Geography Commons^™

Models As Weapons: Review Of Weapons Of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality And Threatens Democracy By Cathy O’Neil (2016), Samuel L. Tunstall

Numeracy

Cathy O’Neil. 2016. Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy (New York, NY: Crown) 272 pp. ISBN 978-0553418811.

Accessible to a wide readership, Cathy O’Neil’s Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy provides a lucid yet alarming account of the extensive reach of mathematical models in influencing all of our lives. With a particular eye towards social justice, O’Neil not only warns modelers to be cognizant of the effects of their work on real people—especially vulnerable groups who have less power to fight back—but also encourages laypersons to take initiative …

Quantitative Map Literacy: A Cross Between Map Literacy And Quantitative Literacy, Ming Xie, H. L. Vacher, Steven Reader, Elizabeth Walton

Numeracy

We define quantitative map literacy (QML), a cross between map literacy and quantitative literacy (QL), as the concepts and skills required to accurately read, use, interpret, and understand the quantitative information embedded in a geospatial representation of data on a geographic background. Long used as tools in technical geographic fields, maps are now a common vehicle for communicating quantitative information to the public. As such, QML has potential to stand alongside health numeracy and financial literacy as an identifiable subdomain of transdisciplinary QL.

What concepts and skills are crucial for QML? The obvious answer is, “It depends on the type …

Assessing Preservation Priorities Of Caves And Karst Areas Using The Frequency Of Endemic Cave-Dwelling Species, Eugen Nitzu, Marius Vlaicu, Andrei Giurginca, Ioana N. Meleg, Ionut Popa, Augustin Nae, Ştefan Baba

International Journal of Speleology

Endemic and rare species as bioindicators of habitat vulnerability were used to develop protection and management plans for biotope prioritization (mainly islands habitats, lava tubes or groundwaters). Due to their narrow distribution, the endemic species (species confined to a restricted geographic area) are more susceptible to ecological disequilibrium and habitat loss than the widespread ones. Consequently, endemics become endangered in the context of ecological disturbance caused by anthropogenic pressure, making them suitable candidates to assess environmental preservation needs. Taking into consideration that most of the stygobitic and troglobitic species are endemic and confined to specific karst areas, based on their …

Mobile-Based Sidewalk Inventory App For Smart Communities, Health, And Safety, Madhav Erraguntla, Dursun Delen, Rupesh K. Agrawal, Karthic Madanagopal, Richard Mayer

Suburban Sustainability

As the United States and other nations strive to cope with the obesity epidemic (NCHS, 2015), progressive communities are developing sidewalk infrastructure to promote physical activity and health. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) recommends that community-based interventions like neighborhood walk, bike programs etc. have shown to be effective in promoting physical activity and health. Smart cities are embracing the development of community trails and promoting their use to increase physical activity among youth and adults. System implementation, data collection, and analysis were performed from January 2015 through July 2015. To promote these objectives, communities and cities need accurate information …

Towards Food Service Sustainability In Suburban Environments By Optimally Locating Shared Anaerobic Digester Units, Rebecca Loraamm, Joni Downs, Robert Alonso Bair, Daniel Yeh

Suburban Sustainability

Anaerobic digestion is an effective method for reducing food waste at the consumer level. Drawbacks associated with this strategy include high construction costs for multiple digester units and limited public awareness of the method’s commercial potential. Given the large scale problem of food waste, an approach establishing community partnerships between local businesses and primary schools is offered to combat the problem of food waste. Optimizing the placement of shared digester units enabling utilization by multiple stakeholders is the suggested mitigation method. This research explores application of the p-median problem to determine the set of optimal sites for shared anaerobic digester …

A Landscape Of Thermal Inequity: Social Vulnerability To Urban Heat In U.S. Cities, Bruce Coffyn Mitchell

