Emerging GIS themes and the six senses of the new mind: is GIS becoming a liberation technology?

Abstract

The past 20 years have witnessed the emergence of a plethora of research themes in GIS that are quite different from conventional GIS practices. This article develops a preliminary framework to loosely knit together the diverse intellectual threads for the emerging GIS themes. It is found that the framework for the six senses of the whole new mind (design, story, symphony, empathy, play and meaning) captures the six major emerging GIS themes remarkably well. Conventional GIS practices have been predominantly concentrating on automated cartography/map-making, spatial modelling, geocomputation and database development with the goal for efficiency, which tend to be closely associated with the left-side/slow thinking capabilities of the human brain. In contrast, the emerging GIS themes focus more on geonarratives, qualitative/ mixed methods, storytelling and synthesis with the goal for achieving equity and social justice, which tend to be more closely associated with the right-side/fast thinking capabilities of the human brain. Evidently, these new GIS practices have the potential to enable GIS users to transcend what Heidegger called the enframing nature of technology and motivate them to explore new areas of enquiry with greater sensitivities to the social and political dimensions of GIS application. Increasingly, these emerging GIS practices are transforming GIS into a liberation technology that continues empowering GIS users in their quest for a better, more equitable and sustainable world. These emerging themes also pose new research and educational challenges for the GIS community in the years ahead.

Geographic information science and the analysis of place and health

“…We suggest that this research can be leveraged to develop a more comprehensive framework for the computational representation of the dynamic, subjective, experiential, and relational aspects of place. This perspective on place representation also aligns with the set of emerging themes in Geographic Information Science research elicited by Sui (2015), which emphasize narrative and synthetic approaches. Similarly, well-defined models of the personalized activity spaces of individuals would allow investigators to save the time and resources needed to measure environmental exposure at the individual level (Jarup, 2004).…”

A Geodesign Decision Support Environment for Integrating Management of Resource Flows in Spatial Planning

“…GIS are not only used for cartographic analysis but are increasingly being used for building narratives, qualitative storytelling and within synthesis approaches with the goal for equity and justice (Sui, 2015). Although the usefulness of GIS in all stages of impact assessments have already been recognized (e.g., Eedy, 1995), it is still seldomly applied in sustainability assessments (e.g., Sholarin & Awange, 2015).…”

Drones and Geographical Information Technologies in Agroecology and Organic Farming Contributions to Technological Sovereignty

“…After decades of conventional GIS based on automated cartographic production, data storage management, quantitative computing, definition, and standardization of geoprocessing, in the 1990s, with the encountering among GIS practitioners and critical cartographers, new paths were opened. Participatory, feminist, qualitative, postcolonial, and indigenous GIS (Sui, 2015;Yuan, 2021) and many other GIS themes dealing with inclusion, empowerment, new epistemologies, critical and transformative approaches emerged in the interaction among GIScience and society (Corbett et al, 2016;Schlosseberg and Shuford, 2005;Sieber, 2006). Sui (2015) names all these emerging practices with the umbrella term of alternative GIS (alt.gis) asking a key question: Is GIS becoming a liberation technology?…”