Strange Maps
A special series by Frank Jacobs.
Frank has been writing about strange maps since 2006, published a book on the subject in 2009 and joined Big Think in 2010. Readers send in new material daily, and he keeps bumping in to cartography that is delightfully obscure, amazingly beautiful, shockingly partisan, and more. "Each map tells a story, but the stories told by your standard atlas for school or reference are limited and literal: they show only the most practical side of the world, its geography and its political divisions. Strange Maps aims to collect and comment on maps that do everything but that - maps that show the world from a different angle."
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This culinary map of Los Angeles proves the city is more than just the world’s movie capital.
No, depression is not just a type of “affluenza” — poor people in conflict zones are more likely candidates
“Beresheet” is first privately-funded space ship ever to make a lunar touchdown
Artistic and statistic cartography projects show the U.K. divided like never before.
Two maps show two very different takes on the huge discrepancies in U.S. life expectancy
The navigation tool has placed a school in the sea, among other things.
Both panoramic and detailed, this infographic manages to show both the size and distribution of world religions.
Three scientists publish a paper proving that Mercury, not Venus, is the closest planet to Earth.
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Tracking project establishes northern Argentina is wintering ground of Swainson’s hawks
Less than a mile long, the Dorfbahn in Serfaus is also the world’s highest metro system.
North Korea’s Great Leader would rather not fly for his second summit with Trump – but the trip is also a political message to China.
Butter supply and life satisfaction are linked — but by causation or correlation?
The same 32 symbols show up in prehistoric European cave art.
First contact movies had their Golden Age in 1980s America – now they’re going global.
Hungarian cartographer travels the world while mapping its treasures.
Worryingly, these are not just two random collections of countries, but two blocs with a lot of pre-existing enmity.
Best case: Redrawing borders leads to peace, prosperity and EU membership. But there’s also a worst case.
Air pollution is up to five times over the EU limit in these Central London hotspots.
She met mere mortals with and without the Vatican’s approval.
TheTrueSize.com offers hours of fun while you stretch and shrink countries and states all over the globe.
Despite itself, this collection of awful cartography may just make a few useful observations.
Interactive map reveals the horror — and the patterns — of murder in 14th-century London.
As this typewritten map shows, constraints can be freeing.
No, the Syrian civil war is not over. But it might be soon. Time for a recap.
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Progressive America would be half as big, but twice as populated as its conservative twin.
Detailed (and beautiful) information on 57 million crop fields across the U.S. and Europe are now available online.
Meanwhile, Spaniards are the least likely to say their culture is superior to others.
This 100-year-old map, originally made for American consumption, highlights the famines that swept across Europe after WWI.
The greatest danger to our planet is not pollution or climate change, but our own despair.
In more than a dozen countries as far apart as Portugal and Russia, ‘Smith’ is the most popular occupational surname