Annals of the Association of American Geographers

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Feminist Visualization: Re-envisioning GIS as a

Mei-Po Kwan

To cite this article: Mei-Po Kwan (2002) Feminist Visualization: Re-envisioning GIS as a Method
in Feminist Geographic Research, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 92:4,
645-661, DOI: 10.1111/1467-8306.00309

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8306.00309

Published online: 15 Mar 2010.

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Despite considerable progress in recent geographic information systems (GIS) research (especially on public-partic-
ipation GIS), the critical discourse on GIS in the 1990s does not seem to have affected GIS practices in geographic
research in significant ways. Development in critical GIS practice has been quite limited to date, and GIS and crit-
ical geographies remain two separate, if not overtly antagonistic, worlds. This suggests that critical engagement that
seeks to conceive and materialize the critical potential of GIS for geographic research is still sorely needed. In this
article, I explore the possibilities for this kind of critical engagement through revisiting some of the central argu-
ments in the critical discourse from feminist perspectives. I examine whether GIS methods are inherently incom-
patible with feminist epistemologies through interrogating their connection with positivist scientific practices and
visualization technologies. Bearing in mind the limitations of current GIS, I explore several ways in which GIS
methods may be used to enrich feminist geographic research. I propose to reimagine GIS as a method in feminist ge-
ography and describe feminist visualization as a possible critical practice in feminist research. I argue that GIS can be
re-envisioned and used in feminist geography in ways that are congenial to feminist epistemologies and politics.
These alternative practices represent a new kind of critical engagement with GIS that is grounded on the critical
agency of the GIS user/researcher. Key Words: critical GIS, feminism, feminist geography, GIS, visualization.

Richly evocative figures exist for feminist visualizations of various social groups (e.g., Sheppard and Poiker 1995;
the world as witty agent . . . We just live here and try to Burrough and Frank 1996; Quattrochi and Goodchild
strike up non-innocent conversations by means of our pros- 1997; Obermeyer 1998; Egenhofer et al. 1999; Good-
thetic devices, including our visualization technologies. child et al. 1999; Mark et al. 1999; Sheppard et al. 1999;
—Haraway (1991, 199) Winter 2001). Among recent studies, research on public-
participation GIS (PPGIS) has made significant progress

T
he critical discourse on geographic information beyond the antagonism in the early phase of the critical
systems (GIS) in the past decade or so has raised discourse (Harris and Weiner 1998; Craig, Harris, and
important questions about the value of GIS in Weiner 2002). This literature has addressed issues such
human geographic research. While many maintain that as the simultaneous empowering and marginalizing effect
the development and use of GIS constitute a scientific of GIS in local politics, representations of multiple reali-
pursuit capable of producing objective knowledge of the ties and local knowledges, and the scale-dependence of
world, others criticize GIS for its inadequate representa- power-knowledge in GIS (e.g., Elwood and Leitner 1998;
tion of space and subjectivity, its positivist epistemology, Weiner and Harris 1999; Sieber 2000; Elwood 2001; Ghose
its instrumental rationality, its technique-driven and 2001; Aitken 2002; Weiner, Harris, and Craig 2002).
data-led methods, and its role as surveillance or military Insights from this literature, however, have yet to bear
technology deployed by the state. The debate between significantly upon GIS practices in geographic research
GIS researchers and critics in the 1990s, however, does at large and on the relationship between GIS and critical
not seem to have affected GIS practices in geographic re- geographies in particular. Despite several calls for the in-
search in significant ways (Schuurman 2000; Kwan 2002b, tegration of GIS practices with critical social theories
2002c). (e.g., Sui 1994; Miller 1995; Yapa 1998; Johnston 1999),
By this I do not mean that there has been a lack of re- development in critical GIS practice in geographic re-
sponse from GIS scientists and practitioners. On the search has been quite limited to date. GIS and critical
contrary, both GIS researchers and critics have been geographies remain two separate, if not overtly antago-
involved in major research initiatives that attempt to nistic, worlds. Nadine Schuurman and Geraldine Pratt
address the limitations of GIS and its negative impacts (2002, 292) aptly describe the situation as “the binary
on society—from issues of ontology, representation, and split of two solitudes.” In a similar vein, Susan Hanson
scale to the social and political implications of GIS for (2002) and Sara McLafferty (2002) argue that GIS and
Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 92(4), 2002, pp. 645–661
© 2002 by Association of American Geographers
Published by Blackwell Publishing, 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, and 108 Cowley Road, Oxford, OX4 1JF, UK.
646 Kwan