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A combination of the urban heat island effect and a rising temperature baseline resulting from global climate change inequitably impacts socially vulnerable populations residing in urban areas. This dissertation examines distributional inequity of exposure to urban heat by socially disadvantaged groups and minorities in the context of climate justice. Using Cutter’s hazards-of-place model, variables indicative of social vulnerability and biophysical vulnerability are statistically tested for their associations. Biophysical vulnerability is conceptualized utilizing a urban heat risk index calculated from summer 2010 LANDSAT imagery to measure land surface temperature , structural density through the normalized difference built-up index, and vegetation abundance …

Reappropriating Public Space In Nanchang, China: A Study Of Informal Street Vendors, Bryan C. Winter

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Since China's shift to market socialism, many marginalized by this process work as informal street vendors where they reappropriate public space in order to survive―a practice at odds with urban authorities' modernizing agenda. In relation to these competing logics concerning public space's use value versus its exchange value, this dissertation examines the practices, experiences, and agency of informal street vendors working in Sanjingwuwei, an ordinary, yet rapidly gentrifying, neighborhood of Nanchang, capital and largest city of southeastern China's Jiangxi Province. After describing the growth of an informal economy in modern China and providing a history of street vending, I describe …

Identifying Nodes Of Transmission In Disease Diffusion Through Social Media, David Sebastian Lamb

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The spread of infectious diseases can be described in terms of three interrelated components: interaction, movement, and scale. Transmission between individuals requires some form of interaction, which is dependent on the pathogen, to occur. Diseases spread through the movement of their hosts; they spread across many spatial scales from local neighborhoods to countries, or temporal scales from days to years, or periodic intervals. Prior research into the spread of disease have examined diffusion processes retrospectively at regional or country levels, or developed differential equation or simulation models of the dynamics of disease transmission. While some of the more recent models …

Potential Impacts Of Accelerated Sea-Level Rise And Hurricane-Induced Storm Surge In Western Pasco County, Florida, Kittiya Harris

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Sea levels have risen approximately 20 cm since the beginning of the 20th century and more than 3 cm in the past 20 years, suggesting that global sea level rise is accelerating. As sea levels continue to rise and storms become more intense, coastal property and populations become more susceptible to damage. Florida is especially vulnerable to hurricane-induced storm surge (HSS) and the onset of accelerated sea-level rise (ASLR) due to its extensive coastline and high population density along the coast. The main purpose of this research is to assess the potential economic impacts of ASLR and HSS for two …

Characterizing Benthic Habitats Using Multibeam Sonar And Towed Underwater Video In Two Marine Protected Areas On The West Florida Shelf, Usa, Jennifer L. Brizzolara

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study investigates a way to characterize the geology and biology of the seafloor in two Marine Protected Areas on the West Florida Shelf. Characterization of benthic habitats needs to include sufficient detail to represent the complex and heterogeneous bottom types. Characterizations can be interpreted from multiple data sets and displayed as benthic habitat maps. Multibeam sonar bathymetry and backscatter provide full spatial data coverage, but interpretation of such data requires some form of ground truth (to characterize the habitat). Imagery from towed underwater video provides continuous transects of seafloor data, which provide a more efficient method than data from …

Longitudinal Awareness: A Study Of Vulnerability To Flooding In Polk County, Iowa, Kerri A. Dickey

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Flooding has become a problem of national proportion and many scholars have started to take note of the human impacts in this area. This study will focus on the social vulnerability framework in tandem with the environmental justice theoretical frameworks being applied to Polk County Iowa so that information can be added to the body of works within a Midwestern U.S. context. This research will contribute to the current geographical knowledge in natural hazards, environmental justice, and vulnerability to flood hazards. Taking into consideration the scarcity of county or sub-county studies in the Midwest U.S. measuring spatial tendencies in hazards …

Sensors Everywhere: Using Satellites And Mobile Phones To Reduce Information Uncertainty In Human Rights Crisis Research, Christoph Koettl

