Cartographic Materials Available from Ball State University Libraries

Summer Reading List:  Cartography, Secret Cities, and the Power of Maps

The Ball State University Libraries provide the latest resources for research and learning.  Anyone interested in learning more about creating maps, human geography, or thematic atlases may wish to check out some of the new materials available from Bracken Library.

Unruly Places:  Lost Spaces, Secret Cities, and Other Inscrutable Geographies by Alastair Bonnett is available in the General Collection on the third floor of Bracken Library (Range 46).  This book was published in 2014 and provides a tour of the world’s hidden geographies—from no man’s lands, secret and dead cities, breakaway nations and enclaves, even the parking lot at LAX, and disappearing islands.  For example, Bonnett describes Sandy Island (reportedly off the coast of Australia), which appeared on National Geographic maps and even Google Earth up until 2012 even though it does not exist.

Mapping the Nation:  History and Cartography in Nineteenth-Century America by Susan Schulten is also available in the General Collection on the third floor of Bracken Library (Range 48).  This book provides a history of map-making in American history, including the mapping of disease, slavery, and environmental issues.  The book includes maps from the Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress and other historic collections.

Mapping in the Cloud by Michael Peterson was published in 2014 and can also be found on the third floor of Bracken Library (Range 48).  This book includes an introduction to maps and the Internet, a map gallery, online street maps, map digitizing and GPS, map mashups, and animated mapping.  Readers can learn about the technology of modern cartography, GIS software, and Web-based mapping.  The book includes a companion Web page providing supplementary materials for instructors and students.

Maps by Aleksandra Mizielinska and Daniel Mizielinski was published in 2013.  This atlas was published for children, but the illustrations and maps (above, click to enlarge) may be interesting for teachers, artists, and other interested in unique cartography.  The maps depict geographical features and political borders, places of interest, iconic personalities, native animals and plants, and cultural events for each region of the world.  The atlas even shows popular names in different regions of the world.  The book is available in the GIS Research and Map Collection (GRMC) on the second floor of Bracken Library.

World Atlas of Birds by Peter Scott was published in 2014 and includes color portraits of 500 specially selected species, 270 line drawings, and 167 maps showing the realms of birds around the world.  The maps cover virtually every habitat from polar regions to rainforests, mountains, and even oceans.  Fourteen of the world’s most distinguished ornithologists provided information for the book.  This resource can be found in the Atlas Collection (Range 3) on the second floor of Bracken Library.

For more information about cartographic resources available from Bracken Library, please contact the GRMC at 765-285-1097.