feminist geography are unconnected and uncommunicative and discursive construction of gendered identities is cru-
and that the possibility that both may have the potential cial for understanding difference in the lived experiences
to enrich each other has been ignored. The critical dis- of individuals (Women and Geography Study Group
course on GIS in the 1990s has stimulated much debate 1997). Second, any claim to transcendent objectivity or
and critical reflection on GIS technology and methods, truth is considered untenable, since all knowledge must
but it does not seem to have led to the kind of changes be acquired through knowers situated in particular sub-
for which critics have called (Kwan 2002b, 2002c). Crit- ject positions and social contexts (Haraway 1991; Hard-
ical engagement that seeks to conceive and materialize ing 1991). Instead, feminist geographers recognize the
the critical potential of GIS for geographic research is partiality and situatedness of all knowledge and the im-
still sorely needed. portance of critical reflections on one’s subject position
In this article, I explore the possibilities for this kind relative to research participants, the research process,
of critical engagement through revisiting some of the and the knowledge produced (reflexivity) (Hanson 1992;
central arguments in the critical discourse from feminist England 1994; Gibson-Graham 1994; Gilbert 1994;
perspectives.1 I examine whether GIS methods are inher- Staeheli and Lawson 1995; Rose 1997; Nast 1998).
ently incompatible with feminist epistemologies through Third, feminist geographers do not hold particular re-
interrogating their connection with positivist scientific search methods as distinctively feminist (see Harding
practices and visualization technologies. Bearing in mind 1987). Instead, they emphasize the need to choose re-
the limitations of current GIS, I explore several ways in search methods that are appropriate for the research
which GIS methods may be used to enrich feminist geo- questions and data (Lawson 1995; Cope 2002; Kwan
graphic research. Further, I reflect upon critical issues 2002d). Increasingly many feminist geographers advo-
pertinent to the use of GIS-enabled visualization as a cate the use of multiple methods in a single study, since
geographical method and describe feminist visualization as the weaknesses of each single method may be compen-
a possible critical GIS practice in feminist research. I sug- sated for by the strengths of another (D. Rose 1993;
gest that GIS can be re-envisioned and used in feminist McLafferty 1995; Moss 1995; Rocheleau 1995). Fourth,
geography in ways that are congenial to feminist episte- feminist geographers share a commitment to progressive
mologies and politics. These alternative practices repre- social change that reduces social inequality and oppres-
sent a new kind of critical engagement with GIS that is sion of marginalized groups in general and gender in-
grounded on the critical agency of the GIS user/researcher. equality in particular. An important element of this
commitment is an integration of feminist theory and
practice in various forms of activism (Moss 2002a).
Feminist Geography and GIS Examining GIS from feminist perspectives is signifi-
cant for several reasons. First, some of the most tren-
Feminist geography has witnessed tremendous growth chant critiques of science and vision have come from
in the last two decades. It is a highly diverse and innovative feminist writings (e.g., Irigaray 1985; Pollock 1988; Mul-
subfield of geography, with practitioners from a variety of vey 1989; Haraway 1991; G. Rose 1993), and they have
epistemological and methodological perspectives (e.g., been used in the critical discourse on GIS (e.g., Bondi
Jones, Nast, and Roberts 1997; McDowell and Sharp and Domosh 1992; Goss 1995). Addressing the tension
1997; Moss 2002b). While at least three broad strands of between these feminist critiques and GIS methods is
feminist geography can be identified in the literature therefore essential before GIS can be reimagined as a
(McDowell 1993a, 1993b; Mattingly and Falconer-Al- method in feminist research. Second, feminist geogra-
Hindi 1995; Moss 1995; Pratt 2000), the most active of phers have contributed to the deconstruction of binar-
these in recent years is arguably what Pratt (2000) describes isms in geographical discourse and methods (e.g., G.
as feminist geographies of difference—a strand that is at- Rose 1993; Lawson 1995). As GIS is often considered
tentive to the construction of gendered identities across part of quantitative/spatial analytical methods and placed
multiple axes of difference (e.g., race, ethnicity, age, sexu- as the opposite to qualitative methods/critical theories,
ality, religion, and nationality) and the geographies of the examining GIS from feminist perspectives may help re-
body.2 Research in this strand mainly draws upon cultural, dress this kind of dualist thinking. Lastly, several femi-
post-structural, postcolonial, and psychoanalytic theories, nist geographers have used GIS in their recent research
while turning away from objectivist epistemologies. (e.g., McLafferty and Tempalski 1995; Hanson, Kominiak,
Although they work with different substantive foci and Carlin 1997). An examination of these studies may
and methods, feminist geographers tend to share some reveal some of the ways in which GIS and feminist geo-
common concerns.3 First, they hold that the material graphic research can enrich each other.
 Re-envisioning GIS as a Method in Feminist Geographic Research 647

Feminist Critiques of Science and GIS a gendered technology relying on scientific knowledge . . .
The technology is socially constructed as masculine in
An important issue concerning whether GIS methods the same way that the camera itself has been recognized
are appropriate for feminist research arises from their pre- as an extension of a ‘redoubtable masculine will’ imply-
sumed epistemological affinity with quantitative/scientific ing (or forcing) the subject’s ‘surrender.’ ” In terms remi-
methods and positivist modes of knowledge production. niscent of Haraway’s (1991, 189) thesis of situated
Some critics have argued that GIS is rooted in geogra- knowledges, Liz Bondi and Mona Domosh (1992, 202)
phy’s quantitative revolution and thus inherits its posi- argue that the Cartesian space-time grid of GIS implies
tivism and empiricism (e.g., Taylor 1990). They consider the existence of an external vantage point and that the
GIS to be basically a tool for quantitative spatial analysis mode of knowledge production enabled by GIS is mascu-
and for answering sets of questions similar to those that linist. It is important that feminist critics consider GIS
quantitative methods answer (e.g., Dixon and Jones 1998). methods—or, more precisely, the mode of knowledge
They assert that the use of GIS methods in geographic re- production enabled by GIS—to be positivist and mascu-
search is driven by the intent to seek for universally appli- linist. In light of these criticisms, it is crucial to re-examine
cable principles or to make generalizations about the the link between GIS methods and positivist/masculinist
world. They argue that GIS cannot be used to understand epistemology (and ontology), and to ask whether GIS
subjective differences among research participants because methods are inherently positivist, universalizing, and un-
of its assumption of subject-object dualism (e.g., Lake able to be used to understand difference (without deny-
1993). If GIS methods are inherently positivist and univer- ing that particular GIS applications can be positivist).
salizing and cannot be used to understand difference and Several issues are pertinent to this critical reflection.
subjectivities, it is quite difficult to conceive any role for First, the connection between GIS methods and positivist/
GIS methods in feminist geography—at least in feminist masculinist epistemology is neither necessary nor inevi-
research that focuses on the geographies of difference. table. Past debates on the connection between positiv-
Some GIS critics have drawn upon feminist critiques of ism and quantitative/spatial analytical methods in geog-
science to argue that the mode of knowledge-production raphy are particularly relevant in this regard. Geographers
enabled by GIS is not only positivist but also masculinist including Robert Bennett (1985), Geraldine Pratt (1989),
(e.g., Curry 1995b; Goss 1995; Roberts and Schein Victoria Lawson (1995), and Eric Sheppard (2001) have
1995). The most influential works used by critics include cogently argued against a necessary connection between
those by Evelyn Fox Keller (1985), Sandra Harding (1991), quantitative geography and positivism. They question
Donna Haraway (1991), and Judy Wajcman (1991). These the essentializing characterization of all quantitative
feminist theorists have provided trenchant critiques of methods in geography as positivist practices. For Lawson
science, especially on the relationship between the social (1995, 451), quantitative methods have been conflated
construction of science and cultures of masculinity—for with a particular epistemology (positivism) under the
example, the way scientific objectivity has been defined quantitative revolution and “a technique for gathering
reflects a particular understanding closely associated information has been conflated with a theory of what
with certain cultural (but contestable) attributes of male- can be known.” She suggests that using mixed methods
ness. For Haraway (1991, 189), scientific objectivity as in feminist research can be part of the process of separat-
conventionally understood is predicated on the position- ing techniques from ontological positions. For Bennett
ality of a disembodied master subject with transcendent (1985, 219), “[T]here is not a close or one-to-one corre-
vision, which she describes as “the god-trick of seeing spondence between what quantitative geography should
everything from nowhere”—where the knower is capable be and positivism.” He suggests that one major aspect of
of achieving a detached view into a separate, completely the confusion seems to arise from the particular represen-
knowable world through the use of their “optics of in- tation of quantitative geography by David Harvey’s
quiry” (Barnes and Gregory 1997, 20; see also Haraway (1969) Explanation in Geography, which depicts quantita-
1997). This kind of knowledge denies the partiality of the tive geography as primarily inductive, searching for uni-
knower, erases subjectivities, and ignores the nexus of versal laws and claiming to be an objective science. In a
power-knowledge in its discursive practice. Feminist crit- similar vein, the epistemological critiques of GIS in the
ics see this mode of knowledge production as masculinist. early 1990s seem to be reactions to Stan Openshaw’s
Based upon these feminist critiques, Susan Roberts (1991, 622, 625) representation of GIS as “data-driven
and Richard Schein argue that GIS is a masculinist tech- and computer-based knowledge-creating technologies”
nology. In their critiques of global imagery in the context that can “put geography back together again.” The oppo-
of GIS marketing, they (1995, 189) assert that “A GIS is sitional polemics in this debate, however, seem to have
648 Kwan

