Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Let's Not Pull Back On The Peace Corps, William G. Moseley

William G Moseley

No abstract provided.

Neogeographies, Cathy Moulder

Cathy Moulder

‘Neogeographies’ are Web 2.0 applications using geographic information. This session will show a few examples of this type of web-based tool but will focus mostly on Google Earth. Cathy Moulder has done some research specifically on Google Earth and its application to student assignments in higher education. This particular neogeography offers considerable potential for incorporation into student assignments in many disciplines.

Using Palaeobotanical Techniques To Guide Peatland Restoration. A Case Study From Byron Bay, Australia, Kathryn H. Taffs, Jeffrey F. Parr, Keith G. Bolton

Jeffrey Parr

No abstract provided.

Optimization Of Check Dams Through The Application Of Advanced Technologies, Praveen Jha Dr

Praveen Jha Dr

Scientific planning for conserving water and while minimizing the financial resources requirement for its implementation could be done through application of advanced technological programs developed by the author. Three state-of-art geo-spatial programs - Multi-Algorithm Automation Program (MAAP), Water Analysis Program (WAP) and Check Dam Optimization Program (CDOP) - would be used. MAAP produces land use land cover (lulc) map primarily by undertaking Digital Image Processing (DIP) of satellite data in an automated fashion using Artificial Intelligence (AI). WAP, a hydrology modeling program, would be used to generate information related to watershed, water flow, water accumulation etc. CDOP, coupled with MAAP …

The State Of African Geography In The North American Academy, William G. Moseley, Kefa Otiso

William G Moseley

The objective of this article is to examine trends in the production of Africa-related geography PhDs at US and Canadian universities.

Estimate Of Limited English Speaking Eligible Voters In Select Communities Of The Boston Metropolitan Area, Marcos Luna

Marcos Luna

A New Application Of Spatiotemporal Analysis For Detecting Demographic Variations In Aids Mortality: An Example From Florida, Yuwen Chiu, Chiehwen Ed Hsu

Chiehwen Ed Hsu

The purpose of the present study was to characterize, geographically and temporally, the patterns of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) death disparity in 67 Florida jurisdictions, and to determine if the detected trends varied according to age, race, and sex. The space-time scan statistic proposed by Kulldorff et al was used to examine the excess AIDS deaths that occurred between 1987 and 2004. Results were geographically referenced in maps using EpiInfo and EpiMap made available by the Centers for Disease Control. Miami-Dade and the nearby counties including Broward, Martin, and Palm Beach are the most likely clusters (observed/expected: 1505.16) with …

Using Palaeobotanical Techniques To Guide Peatland Restoration. A Case Study From Byron Bay, Australia, Kathryn H. Taffs, Jeffrey F. Parr, Keith G. Bolton

Dr Kathryn H Taffs

No abstract provided.

Gasoline Costs, Public Transit, And Sustainability, Bradley W. Lane

Bradley W. Lane

Excessive levels of automobile driving are generally acknowledged to have several negative externalities that contribute to the lack of sustainability in current transport systems. Achieving a reduction in VMT inevitably requires the introduction of disincentives for driving. This has generally been lacking in the US, which has relatively low parking costs and taxes on fuel compared to its developed-world counterparts. However, starting immediately after the Hurricane Katrina disaster, fuel costs in the United States have increased dramatically relative to previous long-term price behavior. This increase has brought attention to the driving behavior and travel preferences of US citizens. A large …

Armchair Archaeology

Nicholas Tripcevich, Ph.D.

Interviewed for an article in The Economist about the use of satellite imagery in Andean archaeology at the Chivay source.

Strong Civil Society As A Double-Edged Sword: Siting Trailers In Post-Katrina New Orleans, Daniel P. Aldrich, Kevin Crook

Daniel P Aldrich

To meet the dire need for housing created by the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleans and the staff of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) worked to create lists of potential sites for trailer parks. This procedure took place within an environment of Not In My Back Yard-ism, or NIMBYism, where a number of communities and individuals expressed their opposition to hosting such trailer sites both publicly and privately. We analyze the final list of city-approved sites to track which factors were correlated with larger (or smaller) numbers of trailers and trailer …

Perceptions Of The 2007 International Symposium On Society And Resource Management Student Forum, Noel Healy

