Gieseking - "Queering the Map" Talk
1 like4,292 views
This document summarizes Jen Jack Gieseking's presentation on queer spatial methods. It discusses using mixed qualitative and quantitative data to have conversations across datasets. It also discusses using multiple tools from digital humanities and social data sciences to allow for more expression. The presentation outlines using mental mapping, GIS, interactive online maps, and mixed analytics to hold tension between data. It provides a case study of mapping lesbian and queer women's spaces in New York City from 1983 to 2008. The goal is queer interventions in mapping that challenge norms.
![Lesbian-Queer
Neighborhoods & Places
…it’s funny—I almost never go to Park Slope. I feel like it’s not a lesbian
neighborhood [in 2008]. …my girlfriend’s aunt lived there in the ‘70s and
when we moved there in 1989 she was like, “Oh! It’s not a lesbian
neighborhood anymore! All of the Columbus Avenue [implying wealthy,
predominantly White elite] people have moved in.” …we [lesbians and queer
women] all talk about Park Slope as this sort of Shangri-La of lesbian safety.
…all of the like institutions, like, The Rising [Café and Bar]—they’ve
disappeared. [Pause.] But, I guess it doesn’t really matter I suppose because
if people feel like something’s a lesbian neighborhood then by dint of their
believing it, it is. - Sarah ‘85
Images: © New York](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/gieseking-gcfitalkfinal02-151004121250-lva1-app6892/85/Gieseking-Queering-the-Map-Talk-18-320.jpg)
![I don’t go [to Manhattan] anymore. …
Brooklyn is really busy. Ginger’s [Bar] is
sort of at the center…and I have lesbians
radiating out from Ginger’s [makes
starburst motions with hands], ‘cause,
you know, that’s kind of how I saw
Brooklyn.
But…it’s not like, “Oh I go home to my
queer neighborhood.” Like, we don’t
have that. …it’s like we’re constantly
moving in and out of queer and straight
and lesbians spaces and mostly we’re in
kind of, like [sighs]…spaces that are
heteronormative or whatever you want to
call it. So I wouldn’t say I really have a
queer community. And I felt like it’s kind
of failing on my part. - Sally ‘95
Lesbian-Queer
City](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/gieseking-gcfitalkfinal02-151004121250-lva1-app6892/85/Gieseking-Queering-the-Map-Talk-19-320.jpg)
Gieseking - "Queering the Map" Talk
- 1. Queering the Map Theoretical Reflections on Spatial Methods Jen Jack Gieseking American Studies Trinity College jgieseking.org @jgieseking
- 2. What the map cuts up, the story cuts across. - Michel de Certeau (YR) What stories cut up, the maps cut across. - Jen Jack Gieseking (2015) @jgieseking
- 3. …“scientificity” between mixed datasets, including qualitative and quantitative data, when placing them in conversation. …choosing tools for digital humanities (DH) and/or social data sciences (SDS) project by working in conversation across multiple platforms. Queer In(ter)ventions …multiple intelligences of data collection and analysis to afford more expression in conversations with participants. Holding tension between… @jgieseking
- 4. An Introduction: Mapping, Queer and Otherwise I: Mental Mapping II: GIS & Spatial Statistics III: GeoWeb / Interactive GIS Online Discussion: Queer Interventions in Mapping Case: Lesbian-Queer New York Methods & Analytics: An Outline @jgieseking
- 5. An Introduction to Theories of Mapping, Queer and Otherwise
- 6. >> Gardner’s Frames Of Mind: The Theory Of Multiple Intelligences (1993) From Hayden (1997): “Cognitive maps of Los Angeles as perceived by predominantly Anglo American residents of Westwood” from the LA Dept of Planning 1971 Spatial Cognition • Tolman’s “Cognitive Maps in Rats & Men” (1948) • Lynch’s The Image of the City (1960) • Wood’s Power of Maps (1992) Mental mapping as the representation of a individual or group’s cognitive map through hand sketching or computer-based design, including information, emotions, and ideas associated with them, whether real and/or imagined. -Gieseking (2013)
- 7. Critical GIS • The reproduction of political, social, and economic inequalities through spatial information technologies and the practices associated with them • Related to and/or inclusive of conversations regarding geodata, spatial temporal modeling, participatory GIS, feminist GIS, mapping 2.0, neogeography, volunteered GIS @jgieseking