denied the possibility for GIS practices to be based upon edge production. Much has been written about the ob-
positions other than positivism or masculinism. jectifying power of an elevated vision (in both metaphor-
Second, the connection between GIS methods and ical and material sense) and the visual appropriation of
positivist/masculinist epistemology is historically and spa- the world in modern science and geography (e.g., Cos-
tially contingent. It was in the particular social and polit- grove 1985; Jay 1992, 1993; G. Rose 1993; Gregory 1994).
ical contexts within which GIS was developed and used, Luce Irigaray, for instance, argues, “More than any other
and through complex processes of social contest and ne- sense, the eye objectifies and it masters” (Irigaray 1978,
gotiation, that GIS assumed its particular form in par- cited in Vasseleu 1996, 129). Michel de Certeau (1984,
ticular application contexts (Latour 1987; Harris and 92) describes the experience of seeing an object from
Weiner 1998; Chrisman 1999; Martin 2000; Sieber 2000; an elevated vantage point as “looking down like a god”
Craig, Harris, and Weiner 2002). Each use of GIS tech- where “imaginary totalizations” are produced. Roland
nology or methods represents a unique combination of Barthes’ (1979) reflections on visitors’ experience of the
technological, scientific, social, and individual perspec- Eiffel Tower and Michel Foucault’s (1977) analysis of
tives. Its use as a military technology, its role as a token panopticism are equally instructive about the power of an
of positivist science, and its instrumental rationality em- elevated vision and the objectifying gaze (see also Bryson
anate largely from such concrete and specific historical 1983; Lefebvre 1991; Duncan and Duncan 1992; Grosz
and social construction. To argue that all or any of these 1992b; Jameson 1992)
constitute the inherent or immutable nature of GIS is to Feminist theorists have written trenchant critiques of
ignore the specificity of this history—for very different the decorporealized vision in modern technoscience.
kinds of GIS could have been developed under different Haraway (1991), for example, highlights the primacy of
sociopolitical interactions—and to foreclose the possi- sight and the reliance on visual technologies in modern
bility for GIS methods to be reimagined as critical prac- society for establishing truth claims and sustaining polit-
tices for feminist geographic research. ical power. As she (1991, 189) asserts, “Vision in this
Third, the critical agency of GIS users/researchers can technological feast becomes unregulated gluttony; all
play an important role in reimagining and developing al- perspective gives way to infinitely mobile vision.” She
ternative GIS practices. Insisting that GIS technology or argues that such a disembodied and infinite vision repre-
methods assume particular epistemologies represents a sents a conquering male gaze from nowhere. Drawing
form of technological determinism—the use of a partic- upon psychoanalytic theory, feminist geographers have
ular technology necessitates a particular mode of knowl- examined the relationships between geography’s visual
edge production—where the possibility for GIS users/ practices and the masculine desire for and pleasure in
researchers to assume other perspectives is entirely ruled looking. Rosalyn Deutsche (1991, 10), for instance, crit-
out. This view erases the very subjectivities and agency icizes Harvey’s (1989a, 1989b) “visual conceit” as a form
of individual GIS practitioners, who may be willing to of voyeuristic gaze. She (11) describes such a disembodied
adopt a critical sensibility and to renegotiate GIS as a gaze as “distancing, mastering, objectifying,” where con-
critical practice. One of the crucial tasks for feminist GIS trol is exercised “through a visualization which merges
users/researchers is to break the positivist/masculinist with a victimization of its object.” In her cogent critique
connection that was historically constituted and to en- of landscape studies in geography, Gillian Rose (1993,
gage in the development of critical GIS practices that 98–99) argues that the masculine gaze “sees a feminine
are congenial to feminist epistemologies and politics. body which requires interpreting by the cultured knowl-
The purpose of using GIS in feminist geographic research edgeable look . . . The same sense of visual power as well
is not to discover universal truth or law-like generaliza- as pleasure is at work as the eye traverses both field and
tions about the world, but to understand the gendered flesh: the masculine gaze is of knowledge and desire” (see
experience of individuals across multiple axes of differ- also Harding 1991; Grosz 1992b; and, on male gaze by cul-
ence. It aims at illuminating those aspects of everyday tural critics, Berger 1972; Pollock 1988; Mulvey 1989).
life that can be meaningfully depicted using GIS methods. The critique of vision, articulated largely in terms of
Haraway’s ocular metaphor and the Foucauldian trope of
surveillance, has been applied to GIS visualizations and
Feminist Critiques of Vision and GIS remotely sensed images (e.g., Goss 1995; Pickles 1995;
Curry 1997). Feminist geographers have also been criti-
The second issue concerning whether GIS methods cal of the use of vision or visualizations in GIS practices.
are appropriate for feminist research is their reliance on Bondi and Domosh (1992, 202–3) assert that the prom-
vision and visualization as an important means of knowl- ise of GIS to produce singular representations from a
 Re-envisioning GIS as a Method in Feminist Geographic Research 649

