Book History Information Graphics

I've spoken in class several times about Jeremy Norman's "History of Information" web site, but I just discovered a new feature: Map View. Click on this link to see how it works in action: Book History Diachronic GPS Mapping.
The pins drop in chronological order, 447 of them; it reminds me of "The Atlas of Early Printing" that we looked at earlier in the semester. You might have heard the term "Digital Humanities". Well, this is an instance of it; it shows how new technologies can present information in insightful ways. Keep in mind how printed books themselves were instances of new technologies throughout their history ( a history that is still evolving).

I was intrigued by some patterns that were hard to ignore. It's not surprising that the bulk of research for an English language site would be located in Western Europe, Great Britain, and North America. However, it's shocking to see not a single entry for "book history" in South America. This is a timely reminder that even the most seemingly neutral reference sources have their blind spots and biases.



World View

Western Europe

Europe-Asia

NATO

South of the Equator