Noel Healy

Travel Behaviour Of The Park And Ride Users And The Factors Influencing The Demand For Theuse Of The Park And Ride Facility, Jamilah Mohammad

Jamilah Mohammad

Park and ride scheme acts as an important component of the parking management strategies of a city. Exploring the significant attributes that influence the utilization of such scheme can provide a better understanding of its application among the urban users. The three main areas of concern towards understanding the characteristics of the park and ride users are the socioeconomic, trip and the parking-related characteristics. Through linear regression, this study identified that the significant attributes that were found to significantly influence the utilization of the facility in the Kuala Lumpur conurbation are total travel time by rail (via the park-and-ride), income, …

Determinants Of Undergraduate Level Business School Choice In The Uk: The Role Of Research Reputation, Ibrahim Sirkeci, Richard Mannix

Ibrahim Sirkeci

This study investigates the role of research reputation in student choice of business school in the UK. Within the growing student demand globally along with increasing competition it is important to understand the value the service receivers (i.e. students) attach to the research reputation which often is a key determinant in university rankings. A review of the literature in this area revealed that little had been done on defining what was meant by research reputation and the specific role that this had on student choices in business schools. This gap in the literature formed the rationale for this study. We …

In Search Of A Better Revolution, William G. Moseley

William G Moseley

No abstract provided.

Google Earth Meets Higher Ed: Reflections On Neogeography, Cathy Moulder

Cathy Moulder

Educators in many disciplines are embracing the wonders of Google Earth to engage their students. This session explains the context of change in education (Web 2.0 and the NetGen students) and how these two trends merge in a new area called Neogeography. The session presents preliminary findings of a research project to identify the early adoption of one Neogeography (Google Earth). Results show a developing use of Google Earth in course assignments at the college and university level, with several resources identified that will become available in summer 2008.

Application Of Geoninformatic Technology In Evaluating Urban Agriculture And Urban Poverty In Lokoja, Nigeria, Olarewaju Oluseyi Ifatimehin, Salihu Danlami Musa

Olarewaju Oluseyi Ifatimehin

The role of urban agriculture in the food supply of cities and towns, as a complement to rural agriculture is becoming an important issue in a globalizing world economy. The developing countries see it as a way to alleviate urban poverty. Remote sensing and GIS techniques were used to assess areal extent of urban agricultural land in Lokoja. Questionnaires were also used to evaluate the contributions to urban agriculture to food security and income generation among the urban poor in Lokoja. The result revealed that urban agricultural land had increased, thereby implying that urban agriculture is supporting many urban poor …

The Honourable Robert Edward Clifford (1767-1817): Maps And Mysteries, Cathy Moulder

Cathy Moulder

Robert Clifford was an Englishman, a renowned map collector – and probably a spy. He lived a quiet scholarly life in Paris during the French Revolution and early years of the Napoleonic era. But his correspondence with John Graves Simcoe reveals an exciting escape from France in 1803 with a trunk of secret maps and plans. Could the maps in McMaster University Library's collection have been part of that daring escape?

Environmental Crises As (Sometime) Windows Of Policy Opportunity, Marcos Luna

Marcos Luna

Los Ajiacos Colombianos, Shawn Van Ausdal, Juliana Duque

Shawn Van Ausdal

No abstract provided.

Playing With Landscape: Social Process And Spatial Form In Video Games, Michael Longan

Michael W Longan

Video games not only incorporate representations of landscapes, they are themselves a form of landscape representation that communicates ideas about how the world is and how it should be. Like traditional forms of landscape representation, video games use tricks of perspective and realistic graphics to represent real world places or to create worlds that appear to be real. Through their interactivity, video games also give their players a sense of power and control over the spatial form of the landscape. However, unlike traditional forms of landscape representation, video games offer opportunities to subjectively enter the space of the game and …

When Beef Was King. Or Why Do Colombians Eat So Little Pork?, Shawn Van Ausdal

Shawn Van Ausdal

This article seeks to understand why Colombians, compared to many other Latin Americans, have traditionally eaten so much more beef than pork. The article first points to the development of a culinary tradition that favored beef. The bulk of the argument, though, centers on the fact that, historically, beef has been substantially cheaper than pork. This price difference, in turn, is rooted in the low productivity of Colombian agriculture, which made corn, often used to fatten hogs, expensive. Additional factors that favored beef include a receding agrarian frontier, a small hog population, the various advantages of cattle, a conflict–ridden history …

