ECAI Mapping & Visualization of Cultural Data

Transcription

1 ECAI Mapping & Visualization of Cultural Data ECAI 20th Anniversary Retrospect & Prospective Jeanette Zerneke Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative PNC 2017 Tainan, Taiwan, Nov 7 th 9 th 2017

2 ECAI Headquarters UC Berkeley - PNC affiliate Directors Prof Lewis Lancaster and Michael Buckland Research Project of the School of Information since 2008 Fluid Network International Teams of Collaborators 2012 I School Hosted conference

3 ECAI Initial Vision 1997 Use time and space to enhance understanding and preservation of history and culture Collaborative development that takes advantage of technical developments as they become useful Using data and visualizations to change how we see and challenge us to ask new questions Share results broadly

4 ECAI Dynamic Maps GIS, spatial databases, spatio-temporal web displays, and a host of related technologies for registering, storing manipulating, searching, analyzing, and displaying location and time data

5 ECAI in 1998 Visualize what we know in new ways First Project used Macromedia Shockwave to enable users to interactivity zoom on a map from a global view to a single site and click on images Long before Google Earth (2001) which made it easy! Initial Zoom Yungung Caves in China

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7 Dynamic Mapping Mapping must include time as well as place Initial Video animation Moghul Empire

8 Moghul Empire Animation

9 Impact of this Video There was a lot of interest in this video Reactions included: Where s the data How do we know it s correct What about fuzzy data history is not black & white When it was posted on YouTube (2008) it generated a comment storm An argument over history by subculture groups in India Since then we ve all become used to Twitter storms

10 Complexity and Context Developed a GIS based visualization tool which added Time to mapping: TimeMap Include ways to document sources and uncertainty Ability to control zoom on both place and time scale Cultural Atlases: Integrated multiple datasets and data types to create new views of data in context

11 ECAI Silkroad Atlas 2002 Yoyo Ma Silk Road Tour linking a complex set of maps & content

12 ECAI Iraq ECAI Iraq Response to Iraq War ECAI Iraq collected new data and cataloged web data

13 Islamic boundaries to 1080

14 Functions and Issues of Visualizations Complexity When layers overlap how do you see the ones underneath The infinite data at one point problem Scale different data is important at different scales What about Fuzzy boundaries Alterative mapping and views of landscape Multiple views Contested histories Authorship Access to Source Information Uncertainty (Accuracy & Precision) Ambiguity (differences of perception or understanding of data) Data and its context Choosing which layers to display

15 Interactive North American Missions epub 2004

16 epublications Collaborating with California Digital Library (University of California) in 2002 digital interactive publication seemed like the future Issues: How do you do peer review Who's the audience / market Can you get buy in from Faculty and Institutions Sustainability Who takes the responsibility to make sure they continue to be accessible Were hosted by CDL for 10 years

17 Visualizing and Analyzing Texts Blue Dots Project explores the design of high dimensional visualizations, analyzing text structure and patterns for humanities scholars See: Thursday Session

18 Larger Scale Collaborations Religious Atlas of China and the Himalaya Community driven resource collection & curation Includes: Contemporary Buddhist Monasteries Tibetan Monasteries Mosques Catholic Institutions Jewish synagogues Historic Taoist profile

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20 Multiple Religions

21 Broadening the focus What questions does the data and visualizations raise? What s beyond the boundary of this project s focus? Why are there Mosques along the coasts so early What happens when we move from history based on text to a multi-faceted trans-disciplinary approach? These questions triggered our Maritime Buddhism Project

22 ECAI Now Still a fluid network of scholars Working on issues of culture, place and time Multiple data sources integrated to enable better understanding Multiple media methods of display, visualization, and access Tell the story in multiple ways Multiple technologies for sustainability

23 Atlas of Maritime Buddhism Maritime Buddhism project components 3D Immersive museum exhibit Data collection and curation Multiple data contributors Multiple visualization methods Publication / access / use Data archiving

24 Data - Collect, Catalog & Curate Initial test case studies Distributed or Crowd Sourced Data collection Collection of bibliographic information and metadata Posting data on Google drive for integration Testing, quality control and uploading to shared service For online data publishing, the data collector has to be their own

25 Maritime Buddhism Class - Fall 2014 Prof Lancaster s class at the University of the West Students researched primary ports / regions

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27 View in Fusion Simple & Complex Line Visualization

28 Research Summary Repot Correlation of Early Buddhism in China with Travel over Water ECAI 2015 Alex Amies e.g.: Evidence of Buddhism in the Northern Chinese Coastal Area in the Eastern Han

29 Atisha - Maritime Travels and Beyond Karma Ngodup Clear evidence of Connection between South Asia & Tibetan Buddhism

30 South Asia Early Buddhism D.DAYALAN - Archaeological Survey of India, 2016 Printed Book Dedicated 2017 KAVERIPPŪMPATTINAM

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32 ARIYANKUPPAM 10th -11th centuries CE

33 10th-11th centuries CE AYIRAVĒLI AYIRŪR (SRIR MSAMUDRAM)

34 Google Maps Interactive Version South Asia Early Buddhism

35 Early History of Buddhism in India The Winds of Change: Buddhism and the Maritime Links of Early South Asia, Himanshu Ray, 1995

36 Immersive Exhibit of Buddhist Diffusion Working with Prof Kenderdine developing the immersive exhibit

37 Prospective Initiatives of ECAI are ongoing Mapping & Visualization Text visualization, search, analysis, and tools for scholars Collaborations, e.g., Ruth Mostern s World History ECAI affiliates still building on portions of the vision e.g., Ryan Shaw PeriodO - Time Period Reference work Looking at changes we ve seen Our single point visualizations have become

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40 Global View We re used to seeing the world this way. What s next? John Hanke founded Keyhole which created the Markup Language used for Google Maps. He also started that company that was spinoff from Google and created Pokemon Go. They have just introduced a massive audience to the use of augmented reality. What s next?

41 Thrilling new technologies Every time we adopt a new technology it affords new capabilities It also uncovers new challenges & reminds us of old ones User interfaces complexity vs simplicity? Technical stability / longevity? Using new technologies with unknown risks? Challenging the relationship of technology to society to people Remembering a data informed society means people must learn, understand, and make choices

42 Charting Culture single layer limited source Google-owned knowledge base, Freebase, to find 120,000 individuals who were notable enough in their life-times that the dates and locations of their births and deaths were recorded Charting Culture (YouTube) nature news: -cultural-history-captured-in-5-minute-film

43 Lucify The Flow Towards Europe One Dataset Over Time Complex Visualization The information shown is based on data published by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). The visualization is designed to provide an intuitive grasp of the scale of the problem; routes or travel times are not accurate. Lucify Flow Towards Europe

44 Ongoing Challenges (In)ability of users to understand the map / graphic The reality of overwhelming data, instant delivery Intentional obfuscation (some sources intentionally confuse) It is our responsibility to attempt to tell the truth These all make our work harder but also more important Some of the same old issues: How do you deal with uncertainty and multiplicity of views How to maintain provenance and source information in visualizations How does the reader assess veracity How is the work funded and sustained

45 Reading Visualizations Alberto Cairo First, pay attention: A visualization isn't meant to be seen. It is meant to be read. It is a piece of content - it has a vocabulary & grammar Visualization should clarify not simplify - Nigel Holmes Visual Trumpery: Fighting against Fake Data Visualizations From the Left and From the Right Alberto Cairo, Oct 25, 2017 UC Berkeley

46 Conclusion There is value in the effort of producing high quality resources There is still plenty of work to do We re still having fun Thank you Jeanette Zerneke ECAI