Conventional accessibility measures based on the notion of locational proximity ignore the role of complex travel behavior and space-time constraints in determining individual accessibility. As these factors are especially significant in women's everyday lives, all conventional accessibility measures suffer from an inherent "gender bias." This study conceptualizes individual accessibility as space-time feasibility and provides formulations of accessibility measures based on the space-time prism construct. Using a subsample of European Americans from a travel diary data set collected in Franklin County, Ohio, space-time accessibility measures are implemented with a network-based GIS method. Results of the study indicate that women have lower levels of individual access to urban opportunities when compared to men, although there is no difference in the types of opportunities and areas they can reach given their space-time constraints. Further, individual accessibility has no relationship with the length of the commute trip, suggesting that the journey to work may not be an appropriate measure of job access. This paper investigates the determinants of spatial knowledge and how our knowledge of space varies according to geographic location. By using data on U.S. city names recalled at 22 test locations, a multivariate model of the information surface specific to each test location is calibrated. This model links the probability of a city being recalled from memory to its distance from the test site, its population size, its location with respect to other cities, and whether or not it is a state capital. The paper then suggests that these recall data provide information on spatial knowledge surfaces from which large-scale spatial choices, such as migration destinations, are made. Results from the analysis lend further evidence to the idea that spatial knowledge is stored and processed hierarchically and that individuals underrepresent information in large clusters. Consequently, the results have important implications for modeling any spatial behavior based on individuals' spatial information surfaces. In particular, the results cast further doubt on the validity of traditional large-scale spatial choice frameworks and lend support to the competing destinations hypothesis.
Richly evocative figures exist for feminist visualizations of the world as witty agent . . . We just live here and try to strike up non-innocent conversations by means of our prosthetic devices, including our visualization technologies.- Haraway (1991, 199) he critical discourse on geographic information systems (GIS) in the past decade or so has raised important questions about the value of GIS in human geographic research. While many maintain that the development and use of GIS constitute a scientific pursuit capable of producing objective knowledge of the world, others criticize GIS for its inadequate representation of space and subjectivity, its positivist epistemology, its instrumental rationality, its technique-driven and data-led methods, and its role as surveillance or military technology deployed by the state. The debate between GIS researchers and critics in the 1990s, however, does not seem to have affected GIS practices in geographic research in significant ways (Schuurman 2000; Kwan 2002b Kwan , 2002c.By this I do not mean that there has been a lack of response from GIS scientists and practitioners. On the contrary, both GIS researchers and critics have been involved in major research initiatives that attempt to address the limitations of GIS and its negative impacts on society-from issues of ontology, representation, and scale to the social and political implications of GIS for Despite considerable progress in recent geographic information systems (GIS) research (especially on public-participation GIS), the critical discourse on GIS in the 1990s does not seem to have affected GIS practices in geographic research in significant ways. Development in critical GIS practice has been quite limited to date, and GIS and critical geographies remain two separate, if not overtly antagonistic, worlds. This suggests that critical engagement that seeks to conceive and materialize the critical potential of GIS for geographic research is still sorely needed. In this article, I explore the possibilities for this kind of critical engagement through revisiting some of the central arguments in the critical discourse from feminist perspectives. I examine whether GIS methods are inherently incompatible with feminist epistemologies through interrogating their connection with positivist scientific practices and visualization technologies. Bearing in mind the limitations of current GIS, I explore several ways in which GIS methods may be used to enrich feminist geographic research. I propose to reimagine GIS as a method in feminist geography and describe feminist visualization as a possible critical practice in feminist research. I argue that GIS can be re-envisioned and used in feminist geography in ways that are congenial to feminist epistemologies and politics. These alternative practices represent a new kind of critical engagement with GIS that is grounded on the critical agency of the GIS user/researcher.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.