On June 1st, Michael Palin will be named as the new president of the Royal Geographical Society. The former Monty Python star has been travelling the world for more than three decades and says that his love of geography stems from school field-trips as a boy in Sheffield. He may therefore use his new position to promote geography in schools, previously arguing that the subject should be made “relevant, lively, stimulating, adventurous and…fun.
The Klamath Tribes and farmers have agreed to drop their state water rights battle pending approval of a federal agreement leading to removal of dams on the Klamath River.
The settlement filed Wednesday with the Oregon Department of Water Resources mirrors the water issues in the dam removal plan, known as the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement.
"Then without warning, the wind shifted, catching everyone by surprise. The shift was sudden and intense. Within a minute it switched from a 10-to-15MPH steady uphill breeze to 50MPH storm force winds heading directly down canyon."
Google Maps has some LA Times coverage including where homes have burned, and links to stories.
[Google] is now facing inquiries from the Justice Ministry and angry accusations of prejudice because its maps detailed the locations of former low-caste communities."
[...]
Castes have long since been abolished, and the old buraku villages have largely faded away or been swallowed by Japan's sprawling metropolises. Today, rights groups say the descendants of burakumin make up about 3 million of the country's 127 million people.
But they still face prejudice, based almost entirely on where they live or their ancestors lived. Moving is little help, because employers or parents of potential spouses can hire agencies to check for buraku ancestry through Japan's elaborate family records, which can span back over a hundred years.
An employee at a large, well-known Japanese company, who works in personnel and has direct knowledge of its hiring practices, said the company actively screens out burakumin job seekers.
"If we suspect that an applicant is a burakumin, we always do a background check to find out," she said....
Lists of "dirty" addresses circulate on Internet bulletin boards. Some surveys have shown that such neighborhoods have lower property values than surrounding areas, and residents have been the target of racial taunts and graffiti. But the modern locations of the old villages are largely unknown to the general public, and many burakumin prefer it that way.
Google Earth's maps pinpointed several such areas. One village in Tokyo was clearly labeled "eta," a now strongly derogatory word for burakumin that literally means "filthy mass." A single click showed the streets and buildings that are currently in the same area.
Google posted the maps as one of many "layers" available via its mapping software, each of which can be easily matched up with modern satellite imagery. The company provided no explanation or historical context, as is common practice in Japan. Its basic stance is that its actions are acceptable because they are legal, one that has angered burakumin leaders.
It was Rumsey who worked with Google to post the maps in its software, and who was responsible for removing the
references to the buraku villages. He said he preferred to leave them untouched as historical documents, but decided to change them after the search company told him of the complaints from Tokyo.
"We tend to think of maps as factual, like a satellite picture, but maps are never neutral, they always have a certain point of view," he said.
Rumsey said he'd be willing to restore the maps to their original state in Google Earth. Matsuoka, the lawmaker, said he is open to a discussion of the issue.
I like reading maps and atlases written in different languages, both for the varying names of countries and features, as well as different words for basic map terminology.
