Full Citation
Title: History and GIS: Railways, Population Change, and Agricultural Development in late nineteenth century Wales
Citation Type: Miscellaneous
Publication Year: 2011
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Abstract: Historical Geographical Information Systems, or Historical GIS, has become a rapidly growing field within historical research (Knowles 2005a; Gregory & Ell 2007; Gregory & Healey 2007). Historical GIS is an inter-disciplinary field that involves taking GIS technology, devised in quantitative, data-rich disciplines such as computer science and environmental management, and applying it to the study of history. A major impetus behind the growth of Historical GIS has been the significant investments made by a number of countries in National Historical GISs (NHGIS). Originally these databases would typically contain a country’s census reports and other data for the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. They contained the statistical data linked to cartographic representations of the administrative units they refer to, together with the changing boundaries of those units. Using a conventional database containing only statistical information, a researcher could search for aspatial patterns of variation and change. Using an historical GIS, however, the researcher is now equipped to identify patterns of change that occur simultaneously over time and across geographic space. Additionally, because all of the data are located in space, they can be integrated with any other data that are also located in space. With historical GIS we can get closer to complexity of change and historical reality.
User Submitted?: No
Authors: Schwartz, Robert, M; Gregory , Ian, N; Henneberg, Jordi, M
Publisher: Mt Holyoke
Data Collections: IPUMS NHGIS
Topics: Other
Countries: United States