The work of mapmaking and geospatial data analysis provide an entry point for critical geographers, critical GISers, and radical cartographers to intervene in geovisual rhetorics that often reify and privilege the expertise of mapmakers. This leveraging of expertise requires deeper ethical considerations, as the power of a drawn line moves decision-makers and members of the public toward a finality that is often too neat, too tidy. In this presentation, we discuss our experiences being interpolated as experts in public debates on gentrification in Lexington, Kentucky. We discuss the resonances and responsibilities of community mapping at a moment when there are many maps, but fewer stories told through them.

Speaker Information

Matthew W. Wilson is Chair and Professor of Geography at the University of Kentucky and Associate at the Center for Geographic Analysis at Harvard University. He directs Mapshop, a community mapping lab, and he is an editor at cultural geographies, an international, peer-reviewed quarterly journal. His most recent book is New Lines: Critical GIS and the Trouble of the Map (University of Minnesota Press). He has previously taught at Ball State University and the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and his current research examines mid-20th century, digital mapping practices.

Emily Barrett is a doctoral student in the Community Research and Action Program at Vanderbilt University. Her research interests include the politics of data-driven and participatory urban planning, the racial logics of municipal budgeting and urban development, and social justice movements in the American South.