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

This article critically reviews the use of ICTs for human rights crisis research. While focusing on two specific technologies—satellite imagery and mobile phone technology—it proposes a general framework for analyzing the added value of ICTs. The author suggests that their added value in mass atrocities research arises from their ability to reduce information uncertainty, a challenge that is exacerbated in the digital age. This is different from delivering “truth”, an inaccurate description that only leads to unfulfilled expectations and hopes. The article is written from a practitioner’s perspective, drawing from the work of a global human rights watchdog, thus avoiding …

Multi-Scale Approaches For Evaluating The Success Of Habitat Restoration In Tampa Bay, Florida, Stephanie Thompson Powers

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research aims to further the understanding of ecological restoration success in the Tampa Bay, Florida, region. Although over four hundred restoration projects have been completed in the bay area, knowledge of their success has been hindered by the lack of assessment and transfer of information concerning project outcomes. Without comprehensive project assessment, local science will be limited in its ability to inform practice because we lack the advantage of past knowledge.

Using a multi-scaled approach, a diverse set of restoration projects are evaluated, providing information on how the projects are contributing to defined targets established by the Tampa Bay …

Forging Blockchains: Spatial Production And Political Economy Of Decentralized Cryptocurrency Code/Spaces, Joe Blankenship

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Cryptocurrencies and blockchains are increasingly used, implemented and adapted for numerous purposes; people and businesses are integrating these technologies into their practices and strategies, creating new political economies and spaces in and of everyday life. This thesis seeks to develop a foundation of geographic theory for the study of spatial production within and surrounding blockchain technologies focusing on acute studies of Bitcoin as cryptocurrency, Ethereum as digital marketplace, and their conditions of possibility as decentralized autonomous organizations. Utilizing concepts from Henri Lefebvre's Production of Space, this thesis situates blockchain technologies within the wider discussion about the political economy of …

How Lessons From A Past Disaster Can Influence Resilience And Climate Adaptation In Broward County, Florida, Hannah Rose Torres

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the face of future uncertainties, many places are struggling with decisions about how to prepare for and adapt to climate change. The purpose of this research is to shed light on the concept of resilience, and uncover lessons for resilience-building exposed by a past disaster, Hurricane Wilma.

The dissertation begins with an introduction (Chapter 1) detailing the research problem, key terms and overall research design. The study was conducted in three distinct phases. The first phase (Chapter 2), explored the concept of resilience to understand how it was defined in three South Florida communities. Content analyses of city and …

Geographical Information Systems (Gis) Applied To Urban Nutrient Management: Data Scarce Case Studies From Belize And Florida, Charlotte Juliane Haberstroh

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Nutrient inputs into the environment greatly impact urban ecosystems. Appropriate management strategies are needed to limit eutrophication of surface water bodies and contamination of groundwater. In many existing urban environments, retrofits or complete upgrades are needed for stormwater and/or wastewater infrastructure to manage nutrients. However, sustainable urban nutrient management requires comprehensive baseline data that is often not available. A Framework for Urban Nutrient (FUN) Management for Geographic Information Systems (GIS) was developed to specifically address those areas with limited data access. Using spatial analysis in GIS, it links water quality, land use, and socio-demographics, thereby reducing data collection and field-based …

Effects Of Anthropogenic Activity On The Green Swamp Preserve Ecosystem, Barbara Ann Nordheim-Shelt

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Green Swamp Preserve is a large geographic area that has sustained many changes since Europeans settled in Florida. There has been little published research on the impacts of anthropogenic activity on this system. This thesis research seeks to document more recent changes in the Green Swamp and to evaluate the effects of various human activities on the system. The study period is from 1985 to 2015. For this time period changes in land use and landcover were examined using neural network classifications. Changes in vegetation health were evaluated by examining Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Green Vegetation Index …

A Framework For Measuring The Spatial Equity In The Distribution Of Public Transportation Benefits, Seyyed Amir Hosein Mortazavi, Meisam Akbarzadeh

