Census 2000/2010 (Lab 7)

As can be seen in the map, the highest percentages of black-alone individuals are concentrated in the southeastern United States. Counties near Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi are colored the darkest, while the majority of the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest contain less than 1.6 percent of black alone individuals.

The Asian population, on the other hand, is largely concentrated on the Western coast of the United States. California contains most of the counties with an Asian-only population percentage of over 3.7 percent.

This map clearly shows that the Western half of the country contains the majority of other race-alone individuals. The highest percentages are also located closest to the Mexican border, suggesting that these individuals might be Hispanic. California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas all contain counties with over 22.2 percent of these individuals.

These census maps provide important data regarding the racial geography of the United States. This information affects fields such as public health, education, and labor policy.

DEMs in ArcGIS (Lab 6)

Standing over 4,000m above sea level, Mauna Loa is Earth's largest volcano, and is located on the island of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean. It has erupted 33 times since 1843, making it one of the world's most active volcanoes as well. The area included in the DEM is bounded by:
Top: 19.740277777
Left: -155.86111111
Right: -155.35333333
Bottom: 19.223888888.
The geographic coordinate system is North American GCS 1983.

Projections in ArcGIS (Lab 5)

Map projections determine how people view the world, the political and economic relationships between different countries, and the importance of certain regions on a global level. We rely on them for navigation, for international research and analysis, and for reference purposes. Since different types of projections skew different aspects of the globe, it is of critical importance that we are aware of these distortions.

Some maps skew the areas of regions across the globe, making the northern hemisphere look much larger than the southern hemisphere. These images have influenced our Western tendencies towards egocentrism, and have reinforced global efforts for Western domination. For example, in the Mercator projection, Greenland looks as though it is almost the size of Africa. In both equal area projections, however, it is clear that it is in fact much smaller. This discrepancy may inflate our perceptions of Greenland’s importance in the geopolitical scene.

Other maps distort distances. These are dangerous in the field of flight or naval navigation, since using the wrong type of map projection could send a navigator many miles away from his/her intended destination. Navigators must refer to map projections that preserve direction and distance, such as the Equidistant Conic Projection (which is useful for polar navigation) and the Equidistant Cylindrical Projection.

Mapping is a complex art, since it involves projecting 3-dimensional objects onto 2-dimensional planes. Any map projection will include distortions. By referring to multiple types of map projections and taking all distortions into consideration, we can more accurately represent the globe in plane forms.

Lab 4