by Alan M. MacEachren
SUMMARY: This book is a systematic integration of cognitive and
semiotic approaches to understanding maps as powerful,
abstract, and synthetic spatial representations.
Presenting a perspective built on four decades of
cartographic research, along with research from other
areas, it explores how maps work at multiple levels -
from the individual to societal - and provides a cohesive
picture of how the many representational choices inherent
in mapping interact with the processing of information
construction of knowledge. Utilizing this perspective,
the author shows how the insights derived from a better
understanding of maps can be used in future map design.
Although computers now provide the graphic tools to
produce maps of similar or better quality than those
produced by previous manual techniques, they seldom
incorporate the conceptual tools needed to make informed
symbolization and design decisions. The search for these
conceptual tools is the basis for How Maps Work
CONTENTS:
1. Taking a scientific approach to improving map
representation and design
I. How meaning is derived from maps
2. An information-processing view of vision and visual cognition
3. How maps are seen
4. How maps are understood: visual array - Visual description -
Knowledge schemata - Cognitive representation
II. How maps are imbued with meaning
5. A primer on semiotics for understanding map representation
6. A functional approach to map representation: the semantics
and syntactics of map signs
7. A lexical approach to map representation: map pragmatics
III. How maps are used: applications in geographic visualization
8. GVIS: facilitating visual thinking
9. GVIS: relationships in space and time
10. GVIS: should we believe what we see?
Postscript
References
Author index
Subject index
Hardcover, 513 pages, 1.37 x 9.22 x 6.24 inches
Price: $45.00
Published: June 1995
Publisher: The Guilford Press, New York.
ISBN: 0-89862-589-0
Webpages about this book:
http://www.guilford.com/gengeo/maceachr.htm
http://amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0898625890