myriad of interconnected variables represents “a god’s nology that entails the creative act of re-envisioning its
eye view” that entails “the distancing of a unitary self potential use. Julien Murphy (1989, 107) proposes a
from the object of vision.” They (203) argue that GIS’s “feminist seeing” that “confronts and moves beyond the
“emphasis on vision as the sense that bestows on the per- distance, destruction, and desire that permeate the look
ceiver a unitary and apparently external positions” is a of oppression.” Feminist geographers can therefore en-
specifically masculine obsession that demotes other gage in the appropriation of the power of GIS’s visual
senses more closely associated with the feminine. Re- technologies and “participate in revisualizing worlds
flecting on the use of satellite images, Dianne Rocheleau turned upside down in earth-transforming challenges to
(1995, 463) argues that “[W]hen the gaze begins from the views of the masters” (Haraway 1991, 192).
space, and when the gaze-from-space is uninformed by Recent works on alternative practices in critical, fem-
the logic of gendered livelihoods and landscapes, then inist, and postcolonial cartography provide significant
the erasure of women’s place in the mapped spaces is all insights that may help inform the development of alter-
but certain.” These criticisms not only highlight the ob- native GIS visual practices (e.g., Harley 1988, 1992;
jectifying power of GIS-based visualizations, but also call Wood 1992; Blunt and Rose 1994; Nash 1994; Rocheleau,
into question the suitability of GIS methods for feminist Thomas-Slayter, and Edmunds 1995; St. Martin 1995;
research. If the vision enabled by GIS is incorrigibly dis- Krishna 1996; Pinder 1996; Dorling and Fairbairn 1997;
embodied and masculinist, the use of GIS methods will Huffman 1997; Seager 1997; Sparke 1998). The purpose
only serve to perpetuate the objectifying gaze of the mas- of these alternative cartographic practices—variously
culinist master subject. called other maps or counter-maps—is to re-present the
In light of these critiques, the use of vision and visual- world in ways that question or destabilize dominant repre-
ization as an important means of knowledge production sentations, which are often imbued with various silences
in GIS constitutes a major concern for feminist geogra- (especially on subaltern groups) and insensitive to the
phers. Before exploring how this issue may be addressed, effects of oppression and violence (Nash 1994; Sparke
it is, first of all, important to recognize the historical and 1998). At the level of practice, Rose (2001) presents a
social context of the critique of vision and to avoid “an helpful account of critical visual methodologies—including
ahistorical condemnation” (Nash 1996, 151) of all visu- content analysis, discourse analysis, and psychoanalysis—
alizations as objectifying or masculinist. As Catherine that can be used to provide some guidelines for enacting
Nash (1996, 153) argues, “There is no inherently bad or critical visual practices when using GIS. A major con-
good looking.” For Gillian Rose, the dominant visuality cern in this context is how to practice reflexivity with re-
(or scopic regime) is neither inevitable nor uncontested. spect to the visualization process and the images created
As she (2001, 9) suggests, “There are different ways of using GIS, in addition to being attentive to one’s posi-
seeing the world, and the critical task is to differentiate tionality with respect to research participants, the re-
between the social effects of those different visions.” search project, and the knowledge produced. Rose (2001,
Given that objectification can also occur through other ch.1) identifies three sites that, I argue, can be the focus
means, such as the use of language,4 the problem is less for practicing reflexivity when using GIS methods: (1)
the use of vision or GIS-based visualizations per se than the site of production, where we reflect on our meaning-
the failure to recognize that vision is always partial and making visual practices; (2) the site of the image itself,
embodied and to acknowledge the risk of privileging where we examine the exclusions, silences, and margin-
sight above the other senses—or, as Haraway (1991, alizing power of our representations; and (3) the site of
195) puts it, “only the god-trick is forbidden.” audiencing, where we consider how our images encour-
Recent writings of feminist theorists provide critical age particular ways of looking, and how meaning may be
inspiration for addressing the critique of vision when contested or renegotiated by various audiences (Kwan
using GIS. First, the vision enabled by GIS can be re- 2002c).
claimed from the abstract, disembodying practice of mas- Second, new GIS-based visual practices can be devel-
culinist technoscience through recorporealizing all visu- oped for representing gendered spaces. Strong evidence
alizations as embodied and situated practices (Nash exists in the writings of feminist cultural and art critics
1996; Nast and Kobayashi 1996; Rose 2001). Haraway that women tend to represent spaces and construct spec-
(1991, 199, 195) calls this appropriation of vision in tator positions differently when compared to men (e.g.,
modern technoscience “feminist visualizations,” which Doane 1982; Pollock 1988; Stacey 1988; Broude and
are grounded in “the view from a body . . . versus the view Garrard 1994; Neumaier 1995; Rose 1995).5 In an analy-
from above, from nowhere, from simplicity.” Jennifer sis of the scene location and spatial ordering in the im-
Light (1995) also suggests a proactive redefining of tech- pressionist paintings of Berthe Morisot and Mary Cassatt,
650 Kwan

Griselda Pollock (1988, 56) concludes that “[T]hey make but also of reading numerous chilling stories told by
visible aspects of working-class women’s labour within the people from their personal experience of the calamity
bourgeois home” and that their spaces are characterized (including media reports, photos and news on the Web,
by proximity and compression, instead of vast spaces in and messages on several electronic discussion lists). These
which the viewer’s position is hard to infer. Rose (1995) data vividly wove together a tragic story that is evocative
examines how the work of three women artists (Jenny of critical reflections and emotions.6 This suggests that
Holzer, Barbara Kruger, and Cindy Sherman) offers ways GIS users can interact with GIS-created images in a rel-
of seeing that are constructed, not through voyeurism, atively embodied manner, and that GIS-based visualiza-
but through intimacy and care. Feminist geographers tions are not necessarily devoid of context or meaning.
using GIS methods can experiment and create new visual When complemented by contextual information on the
practices, especially those that can better represent gen- ground and at microscale (e.g., stories about the lived ex-
dered spaces and help construct different spectator posi- periences of individuals), GIS visualizations can establish
tions when compared to conventional GIS methods. important connections between large-scale phenomena
Third, historical studies of the experiences of women (e.g., urban restructuring or land-cover change) and the
travelers hint at the possibility of a more reflexive mode everyday lives of individuals (see also Jiang 2001; Pav-
of visualizing geographic data (e.g., Blunt 1994; Morin lovskaya 2002).
and Guelke 1998). In her discussion of the experiences
of Victorian women explorers, for instance, Domosh
(1991) alludes to the possibility of a feminine way of see- Feminist Geographic Research
ing based upon the understanding that women travelers and GIS Methods
often had different goals, routes, and destinations while
traveling in foreign lands than those of men. Further, As I argued earlier, the purpose of using GIS in femi-
these women often spoke of the empowerment they felt nist geographic research is not to discover universal truth
when they were exploring. Thus, “even the exploitative or law-like generalizations about the world, but to under-
appropriation of European exploration was not without stand the gendered experience of individuals across mul-
the possibilities for developing other kinds of connec- tiple axes of difference. It aims at illuminating those as-
tions” (Bondi and Domosh 1992, 211). Based on these pects of everyday life that can be meaningfully depicted
accounts, and given that the use of GIS technologies and using GIS methods. As major GIS data models were de-
methods often involves the exploration of cartographic signed to handle digital spatial data and many of the core
images and high-dimensional graphics in a GIS’s cyber- functionalities of GIS were developed for analyzing quan-
spatial environment, it seems that different kinds of in- titative information, earlier debate on the role of quanti-
teractions between the GIS user and GIS technology are tative methods in feminist geographic research is still highly
possible. This hints at the contestability of the GIS user- relevant (e.g., Lawson 1995; Mattingly and Falconer-
technology relations that can be a basis for creating alter- Al-Hindi 1995; McLafferty 1995; Moss 1995; Rocheleau
native GIS visual practices for feminist research. 1995). For instance, GIS methods can be used to reveal
My experience in viewing a three-dimensional image “the broad contours of difference and similarity that vary
of the World Trade Center site on the Web after the 11 not only with gender but also with race, ethnicity, class,
September 2001 attack may help illustrate this point. and place” (McLafferty 1995, 438). They can be used to
The image was created from elevation data collected by support arguments in political discourse for initiating
a plane flying at 5,000 feet above the site using light de- progressive social and political change, and to indicate
tection and ranging (LIDAR) technology (Barnes 2001; research areas that urgently require attention and suggest
Chang 2001). The 3-D topographic image shows the re- directions for in-depth qualitative research. GIS methods
mains of the World Trade Center building structures and can also help discover the gender biases in conventional
the craters that drop 30 feet below street-level at the site. quantitative methods. Further, as GIS is capable of dis-
Although the text accompanying the image marveled at playing and overlaying many layers of data, it can be used
the technological achievement and usefulness of LIDAR to reveal spatial contexts, depict spatial connections, and
technology in this context (which I fully acknowledge), hint at the complex social relationships among people
I was instead overwhelmed by a deep sense of grief that and places. The strength of GIS methods lies in helping
led me to ponder on the meaning of such a tragic inci- the user/researcher to identify complex relationships
dence for the victims, for those who were affected, and for across geographical scales.
myself as a feminist geographer and GIS user/researcher. That said, GIS methods have many limitations when
My reaction was a result not only of viewing the image used in feminist research. For instance, there are no
 Re-envisioning GIS as a Method in Feminist Geographic Research 651