Location, Location, Location: Selecting Sites For Controversial Facilities, Daniel P. Aldrich

Daniel P Aldrich

While a large literature exists on the siting of controversial facilities, few theories about spatial location have been tested on large samples. Using a new dataset from Japan, this paper demonstrates that state agencies choose localities judged weakest in local civil society as host communities for controversial projects. In some cases, powerful politicians deliberately seek to have facilities such as nuclear power plants, dams, and airports placed in their home constituency. This paper then explores new territory: how demographic, political, and civil society factors impact the outcomes of siting attempts. It finds that the strength of local civil society impacts …

Eco101 - Introdução À Economia, Eloi Martins Senhoras

Elói Martins Senhoras

No abstract provided.

Mapping As A Knowledge Translation Tool For Ontario Early Years Centres: Views From Data Analysts And Managers, Anita Kothari, S. Michelle Driedger, Julia Bickford, Jason Morrison, Michael Sawada, Ian D. Graham, Eric Crighton

Anita Kothari

Background: Local Ontario Early Years Centres (OEYCs) collect timely and relevant local data, but knowledge translation is needed for the data to be useful. Maps represent an ideal tool to interpret local data. While geographic information system (GIS) technology is available, it is less clear what users require from this technology for evidence-informed program planning. We highlight initial challenges and opportunities encountered in implementing a mapping innovation (software and managerial decision-support) as a knowledge translation strategy.

Methods: Using focus groups, individual interviews and interactive software development events, we taped and transcribed verbatim our interactions with nine OEYCs in Ontario, Canada. …

Expansion Of Golf Courses In The United States, Darrell E. Napton, Chris Laingen

Chris Laingen

Twenty-five million Americans play golf on the nation's 16,000 courses each year. These golf courses constitute a significant national landscape feature. Since 18789, when the game arrived in the United States, golf has filtered down the urban, economic, and social hierarchies to become accepted by and accessible to most Americans. During the ensuing thirteen decades the number, location, and layout of the nation's golf courses have responded to many of the same driving forces that impacted the nation, including decentralization, growth of the middle class, war, economic depression, suburbanization, and the increasing role of the federal government. Four epochs of …

Ni Calamidad Ni Panacea: Una Reflexión En Torno A La Historiografía De La Ganadería Colombiana, Shawn Van Ausdal

Shawn Van Ausdal

No abstract provided.

Un Mosaico Cambiante: Notas Sobre Una Geografía Histórica De La Ganadería En Colombia, 1850-1950, Shawn Van Ausdal

Shawn Van Ausdal

No abstract provided.

Four-Thousand-Year-Old Gold Artifacts From The Lake Titicaca Basin, Southern Peru, Mark Aldenderfer, Nathan M. Craig, Robert J. Speakman, Rachel Popelka-Filcoff

Nathan M Craig

Artifacts of cold-hammered native gold have been discovered in a secure and undisturbed Terminal Archaic burial context at Jiskairumoko, a multicomponent Late Archaic–Early Formative period site in the southwestern Lake Titicaca basin, Peru. The burial dates to 3776 to 3690 carbon-14 years before the present (2155 to 1936 calendar years B.C.), making this the earliest worked gold recovered to date not only from the Andes, but from the Americas as well. This discovery lends support to the hypothesis that the earliest metalworking in the Andes was experimentation with native gold. The presence of gold in a society of low-level food …

Suitability Mapping Of Sesame Cultivation In Nigeria, Charles Alegbe

Charles Alegbe

Nigeria as a microcosm of the sub-Saharan Africa has agriculture as her mainstay which provides employment and source of livelihood for the increasing population. Sesame also known as beniseed, which is a very sensitive cash-crop to environmental factors such as rainfall, temperature and soil types; is not an exception as it has become one of the foreign exchange earners for Nigeria. The objective of this project is to use Geographical Information Systems (GIS) as a decision making tools to solving the spatial problems of sesame suitability mapping in Nigeria. Basic GIS operations ranging from spatial to aspatial search, reclassification and …