
- The Department of Digital Humanities' New Scholars lecture series and the
Arts and Humanities Research Institute's Interdisciplinary Seminar, King's
College London, UK, March 1 2013. Presentation. Sound recording.
- The 26th International Cartographic Conference, Dresden, Germant, August
25–30 2013. Paper. Presentation. Conference webpage.
Tool development
GeoModelText is a tool that will assist an operator in adding detailed geographical
information to XML-TEI files, and export the model created in XML. For the time
being, it is developed for my own needs in this project only, but that may change in
the future. GeoModelText has its own site
on Sourceforge.