Update: This talk has been moved to a larger room: 1st floor student lounge in NWQ-B. Details and RSVP link below.

The Center for Information Policy research, in partnership with the Social Studies of Information Research Group, welcomes UW-Milwaukee Department of Geography professor Dr. Rina Ghose, who will discuss her research on the social and policy dimensions of geographic information systems:

“Bridging the Geospatial Divide through Public Participation GIS”Geographic Information Systems is a powerful technology that analyzes geospatial data and is used prolifically in public and private sector. GIS has been used for over four decades for planning and policy making activities. GIS today is a globally dominant technology, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy has provided $200 million for the Big Data Initiative that emphasizes mining large spatial datasets and use of GIS. Yet GIS can be ethically criticized for being an elitist technology by virtue of its technological complexity and cost. A digital divide in GIS exists along class and race lines, whereby traditionally marginalized citizens have been excluded from using the technology. The question of democratizing GIS has been a primary goal in the GIS and Society research agenda. This presentation addresses the thorny issue of uneven access to GIS and the associated social power it confers. Following the principle that effective usage of information leads to better citizen participation in planning and policy making activities, Public Participation GIS has emerged as a strong research agenda and practice that has enabled marginalized citizens to integrate their local, experiential knowledge with public data sets, and use the technology to contest hegemonic power relations. This is a global research agenda that emphasizes not only an easy access to spatial data, but also the creation of user friendly, inexpensive/free GIS. PPGIS research and practice are widely undertaken in developing and developed countries, addressing both environmental and urban planning activities. Drawing upon my decade long PPGIS research among inner-city neighborhoods in Milwaukee, I aim to unpack the complex narrative of spatial knowledge production for effective participation of marginalized citizens into inner-city revitalization planning programs.

This CIPR/SSI research lunch is October 19, 2012 from noon-1:30pm, in the 1st floor student lounge inNorthwest Quadrant Building B. Lunch will be provided by the School of Information Studies.

Please RSVP here.