Journal of Public Transportation

This paper proposes that an equitable transit system requires that the geographical distribution of transit service benefits conform to the geographical distribution of the citizens with the greatest need for public transportation. This is the essence of vertical equity. This study calculated “connectivity power,” which reflects public transit service quality in each traffic analysis zone (TAZ) in a city to indicate the amount of benefit that TAZ is receiving from the transit system. The number of carless citizens in each TAZ was also calculated as an index of need to the public transit services in that area. Conformity of need …

The Causal Effect Of Bus Rapid Transit On Changes In Transit Ridership, Orion T. Stewart, Anne Vernez Moudon, Brian E. Saelens

Journal of Public Transportation

Numerous studies have reported ridership increases along routes when Bus rapid transit (BRT) replaces conventional bus service, but these increases could be due simply to broader temporal trends in transit ridership. To address this limitation, we compared changes in ridership among routes where BRT was implemented to routes where BRT was planned or already existed in King County, Washington. Ridership was measured at 2010, 2013, and 2014. Ridership increased by 35% along routes where BRT was implemented from 2010 to 2013 compared to routes that maintained conventional bus service. Ridership increased by 29% along routes where BRT was implemented from …

Public Transit Equity Analysis At Metropolitan And Local Scales: A Focus On Nine Large Cities In The Us, Greg P. Griffin, Ipek N. Sener

Journal of Public Transportation

Recent studies on transit service through an equity lens have captured broad trends from the literature and national-level data or analyzed disaggregate data at the local level. This study integrates these methods by employing a geostatistical analysis of new transit access and income data compilations from the Environmental Protection Agency. By using a national data set, this study demonstrates a method for income-based transit equity analysis and provides results spanning nine large auto-oriented cities in the US. Results demonstrate variability among cities’ transit services to low-income populations, with differing results when viewed at the regional and local levels. Regional-level analysis …

Spatiality Of The Stages Of Genocide: The Armenian Case, Shelley J. Burleson, Alberto Giordano

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

This article describes the construction of a historical GIS (HGIS) of the Armenian genocide and its application to study how the genocide unfolded spatially and temporally using stage models proposed by Gregory Stanton. The Kazarian manuscript provided a daily record of events related to the genocide during 1914-1923 and served as a primary source. Models outlining and describing the stages of genocide provide a structured and vetted approach to studying the spatial and temporal aspects of the genocidal process, especially genocide by attrition. This article links HGIS to a qualitative, historical source and describes the uncertainties that arise when mapping …

Locally Optimized Mapping Of Slum Conditions In A Sub-Saharan Context: A Case Study Of Bamenda, Cameroon, Julius Anchang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Despite being an indicator of modernization and macro-economic growth, urbanization in regions such as Sub-Saharan Africa is tightly interwoven with poverty and deprivation. This has manifested physically as slums, which represent the worst residential urban areas, marked by lack of access to good quality housing and basic services. To effectively combat the slum phenomenon, local slum conditions must be captured in quantitative and spatial terms. However, there are significant hurdles to this. Slum detection and mapping requires readily available and reliable data, as well as a proper conceptualization of measurement and scale. Using Bamenda, Cameroon, as a test case, this …

Constituting Agricultural And Food Policy In Malawi: The Role Of The State And International Donors In The Farm Input Subsidy Program (Fisp), Peter Rock Nkhoma

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Numerous studies have been undertaken on the political economy of agricultural policies in developing countries. These studies have explained agricultural policies in terms of urban bias, economic reforms, and domestic politics. Recently, the emphasis has been on explanations that reference the existence of a rational-legal and patronage element within the African state. Such explanations tend to underplay the extent to which agricultural policies are devised in a context of power asymmetries between the state and international donors or financial institutions. In the Malawian context specifically, limited attention has been paid to the possibility that policies are a negotiated outcome of …

How Mature Capitalism Turns Pollution Into Diamonds: Malagnogenesis And The Reverse-Engineering Of Harm Into Risk, Kevin P. Martyn

