2004 UC Proceedings Abstract
 Development of a Custom GIS Application for Viewing Ethnographic Data Track: Application Development Author(s): Jim Detwiler This paper discusses the use of GIS in an ethnographic study being conducted at Penn State University. Its focus is on the development of an ArcMap extension using ArcObjects and Visual Basic that provides the social scientists in the study (generally not GIS users) easy access to various forms of geographic information through custom tools and forms. The extension provides access to secondary data such as census variables, transportation networks, crime data and tax parcel data. It also enables the researchers to view data collected by the ethnographers in a geographic context through neighborhood walkthrough layers that are hyper-linked to the original field notes and layers that map the neighborhood resources used by families in the study. This extension enables the researchers to understand the neighborhoods in which their families live in a way that would not be possible without GIS. Jim Detwiler Penn State University Geography 2217 Earth-Engineering Sciences Bldg University Park , PA 16802 US Phone: 814-865-2932 E-mail: detwiler@essc.psu.edu |
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