readily available procedures in current GIS for represent- women’s everyday lives (including activities locations
ing gendered bodies, women’s knowledges or desires, or and travel routes) with their geographical context at
the complex processes involved in the social construc- various geographical scales. This would allow a mode of
tion of space (Lefebvre 1991; Massey 1993; G. Rose 1993; analysis that is more sensitive to scale and context than
Gregory 1994). It is also impossible to avoid the unequal are conventional methods. Further, when individual-
power relations between the researcher and researched level data are available, GIS methods can be attentive to
when relying only on secondary data (McLafferty 1995). the diversity and differences among individuals. This
It is important to acknowledge these limitations and mode of analysis contrasts significantly with conven-
their implications when using GIS methods. The mallea- tional aggregate analysis and permits an understanding
bility of GIS software allows some possibilities for allevi- of women’s situations “at a level that does not obfuscate
ating these limitations. Specific strategies include: (1) their daily lives through maps and language drawn from
complementing secondary data with other contextual instrumental, strategic logic” (Aitken 2002, 364).
information; (2) collecting primary quantitative and/or As McLafferty (2002) suggests, GIS provides a tool for
qualitative data from individual subjects; (3) developing representing and visualizing not only the proximate geo-
dedicated algorithms instead of using inappropriate but graphical context of women’s lives but also environ-
readily available procedures in current GIS; and (4) ments beyond the scope of women’s daily experiences
practicing reflexivity with respect to the knowledge pro- (see also Jiang 2001). For Hanson (2002), GIS enables
duction process and the representational tactics (includ- description and representation of context at levels of de-
ing the production and use of visual materials such as tail and scale flexibility that are difficult to achieve with-
GIS-created maps and images). Using multiple methods out using GIS. My recent studies indicate that GIS may
in a particular study would also allow a more nuanced help reveal complex links among women’s experiences
understanding of the research problem than using only at various spatial scales—for example, how gender rela-
GIS data and methods. tions within the household interact with larger, urban-
It is also crucial for feminist geographers to be atten- scale accessibility patterns through the mediation of fix-
tive to ethical and privacy issues when using GIS methods ity constraint (Kwan 1999a, 1999b). In his analysis of
(Crampton 1995; Curry 1995a, 1995b). This is especially the potential of GIS for scale-sensitive research and local
true for studies of human subjects or establishments that activism, Stuart Aitken (2002) argues that GIS can be
are “hidden, secret, or concealed” (e.g., lesbian or gay used to help interpret women’s daily trajectories that
venues; Brown 2000, 62), since disclosing their identities link their experiences inside and out of the home (thus
or locations through GIS mapping may put them at un- connecting the private and public spheres).
foreseeable risk. Procedures should therefore be taken to Several recent studies suggest the possibility of scale-
protect the privacy and anonymity of this kind of subject and context-sensitive GIS-based feminist research. An
or establishment.7 Another privacy risk in the use of GIS example is Hanson, Kominiak, and Carlin’s (1997) study
maps is the possibility of recovering the identities of sub- on the impact of local context on women’s labor-market
jects from map symbols through a process of reverse engi- outcome in Worcester, Massachusetts. The study exam-
neering called map hacking (Armstrong and Ruggles ines whether the proximity to home of a large number of
1999). Feminist GIS users may need to be vigilant in jobs in female-dominated occupations increases the
recognizing this kind of problem and informed by recent probability that a woman will work in a gender-typed oc-
research on methods for hiding subjects’ identities.8 cupation. It computed the number of jobs in female-
With these caveats in mind, I describe in what follows dominated occupations locally available to each woman
some possibilities for using GIS methods in feminist geo- using a person-specific spatial interpolation method and
graphic research.9 a job-search space defined by a realistic estimate of the
distance traveled to work for each woman. Using this
Linking Geographical Context GIS method, Hanson and colleagues (1997) are able to
and Women’s Everyday Lives avoid the problem of using overgeneralized census data
while conducting their analysis at the individual level.
The ability of GIS to incorporate information about The study concludes that local employment context is
the geographical environment across spatial scales ren- important for part-time workers with a college education
ders it a useful tool for feminist research. As geographic and young children at home. It illustrates the fact that
data of urban environments at fine spatial scales (e.g., at significant questions in feminist research can be addressed
the parcel or building level) can be assembled and incor- by developing and using innovative GIS methods that
porated into a GIS, it is possible to link the trajectories of incorporate the geographical context into the analysis.
652 Kwan

