Resources

Media, materials and guides produced by members of Livingmaps Network for use in creative mapping projects.

Mapping Methods: Information Cards

Livingmapper Heather Miles has created a set of concise information cards to introduce a range of diverse mapping techniques used by researchers, artists, geographers and community workers amongst others. These are provided here for use in workshops, research methods discussions and in planning participatory mapping. We hope they will help to encourage creative and inclusive mapping practices. Download the cards.

The cards describe approaches to making or using maps according to five types of knowledge: 

georeferenced | words-focused | creative & interpretative | sensory | visceral

Heather explains: 

"One way of thinking about how to choose mapping methods is in terms of the type of data or knowledge sought. These information cards were created for the purpose of illustrating the huge range of data and insights that different forms of mapping can generate to a team of transdisciplinary researchers working on an environmental restoration project. For this particular project, researchers are deploying contrasting practices of mapping together as an approach to transdisciplinarity, but any of the methods could also be deployed on their own.
Many of these approaches to mapping are process-based; i.e. data or knowledge is generated during the process of making or engaging with a map, rather than presented in a "final" map. For example, the most valuable data may be the recorded and transcribed discussions that community map-makers, for instance, have while they are creating a map, rather than the located phenomena."

For further information, please contact Heather Miles