James Richard Akerman | |
---|---|
Born | October 1956 |
Nationality | American |
Alma mater | Pennsylvania State University |
Scientific career | |
Fields | geographer, administrator |
James Richard Akerman (born October 1956) is an American geographer and former director of the Newberry Library's Hermon Dunlap Smith Center for the History of Cartography. He is known for his work on the history of cartography. [1] [2]
Akerman obtained his B.A.in Sociology from Denison University in 1978, his M.A. in Geography from the University of Michigan in 1981 and his Ph.D. also in Geography from Pennsylvania State University in 1991. [3]
In 1985 Akerman started at the Newberry Library as acting and assistant curator of maps. In 1988 he became Assistant Director and in 1995 Acting Director of the Hermon Dunlap Smith Center for the History of Cartography. He also served as Curator of Maps from 2011 until his retirement in 2022. [4]
Cartography is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality can be modeled in ways that communicate spatial information effectively.
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The Newberry Library is an independent research library, specializing in the humanities. It is located in Chicago, Illinois, and has been free and open to the public since 1887. The Newberry fosters a deeper understanding of our world by inspiring research and learning in the humanities and encouraging conversations about ideas that matter. Its mission is rooted in a growing and accessible collection of rare and historical materials.
Arthur H. Robinson was an American geographer and cartographer, who was professor in the Geography Department at the University of Wisconsin–Madison from 1947 until he retired in 1980. He was a prolific writer and influential philosopher on cartography, and one of his most notable accomplishments is the Robinson projection of 1961.
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Cartographic propaganda is a map created with the goal of achieving a result similar to traditional propaganda. The map can be outright falsified, or created using subjectivity with the goal of persuasion. The idea that maps are subjective is not new; cartographers refer to maps as a human-subjective product and some view cartography as an "industry, which packages and markets spatial knowledge" or as a communicative device distorted by human subjectivity. However, cartographic propaganda is widely successful because maps are often presented as a miniature model of reality, and it is a rare occurrence that a map is referred to as a distorted model, which sometimes can "lie" and contain items that are completely different from reality. Because the word propaganda has become a pejorative, it has been suggested that mapmaking of this kind should be described as "persuasive cartography", defined as maps intended primarily to influence opinions or beliefs – to send a message – rather than to communicate geographic information.
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The Historical Atlas of the United States Congressional Districts: 1789-1983 is a 352-page bound volume of maps of all United States congressional districts from the effective date of the U.S. Constitution through the congressional redistricting after the 1980 U.S. Census. It was authored by West Virginia University geography professor Kenneth C. Martis with cartography by Ruth A. Rowles.
Gilles Palsky, is a French geographer and Professor at the Pantheon-Sorbonne University in Paris, France from 2007 to 2015. He is a member of the editorial board of Cybergéo and Imago Mundi, and known for his work on the history of statistical graphics and thematic mapping in the 19th century.