Supporting Women’s Activism through others (e.g., Elwood and Leitner 1998; Harris and Weiner
GIS-Based Research 1998; Ghose 2001; Aitken 2002). This often happens
because groups that have better command of technical
As GIS is increasingly used in the public decision- and political skills (e.g., government agencies) will tend
making process, especially in the context of urban plan- to have more power and influence in political discourse
ning, an important area in which it can play a role in than those that do not (e.g., inner-city neighborhood
feminist research is empowering women’s activist groups groups). In the case of the Long Island project, community-
in local politics. As Hanson (2002) argues, the availabil- based breast-cancer coalitions succeeded in capturing
ity of GIS technology may strengthen activism and chal- public attention and gaining federal funding (McLafferty
lenge traditional power relations and forms of gover- 2002). But as the grassroots-based GIS project evolved
nance. Feminist GIS users/researchers can play a role in into a U.S. $27 million federal initiative, the power of
supporting women’s local activism in several ways. These the women activists dwindled, as several powerful groups
include: (1) assembling, codifying, and coalescing women’s (e.g., government agencies) were also on the GIS advi-
local knowledges and experiences; (2) performing GIS sory board. Feminist GIS users/researchers need to be
analysis that women’s activist groups do not have the aware of this kind of problem. Conceiving strategies that
skills or resources to undertake; (3) preparing data and assist activist groups in scaling their participatory GIS up
analytical results to facilitate the articulation of the to a higher level of politics will also be an important ele-
course of women’s activist groups; and (4) disseminating ment in projects that seek to empower women’s activist
results to assist the formation of a collective conscious- groups through GIS-based research.
ness that enhances the effectiveness of women’s activist
groups in the political arena. Using Qualitative Data to Construct
Few studies have documented the role of feminist GIS- Cartographic Narratives
based research in local politics to date. A community-
initiated GIS project at Hunter College that aims at Although GIS can handle only digital information
understanding the spatial tendency and potential envi- and has limitations in representing the diverse and com-
ronmental causes of breast cancer in the community of plex experiences of women’s everyday lives, recent de-
West Islip on Long Island, New York provides one good velopment of digital technologies has greatly expanded
example (Timander and McLafferty 1998; McLafferty the kind of information with which it can deal. In other
2002). The project was launched on request by a group of words, “digital” now includes a much wider array of
women who were worried about a possible breast-cancer representational possibilities than merely numerical or
problem in their community after seeing high breast- quantitative data. Qualitative data such as digital photos,
cancer incidence among themselves. It uses individual voice clips, and video clips can be linked or incorporated
data collected by a group of women activists through into a GIS. In studies using qualitative methods, sub-
door-to-door surveys to answer specific questions arising jects’ handwriting, hand-drawn maps, and other sketches
from their fears and concerns—for example, are breast- collected through ethnographic methods can also be in-
cancer cases clustered near a hazardous site? For these corporated into a GIS. The use of GIS, therefore, does
women, as McLaffery (2002, 265) stresses, “[M]apping not necessarily preclude the use of contextual qualitative
and GIS became important tools for acquiring knowl- information of subjects or locales. Indeed, a comparison
edge outside the realm of daily experience and for con- of GIS software with qualitative data-analysis programs,
necting their personal experience of health and illness to such as NVivo or ATLAS.ti, would find many similarities
a wider social and political agenda.” As arguments and (although the latter focus mainly on the coding and
explanations that refer to “broader patterns, conditions, analysis of textual data). For instance, both types of pro-
and relationships . . . frequently command greater legiti- grams adopt a highly visual approach, provide links to
macy and influence” in local politics (Elwood 2001, 12), integrate various types of qualitative data (photos and
GIS-based research has the potential to empower women’s voice clips), support a suite of query tools including
activist groups. Boolean operators (or, and, not), and emphasize explor-
Feminist geographers, however, need to be aware of atory data-analysis.
the possibility of a marginalizing effect as the scale of pol- In ethnographic research, GIS has been used to incor-
itics shifts up (e.g., from community groups to city or porate qualitative data into geographic databases. For ex-
regional planning). As GIS researchers have observed, ample, in an ongoing, multisite study of low-income and
participatory politics involving the use of GIS technol- welfare-recipient families and their children, family
ogy can disenfranchise certain groups while empowering ethnographic field-notes are linked with neighborhood
 Re-envisioning GIS as a Method in Feminist Geographic Research 653

field-notes and other contextual data in a GIS (Mat- body (e.g., McDowell and Court 1994; Duncan 1996;
thews, Burton, and Detwiler 2001). The integration of Pile 1996; Nast and Pile 1998; Butler and Parr 1999; Val-
GIS and ethnography has allowed researchers of the entine 1999; Longhurst 2001). For instance, the lines for
project to visualize and better understand the complexity representing moving bodies in the Cartesian space of a
of the lives of low-income families and the strategies GIS are clearly delimited and seem to suggest unlimited
they adopt in negotiating the welfare system. GIS has spatial freedom (G. Rose 1993). The abstract geometry
also been used in the construction of biographical narra- of points and lines cannot reflect many significant as-
tives. An example is the Ligon history project that was pects of women’s experiences (e.g., the fear of violent
initiated to preserve the history, culture, and memory of crime), and they are blind to the power relations that
an inner-city high school (Ligon High) in Raleigh, permeate public space and have impacts upon women’s
North Carolina (Alibrandi, Thompson, and Hagevik lives (Valentine 1989; Pain 1997). The representation of
2000). Besides documenting the African-American per- space and the body in current GIS therefore calls into
spective of life during Ligon High School’s pre- and question how GIS methods can be useful for understand-
civil-rights eras, GIS was used in the project to create a ing women’s everyday lives.
series of historical life maps that describe the biography of Given these limitations, it is difficult to imagine a
an alumnus. GIS production that can do justice to the contribution of
In light of the expanded representational capabilities feminist theories of corporeality and subject formation
of current GIS, GIS methods can be used in feminist re- (e.g., Butler 1990, 1993; Young 1990; Grosz 1992b,
search for composing spatial stories or biographical ac- 1994; Bordo 1993; Gregson and Rose 2000). Believing
counts of women’s lives (de Certeau 1984). GIS may also that GIS methods can be a helpful visual device for illu-
provide a digital environment for the interactive inter- minating certain aspects of women’s everyday lives,
pretation of ethnographic data or local knowledges in however, I propose two directions for addressing GIS’s
which research subjects are active participants. As this limitations in this context. First, the lines representing
mode of GIS production is more open to the articulation women’s life paths in space-time in a GIS can be re-
of different voices when compared to current GIS discur- imagined as body inscriptions—inscriptions of oppressive
sive practices, alternative GIS practices can be con- power relations on women’s everyday spatiality and in-
ceived for enhancing GIS’s potential for polyvocality. scriptions of gendered spatiality in space-time (Laws
For example, in a study of community integrated GIS 1997). As Elizabeth Grosz (1992a, 242) argues, “[B]odies
(CiGIS) for land reform in Mpumalanga Province, reinscribe and project themselves onto their sociocul-
South Africa, Dan Weiner and Trevor Harris (1999) in- tural environment so that this environment both pro-
corporate views and local knowledges of different groups duces and reflects the form and interests of the body.”
of subjects—in the form of sketch maps compiled The geometry of women’s life-paths and the processes of
through participatory mental-mapping workshops—into identity formation and women’s experiences of places
a multimedia GIS (see also Rundstrom 1995 and Ismail are mutually constitutive. The movement of women’s
1999 for difficulties in representing knowledges of indig- bodies in space-time is also an active element in the pro-
enous peoples). duction of gendered spaces (Spain 1992; Nead 1997).
Through this reimagining, the lines representing women’s
Mapping Women’s Life Paths in Space-Time life paths in space-time are no longer abstract lines in the
transparent Cartesian space of GIS. Instead, they are
As contemporary feminist geography is particularly the material expressions of women’s corporeality and
attentive to the construction of gendered identities and embodied subjectivities—a mapping of their bodies onto
the geographies of the body, the extent to which GIS can space-time that emanates from their prediscursive prac-
represent gendered spaces and bodies is a major concern. tices of everyday life (Pile and Thrift 1995). In this light,
Despite recent advances in GIS technology and research, I argue that feminist geographers can appropriate GIS
current GIS data models still have serious limitations for methods for illuminating women’s spatiality, while rec-
representing entities as complex and fluid as gendered ognizing the apparent privilege given to the physicality
spaces and bodies. The most likely possibility is to use of the body by GIS methods.
vector or object-oriented data models to represent the Extending the representational capabilities of current
body as discrete geometric objects (e.g., stationary bodies GIS comprises another direction for overcoming some of
as points and moving bodies as lines). its limitations for representing gendered spaces and
This representational schema, however, is problem- bodies. For instance, I have mapped movements of women’s
atic in light of the recent work on the geographies of the bodies in space-time as continuous trajectories using 3D
654 Kwan

