Abstract

Place and Space: Social and Spatial Networks in 1944 Budapest
Track: Education
Authors: Alberto Giordano, Tim Cole

When studying spatial patterns, GIScientists often employ distance-based methods and techniques, such as network analysis. When studying human behavior, however, spatial patterns often emerge that cannot be adequately examined assuming a physical conceptualization of distance. Such patterns emerged during our study of the process of ghettoization of Jews as implemented in Budapest during the course of 1944. Spatial analytical techniques allowed us to discover distinct spatial patterns of isolation, interrelation, and concentration, but a whole set of patterns appeared that could only be explained by thinking of distance not in spatial terms but in social ones. In this article we employ social network analysis to examine the geography of oppression in the Budapest ghetto. What jumped out from our study is the interweaving of space and place-intended as a community bounded by social relations and living in a specific time and location.