Lab 7

     

This map is about the percentage of Black people ranked by percent in America. The data is county-level. We can see from this map that Alabama, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia have the highest percentage of Black people. If we zoom in, we can see small pieces of rectangles. The map is made up of these cells. Each cell has a value, which is shown by a specific color. Each cell represents a county, because the map is based on county-level data.

     This map is about the percentage of Asian people ranked by percent in America. The data is also county-level. We can also see small cells if we zoom in, and these cells represent the counties in the United States. Different from the “Black” map, states with high percentage of Asian people are mostly located in the west, such as California and Washington.

This map is about the percentage of some other races ranked by percent in America. Like the data of previous maps, the data of “Some Other Race Alone” is also county-level. According to the “Some Other Race Alone” map, states like California and New Mexico have the highest percentage of people of other races. States like Indiana have the lowest percentage.

 Overall discussion: 

Because all three maps use county-level data, we can directly compare these maps. There are some interesting points of the maps. Firstly, compared to the other races, Asian people are distributed more evenly. Secondly, California is a very diverse state. The percentage of Black people in California is higher than many other states. In addition, it has the highest Asian people percentage, and it has a high percentage of other races. Thirdly, the three maps have some features, namely title, legend, scale bar, and north arrow.

I was impressed by GIS during the mapping process. GIS mapping can provide users with a more direct sense of information. In addition, it is very convenient to do geographic analysis through GIS mapping. However, the amount of information should be controlled, because people will be confused if map makers put too much information on a single map. In the three maps that I made this time, I only used data that relates to the themes of the maps. Moreover, map makers need to follow certain conventions. For example, map makers need to choose similar colors in order to make the maps neat, and maps have to contain features like title and north arrow.