Figure 1. The space-time paths of a sample of African-American women in Portland, Oregon.

GIS in a series of studies (Kwan 1999a, 2000a, 2000b, qualitative data collected through in-depth interviews.
2000c; Kwan and Lee forthcoming). The body maps I The study suggests that many representational possibili-
have produced look like Hägerstrand’s (1970) space-time ties of GIS remain unexplored.
aquarium, where women’s body movements are por-
trayed as life paths in a 3D space.10 Figure 1 shows, as Revealing the Gender Biases of Conventional
an example, the daily space-time paths of the African- Quantitative Methods
American women in a sample of households in Portland,
Oregon (Figure 2 provides a close-up view of downtown As many quantitative methods in geography are based
Portland). Geovisualizations performed using this method on the abstract logic of spatial organization and assump-
indicate that not only do the homes and workplaces of tions that ignore the complexities of life situations
these women concentrate in a small area of the entire among different individuals, analytical results can devi-
metropolitan region, but their activities locations are ate considerably from what people actually experience in
much more spatially restricted when compared to those their everyday lives. Since GIS can take into account
of all other gender/ethnic groups (Kwan 2000c). The certain complexities of an urban environment (e.g., vari-
closeted spatiality of African-American women in the study ations in facility opening hours and the ease of travel in
area suggests that urban space can be racialized in a different locales and at different times of the day) and
manner that goes beyond what the socioeconomic pro- incorporate some behavioral attributes of individuals into
cesses in the housing and job markets can fully explain. dedicated geocomputational algorithms (Weber and Kwan
I have extended this kind of body-mapping in subse- 2002), GIS methods can better approximate real-world
quent studies. In a study of human extensibility in space- behavior and can be used to reveal the gender biases in
time (Kwan 2000b), I developed a multiscale representa- conventional quantitative methods.
tion of a person’s extensible body boundary using 3D In a project that examines the impact of women’s
GIS. In another study (Kwan 2002a), I constructed car- space-time constraint on their employment status and
tographic narratives with 3D GIS to tell stories about access to urban opportunities in Columbus, Ohio, I argue
Muslim women’s experience of the urban environment that conventional accessibility measures are not ade-
after 11 September 2001 using both quantitative and quate for studying women’s accessibility (Kwan 1998,
 Re-envisioning GIS as a Method in Feminist Geographic Research 655

Figure 2. A detailed view of an area close to downtown Portland, Oregon.

1999b). Based on locational proximity to a single refer- As these conclusions would not have been possible
ence point (e.g., home or the workplace), these measures without using GIS, applying GIS methods in feminist
ignore the sequential unfolding of women’s daily lives in research has potential for revealing the gender biases in
space and time and the restrictive effect of fixity con- conventional concepts and quantitative methods in ge-
straint on their access to urban opportunities in a partic- ography. In other words, GIS methods may allow femi-
ular day. Instead of using conventional measures, I for- nist geographers to expose the discursive limits of certain
mulate three space-time accessibility measures that take geographical methods without invoking ontological or
these factors into account. I develop a geocomputational epistemological arguments (Derrida 1976; Barnes 1996).
algorithm to implement these measures in a GIS envi-
ronment. It uses the activity diary data I collected from a
sample of individuals in Columbus, Ohio and a geo- Conclusion
graphic database with parcel-level details. The results from
using space-time measures reveal considerable spatial Although GIS and feminist geography may have the
variations in women’s accessibility patterns, while men’s potential to enrich each other, they have remained two
accessibility patterns mainly follow the spatial distribu- separate worlds to date (Hanson 2002; McLafferty
tion of the urban opportunities in the study area. The re- 2002). Despite their limitations, GIS methods can play a
sults from using conventional measures, however, do not role in addressing certain issues in feminist geographic
indicate this kind of gender difference in accessibility research. Through revisiting earlier critiques of GIS and
patterns. The study concludes that GIS-based space-time hinting at some possibilities for alternative practices, this
measures are more sensitive to women’s life-situations article calls for a different kind of critical engagement
when compared to conventional measures, and that con- with GIS—one that seeks to re-envision and re-present
ventional accessibility measures suffer from an inherent GIS as a feminist practice, and one that is actively in-
gender bias and therefore are not suitable for studying volved in the creation of GIS practices informed by
women’s accessibility. feminist epistemologies and politics. Recent writings of
656 Kwan