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, there has been a great deal of debate about the pervasiveness and persistence of neoliberal thinking. In the context of the post-2008 ‘great recession’ the resilience of neoliberalism is particularly confounding. To begin to unravel the ways in which neoliberalism is situated relative to risk, this study identifies an increasingly important neoliberal knowledge practice: malagnogenesis. Malagnogenesis is proposed herein as the production of ignorance that normalizes harm for and amongst marginalized populations. To shed light on the phenomena of malagnogenesis, this study investigated the history of leaded gasoline in the U.S. To that end, I …

Situating Migrants In Contemporary Japan: From Public Spaces To Personal Experiences, Milena Urszula Janiec Grygo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Within the broader literature on migration, Japan is often portrayed as straddling two categories, one of a homogenous country and another of a multicultural society. The arguments on both sides are supported through the historical evidence, analysis of media resources, as well as narratives of Japanese residents. This inquiry seeks to highlight voices of migrants within these debates. This dissertation focuses on the urban – rural residential experiences of international migrants in Kanto and Tohoku regions. This inquiry treats international migration processes in terms of moving between the contexts of different countries as well as between urban – rural locations. …

Making A Place For People At A Wildlife Corridor On Chicago's South Side, Alexis Winter

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

What role do environmental conservation projects play in the transformation of American cities? How do these projects affect city residents? In this study, I ask these questions at the Burnham Wildlife Corridor, where the Chicago Park District worked with institutional and community-based partner organizations to engage city residents in the creation of a lakefront wildlife habitat and public nature area. Through ethnographic interviews and participant observation I explored how actors at various levels understand this changing landscape and their roles in shaping it. I situate the Burnham Wildlife Corridor project in the broader context of a state-level plan, the Millennium …

Media Representations Of Abortion Politics In Florida: Feminist Geographic Analysis Of Newspaper Articles, 2011-2013, Jennifer Iceton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Feminist geographers argue that gendered bodies and power are deeply entwined (McDowell 1992; Rose 1993). However, few geographers have investigated how gender and power interact in relation to the politics of abortion access. This thesis seeks to fill this gap by conducting a feminist content analysis of six newspapers from Florida’s three largest metropolitan areas to determine how articles featuring abortion are framed. Analysis of the dataset concludes that the politicization of the abortion debate results in the erasure of women from the conversation, the identification of a pregnant women trope which homogenizes all women into one category, and Planned …

The Effect Of Home Range Estimation Techniques On Habitat Use Analysis, Brendon Quinton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The term “home range” refers to the area in which an animal spends most of its time during everyday activities. This study examined the effects of four different home range estimation techniques on the proportions of habitats located therein. The study utilized a point dataset collected for twenty individual Florida Black Bears (Ursus americanus floridanus), occurring in five different areas throughout the state of Florida. Each dataset was used to create home ranges using the following techniques: (1) Minimum Convex Polygon, (2) Kernel Density Estimation, (3) Characteristic Hull Polygon, and (4) Time-Geographic Density Estimation, a new home range …

Planning For Bike Share Connectivity To Rail Transit, Greg P. Griffin, Ipek N. Sener

Journal of Public Transportation

Bike sharing can play a role in providing access to transit stations and then to final destinations, but early implementation of these systems in North America has been opportunistic rather than strategic. This study evaluates local intermodal plan goals using trip data and associated infrastructure such as transit stops and bike share station locations in Austin, Texas, and Chicago, Illinois. Bike sharing use data from both cities suggest a weak relationship with existing rail stations that could be strengthened through collaborative, intermodal planning. The study suggests a planning framework and example language that could be tailored to help address the …

Applications Of Satellite Geodesy In Environmental And Climate Change, Qian Yang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Satellite geodesy plays an important role in earth observation. This dissertation presents three applications of satellite geodesy in environmental and climate change. Three satellite geodesy techniques are used: high-precision Global Positioning System (GPS), the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) and Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR). In the first study, I use coastal uplift observed by GPS to study the annual changes in mass loss of the Greenland ice sheet. The data show both spatial and temporal variations of coastal ice mass loss and suggest that a combination of warm atmospheric and oceanic condition drove these variations. In the second …