| Statement in support of the proposal to establish an RGS-IBG
Research Group on Geographical Information Science (GIScRG) Submitted to RGS-IBG Research Division Committee
April 2002
Geographical Information Science (GIScience) is concerned with the breadth
of issues arising from the computer-based representation of geographical
information. GISystems are software realisations of particular areas
of GIScience. Those working in GIScience are concerned to extend the
possibilities
of the computer-based representations both in terms of the storage
and derivation of the information, they are concerned with how the related
technology is used, and the ethical and professional issues which arise
in that use.
Over the last 20 years, and more, GIScience have become central to geography.
Not because everyone in Geography uses GISystems or knows about GIScience,
but because:
-
Almost every department in the country
offers courses in GISystems in its curriculum,
-
Knowledge of GISystems is important in the
HEFCE Benchmark for Geography,
-
GISystems (through its very existence)
is getting “geography” talked
about at man levels in government and industry, andGIScience
is probably the principal way in which people in society interact
with geography
and in the future that interaction will only increase
(although
the latest phrase is known as Location Based Services, it is
still grounded in GIScience).
GIScience, therefore, is of fundamental importance to Geography, and especially
to British Geography.
To date within the RGS-IBG GIScience issues have been the remit of the
Quantitative Methods Research Group. However, it is felt by the majority
of supporters of the move for a GIScRG that this has not been successful.
Coping with Quantitative Methods and GIS introduces a tension in the
mission of that group. The QMRG is founded in the quantitification of
geographical data and the analysis of that quantificaiton. In some areas
of geography (particulary with census data) this is synonymous with GIScience,
but for many others working with GIScience where the analysis is more
qualitative, this concern, indeed any concern with quantification is
alien, and is not recognisable in their research.
Researchers belonging
to other research groups of the RGS-IBG make use of GISystems and develop
ideas in GIScience. This merely emphasises the
need for the GIScRG as a forum for that research to reach the wider
group of GIScientists in Geography. Finally, a number of well known quantitative
geographers and GIScience geographers are not current members of the
RGS-IBG partly because they
see nothing in it for them. The creation of this Research Group will
state clearly to British Geographers the recognition of the field
by the RGS-IBG,
and that they have a place in that organisation.
The Group will:
- Hold an annual meeting at the RGS-IBG Annual meeting;
- Sponsor
paper sessions at those meetings and at other meetings;
- Publish a newsletter – probably via email or a web page;
- Foster links to the GISRUK conference, the foremost GIS Research
conference in Britain;
- Forge collaboration with the GIS specialty groups of other
learned societies (such as the Association of American Geographers,
the Remote
Sensing and Photogrammetric Society, and the British Computer
Society).
Peter Fisher
Professor of Geographical Information
University of Leicester
19 April 2002
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