feminist theorists and methodological debates in femi- Ghose, Munira Ismail, Hong Jiang, Steve Matthews, Eric
nist geography provide important guidelines in ground- Sheppard, and Dan Weiner for sharing their thoughts in
ing GIS practices in feminist epistemologies and research various contexts or allowing me access to their unpub-
methodologies. They suggest that feminist GIS users/ lished papers. All shortcomings and errors of the article
researchers need to acknowledge and deal with the limi- remain my responsibility. I wrote this article when I held
tations of GIS methods, the power relations GIS entails, an Ameritech Fellowship (2000–2001) and was sup-
the difficulty of practicing reflexivity, and the ethical ported by a grant (BCS-0112488) from the Information
or moral implications of the knowledge produced. The Technology Research (ITR) Program of the National
question is perhaps less one of the possibility of feminist Science Foundation (NSF). The assistance of the Geog-
GIS practices than one of how this potentiality can be raphy and Regional Science Program of the NSF is grate-
realized. fully acknowledged.
At the level of practice, an urgent need exists to go be-
yond the conventional understanding of GIS as a largely
quantitative practice and to recognize the potential of
such realization for disrupting the rigid distinction between Notes
quantitative and qualitative methods in geographic re-
1. Many perspectives can be identified within critical geogra-
search. As I have argued elsewhere (Kwan 2002c), GIS can phies. These include postcolonial, post-structuralist, femi-
be a site for deconstructing the dualist understanding of nist, socialist, queer, and other radical perspectives. I focus
geographical methods (as either quantitative or qualita- mainly on feminist geography because it is an important
tive) and for enacting feminist visualization—the material area of my research interests and I can draw upon my expe-
rience in writing this article. Some of my arguments (e.g.,
practice of critical visual methods in feminist geography.
on reflexivity) in this article are perhaps also relevant to
Further, as Schuurman (2002) and I (Kwan 2002c) have ar- other critical perspectives.
gued, an important element in feminist critiques of science 2. A vast literature on the geographies of the body has emerged
and vision has been lost in the critical discourse on GIS in the last decade or so. Drawing upon diverse theoretical
in the last decade or so. Haraway (1991, 192) not only perspectives (e.g., post-structuralist and psychoanalytic
theory), this literature challenges and destabilizes much of
provides a trenchant critique of modern technoscience our conventional understanding of the relations among the
and visual technologies, but also emphasizes through her materiality and spatiality of the body and processes of iden-
“cyborg manifesto” that feminists can reclaim the vision tity and subject formation (see Longhurst 2001, ch. 2 for a
and power of modern technoscience (GIS technologies helpful introduction).
included) and participate in “earth-transforming chal- 3. The common concerns identified here are necessarily over-
generalizations, as considerable difference exists among
lenges to the views of the masters.” Perhaps much would feminist geographies associated with variations in race, sex-
be gained through teasing out the implications of her uality, class, and national context. See, for example, Janice
(1991, 4) question: “Can cyborgs, or binary oppositions, Monk (1994) on different feminist geographies in different
or technological vision hint at ways that the things many countries.
4. Calling or naming can also produce objectified and op-
feminists have feared most can and must be refigured and
pressed subjectivities. See, for instance, Louis Althusser’s
put back to work for life and not death?” (1969) notion of interpellation (linguistic objectification).
See also the discussions of interpellation by Kaja Silverman
(1983), Stephen Melville (1996), and Heidi Nast (1998).
5. This section refers to various kinds of gender differences—
Acknowledgments the way women represent spaces, construct spectator posi-
tions, and experience travel differs from that of men. These
A version of this article was first presented in a session gender differences, as reported by feminist scholars, are
on “Feminist Geography and GIS” I organized at the an- drawn upon as a point of departure for thinking about the
nual meeting of the Association of American Geogra- possibility of alternative GIS practices. They by no means
phers, Pittsburgh, PA, April 2000. I thank Susan Hanson imply an essentialist understanding of women’s experience,
nor do they suggest that the complexities of gendered expe-
for her encouragement and support for the project, and rience can be captured in terms of the binary categories of
Regina Hagger, Sara McLafferty, and Marianna Pav- women and men.
lovskaya for their stimulating presentations. I am also 6. See Kay Anderson and Susan Smith (2001) for the impor-
grateful to Nancy Ettlinger, Michael Goodchild, Vicky tance of recovering the role of emotions in the production
Lawson, Pamela Moss, Nadine Schuurman, and four of geographical knowledge. Rosalind Picard (1997) also
provides an interesting perspective on the possibility of
anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on ear- incorporating emotions in computing.
lier drafts of the article. In addition, I would like to thank 7. For instance, while Michael Brown (2000) admitted that
Stuart Aitken, Meghan Cope, Sarah Elwood, Rina GIS was a helpful tool in his study on sexualized urban space
 Re-envisioning GIS as a Method in Feminist Geographic Research 657

(with a focus on the closeted spatiality of gay venues) in Barnes, Scottie. 2001. United in purpose: Spatial help in the
downtown Christchurch, New Zealand, he was deeply con- aftermath. Geospatial Solutions 11 (11): 34–39.
cerned about the ethical implications. To avoid disclosing Barnes, Trevor. 1996. Logics of dislocation: Models, metaphors,
the exact location of the gay venues on maps, he used their and meanings of economic space. New York: Guilford.
mean center to represent their spatial tendency instead of Barnes, Trevor, and Derek Gregory, eds. 1997. Reading human
using the dot symbol to plot the location of each venue. geography: The poetics and politics of inquiry. London: Arnold.
8. See, for example, Marc Armstrong, Gerard Rushton, and Barthes, Roland. 1979. The Eiffel Tower and other mythologies.
Dale L. Zimmerman (1998) on geographical masks. Translated by Richard Howard. New York: Hill and Wang.
9. Although each example is used to illustrate one purpose for Bennett, Robert J. 1985. Quantification and relevance. In The
using GIS methods, I do not mean to suggest that it is the future of geography, ed. Ron J. Johnston, 211–24. London:
only or the most important purpose for the study in ques- Methuen.
tion. Further, discussion in the following five subsections fo- Berger, John. 1972. Ways of seeing. London: Penguin.
cuses largely on women’s everyday lives and experiences. Bondi, Liz, and Mona Domosh. 1992. Other figures in other
This, however, is more a reflection of my own research in- places: On feminism, postmodernism, and geography. Envi-
terests than a presupposition that feminist research or geog- ronment and Planning D 10:199–213.
raphy deals only with women’s experiences (although Bordo, Susan. 1993. Unbearable weight: Feminism, Western cul-
women’s diverse experiences constitute a major concern in ture, and the body. Berkeley: University of California Press.
feminist geography). For instance, feminist geographers have Blunt, Alison. 1994. Travel, gender, and imperialism: Mary Kings-
made significant contributions to the study of gendered con- ley and West Africa. New York: Guilford.
struction of nature and space (e.g., G. Rose 1993), masculin- Blunt, Alison, and Gillian Rose. 1994. Introduction: Women’s
ities (e.g., Butz and Berg 2002), and capitalism (e.g., Gibson- colonial and postcolonial geographies. In Writing women
Graham 1996). and space: Colonial and postcolonial geographies, ed. Alison
10. Despite Gillian Rose’s (1993) critiques on this kind of time- Blunt and Gillian Rose, 1–25. New York: Guilford.
geographic representations, geographers have found them Broude, Norma, and Mary D. Garrard, eds. 1994. The power of
useful in various contexts (e.g., Hanson and Hanson 1993; feminist art: The American movement of the 1970s, history and
Gregory 1994; Adams 1995; Miller 1995; Hannah 1997; impact. New York: Harry N. Abrams.
Laws 1997; Dorling 1998; Rollinson 1998; Kwan 2000c). Brown, Michael. 2000. Closet space: Geographies of metaphor from
Such 3D representations also seem to be helpful for illumi- the body to the globe. New York: Routledge.
nating the complex interactions between space and time in Bryson, Norman. 1983. Vision and painting: The logic of the gaze.
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jects with indeterminate boundaries. London: Taylor and Francis.
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Correspondence: Department of Geography, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210-1361, e-mail: [email protected].