- 8. Queer Geography • Successful and imperfect maps that “attempt” to represent unrepresentable (Brown & Knopp 2008 “Queering the Map”) • Social, political, and economic limits on what women can say and show (Women’s Ways of Knowing 1986; Bagheri 2014) • Beyond “antinormativity” (Weigman & Wilson 2016) > hold binaries in tension examples: global v. local >> intimate imbricated in global (Pratt & Rosner 2012); queer in/stability of history making (Gieseking 2015) Images: © Green Monkey, LHA, Vanity Fair, Tattooinque
- 9. Case: from Living in an (In)Visible World to Queer New York
- 10. • 1979 “ghettos” --> 1983 “neighborhoods” • Gays linked to patterns of gentrification • LGBTQ people are most often associated with places such as bars, neighborhoods, and cities • Consistent claim to territoriality and publics as pathway to LGBTQ liberation Urban Geographies of Sexualities Castells (1983) @jgieseking
- 11. • “Invisible” • Possess less capital and power than men / rent longer and buy later heightens dispossession • Associated with a narrative of fear of the city and fear of public space • Lesbian neighborhoods are more identified as “spatial concentrations” LesbianHerstoryArchives.org. 2012. Urban Geographies of Women @jgieseking
- 12. 1983-2008 NYC Images: © Levine Roberts, Keith Haring, n/a, GO, gonyc.gov
- 13. • 47 self-identified lesbians & queer women came out between 1983-2008, 1/3 women of color, 1/2 from NYC Alison Bechdel 1987 Methods • 22 group interviews mixed-methods: within & across generation interviews, mental maps, artifact sharing • Archival research (Lesbian Herstory Archives) 382 organizational records, 25 years of publications
- 14. • Participatory online focus group 1/3 of participants, all generations • Group Interviews, Mental Maps, Artifacts, Thematic top-down, bottom-up coding • Archival Research Thematic coding, statistical analyses, critical GIS • Mixed Analytics Trace summary & individual stories across data, compare/ contrast across datasets > reiterate, reiterate, reiterate the tension Methods & Analytics Image: © Shutterstock We too often obscure knowledge production by highlighting methods alone
- 15. Neighborhoods Bars City & Bodies What do contemporary lesbians’ and queer women’s everyday, urban spaces say about their history and culture?
- 16. Methods & Analytics I: Mental Mapping & Across Generation Group Interviews
- 17. Lesbian-Queer Neighborhoods Desi ‘91’s Map Sally ‘95’s Map @jgieseking
- 18. Lesbian-Queer Neighborhoods & Places …it’s funny—I almost never go to Park Slope. I feel like it’s not a lesbian neighborhood [in 2008]. …my girlfriend’s aunt lived there in the ‘70s and when we moved there in 1989 she was like, “Oh! It’s not a lesbian neighborhood anymore! All of the Columbus Avenue [implying wealthy, predominantly White elite] people have moved in.” …we [lesbians and queer women] all talk about Park Slope as this sort of Shangri-La of lesbian safety. …all of the like institutions, like, The Rising [Café and Bar]—they’ve disappeared. [Pause.] But, I guess it doesn’t really matter I suppose because if people feel like something’s a lesbian neighborhood then by dint of their believing it, it is. - Sarah ‘85 Images: © New York
- 19. I don’t go [to Manhattan] anymore. … Brooklyn is really busy. Ginger’s [Bar] is sort of at the center…and I have lesbians radiating out from Ginger’s [makes starburst motions with hands], ‘cause, you know, that’s kind of how I saw Brooklyn. But…it’s not like, “Oh I go home to my queer neighborhood.” Like, we don’t have that. …it’s like we’re constantly moving in and out of queer and straight and lesbians spaces and mostly we’re in kind of, like [sighs]…spaces that are heteronormative or whatever you want to call it. So I wouldn’t say I really have a queer community. And I felt like it’s kind of failing on my part. - Sally ‘95 Lesbian-Queer City
- 20. Lesbians and queer women’s spaces are less territorial and instead fragmented and fleeting. Lesbians and queer women carry their spaces in and on the body. I call these productions of lesbian-queer spaces constellations. The processes and practices underlying the production of constellations inform my new research of the Queer Public Archive. Queer New York Queer New York: Geographies of Lesbians, Dykes, and Queer Women, 1983-2008
- 21. Methods & Analytics II: GIS & Spatial Statistics
- 22. Color = Participant Year of Coming Out Red = Cassie ’83 (Latina, middle class, from NYC) Blue = Susan ’92 (white, middle class) Green = Sally ’96 (white, upper-middle class) Brown = Shawn ’98 (black, middle class, from NYC) Purple = Holly ’03 (white, working-middle class) Orange = Beth ’06 (white, working-middle class) MANHATTAN QUEENS BROOKLYN West Village East Village Park Slope Bed- Stuy Central Park WilliamsburgChelsea Lesbian-Queer Gentrification @jgieseking
- 23. 60000 65000 70000 75000 80000 85000 90000 95000 100000 105000 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 Couple'Male* Male' Couple' Female*Male' Couple' Female*Female' F(3) = 433; p > .001, R2 = .946 $13,392 +/- per couple type US Median Annual Earnings by Type of Couple $13,392 +/- per couple type Source data: Hegewisch, et al. (2011), Institute for Research on Women Lesbian-Queer Economies
- 25. Range of GIS Tools Level of difficulty Google Maps Non-proprietaryre:access/controlofdata CartoDB MapBox OSM ArcGIS QGIS Note: colors just to make more readable
- 26. QGIS Is… •Quantum GIS @ qgis.org •F/OSS is free & open source software - accessible by and for public •Fills gap between ArcGIS and GMaps •Free and smart GIS practicum: http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/geoportal/ practicum/ ℅ Frank Donnelly - taught in six 1.5 hour classes @jgieseking
- 29. Opaque is Being Polite • Spatial statistics, stats, and data visualizations, et al., can…fail you • On the left: regression analyses between census property values and number of lesbian-queer places per tract reveals “groupings” • For more, see http:// jgieseking.org/opaque-is-being- polite/ @jgieseking
- 30. Methods & Analytics III: GeoWeb / Interactive GIS Online
- 31. Mapbox Is… •Mapbox Studio (was TileMill) can be found at mapbox.com •F/OSS is free & open source software with pay as you go storage •Interactive geoweb tech - fills gap btw QGIS & GMaps •Heavy design component in CartoCSS & code for participatory qualities •Training: TileMill’s “Crashcourse” in one day + learn CSS as you go
- 32. Queer Public Archive at WorkLesbian Herstory Archives
- 33. Queer Public Archive at Work 1983 1998 @jgieseking
- 34. Discussion: Queer Inventions, Intentions, & Interventions in Mapping
- 35. …“scientificity” between mixed datasets, including qualitative and quantitative data, when placing them in conversation. …choosing tools for digital humanities (DH) and/or social data sciences (SDS) project by working in conversation across multiple platforms. Queer Inte(rve)ntions …multiple intelligences of data collection and analysis to afford more expression in conversations with participants. Holding tension between… @jgieseking
- 36. Friendships between 7,188 users of the Facebook group “Queer Exchange” over one year. 2013. Relationships between one users’ 1,512 friends on Facebook. 2013. Moment of Big Data
- 37. Friendships between 7,188 users of the Facebook group “Queer Exchange” over one year. 2013. Relationships between one users’ 1,512 friends on Facebook. 2013. Moment of Big Data
- 38. Friendships between 7,188 users of the Facebook group “Queer Exchange” over one year. 2013. Relationships between one users’ 1,512 friends on Facebook. 2013. Moment of Big Data
- 40. Geography as More than GIS Geography reveals and is revealed by history, culture, political economy, and so on.
- 41. …“scientificity” between mixed datasets, including qualitative and quantitative data, when placing them in conversation. …choosing tools for digital humanities (DH) and/or social data sciences (SDS) project by working in conversation across multiple platforms. Queer Interventions …multiple intelligences of data collection and analysis to afford more expression in conversations with participants. Holding tension between… @jgieseking
- 42. What the map cuts up, the story cuts across. - Michel de Certeau (YR) What stories cut up, the maps cut across. - Jen Jack Gieseking (2015) @jgieseking
- 43. Questions & comments: @jgieseking jgieseking.org peopleplacespace.org jack.gieseking@trincoll.edu All papers available on jgieseking.org/publications. Thank you.