Anna Barford

World views of world inequalities: surveys, discourse and map reading
Supervisors: Professor Danny Dorling and Professor Peter Jackson

I am a research student in the Social and Spatial Inequalities (SASI) group. My work is about understandings, interpretations and mapping of world inequalities. I am interested in how people at different points within these inequalities understand their own positions and relations to others. Underlying this is the question of why people hold certain attitudes towards world issues. Maps can be used to communicate information about the world, by contrasting the lives and opportunities of people around the world. Part of my work is about how people interpret world maps in different parts of the world. Cartographic representations of inequalities are shocking and appalling at times, but they can assist us in attaining an overview of the world and facilitate empirically based discussions about inequalities.

My research mixes a quantitative analysis of world opinion survey data with a discourse analysis of findings from discussion groups. The opinion survey analysis focuses on attitudes towards world issues, and how these are affected by various demographic characteristics. Teachers from the UK, Mexico and Kenya are participating in discussion groups, in which we talk about the causes and consequences of world inequalities. We also read and discuss some cartographical and graphical representations of the world, to consider the role of visualisation in information communication.

Education

I have a BA in Geography (University of Cambridge, 2004) and an MA in Research Methods and Sociology (University of Nottingham, 2005). I worked as a Research Assistant in the Department of Geography at the University of Leeds; and interned in the Department of HIV/AIDS at the World Health Organisation Head Quarters in Geneva. I also worked for 2 years as a Research Associate working in the Social and Spatial Inequalities (SASI) Group, Department of Geography, University of Sheffield. There I worked on the "worldmapper" project: making and presenting a collection of hundreds of world cartograms.

Interesting websites

6 billion others: http://www.6billionothers.org/index_en.php
Gapminder: http://www.gapminder.org/
Worldmapper: http://www.worldmapper.org/
SASI research group: http://www.sasi.group.shef.ac.uk/
The Atlas of the Real World - Mapping the Way We Live: http://www.sheffield.ac.uk/geography/about/081006.html

Publications

2010

• Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (forthcoming). Atlas of Real World (2nd edition). Thames and Hudson, London
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (forthcoming). Inequality. In: Southerton, D. et al (Eds.) Encyclopaedia of Consumer Culture. SAGE Publications, London

2009

• Barford, A., Pickett, K. and Dorling, D. (2009). Re-evaluating self-evaluation: A Commentary on Jen, Jones, and Johnston. Social Science and Medicine, 70(4), 496-497.
  doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2009.10.05
• Dorling, D. and Barford, A. (2009). The inequality hypothesis: Thesis, antithesis, and a synthesis? Health and Place, 15(4), 1166-1169.
  doi:10.1016/j.healthplace.2009.06.005
• Moraru, M., Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2009). Cartografiando la extensión de la globalización. Geofocus, 9, 1-18.
• Barford, A. (2009). World poverty – what can we do about it? Geography, 94(3), 215-218.
• Barford, A. (2009). Visitantes do Passado e do Presente ao Grande Continente do Sul. APOGEO, 36, Julho 2009, 20-25.
• Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2009). The Atlas of the Real World. Two further foreign language editions (Korean and Japanese).

2008

• Dorling, D. and Barford, A. (2008). Humanising geography. APOGEO 35, Dezembro 2008. Associaçõ Professores de Geografia, Lisboa. (reprint)
• Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2008) The atlas of the real world. London, Thames & Hudson.
  Also published in the United States, France, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands. Other editions are:
  • Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2008) The atlas of the real world. New York, Thames & Hudson
  • Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2008) Atlas du monde réel: cartographier nos mode de vie. La Martinère (France)
  • Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2008) Atlante del mondo globale. Zanichelli Editore (Italy)
  • Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2008) Der schlaue Planet. Süddeutsche Zeitung (Germany)
  • Dorling, D., Newman, M. and Barford, A. (2008) Atlas van de dagelijkse wereld. Kosmos Uitgevers (The Netherlands)
• Barford, A. (2008). Worldmapper, des centaines de cartes du monde sur Internet. M@ppemonde, 89(1), 1-15.
  Archived online PDF (open access)
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2008). What's it to do with the price of fish? Wideworld, 19(3), 6-8.
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2008). Telling an old story with new maps. In: Dodge, M., McDerby, M. and Turner, M. (eds.) Geographic Vizualization: Concepts, Tools and Applications. Wiley, Chichester

2007

• Dorling, D. and Barford, A. (2007). Shaping the world to illustrate inequalities in health. WHO Bulletin, 85(11), 821-900.
  doi:10.2471/BLT.07.044131
• Dorling, D., Barford, A. and Wheeler, B. (2007). Health impacts of an environmental disaster. Environmental Research Letters, 2 (2007) 045007.
  doi:10.1088/1748-9326/2/4/045007
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2007). Re-ordering the world. Geography Review, 20(5), 8-11.
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2007). A map a day, for every day of the year: A new view of the world. GeoInformatics, April/May 2007.
  http://www.geoinformatics.com
• Dorling, D. and Barford, A. (2007). The shape of global causes of death. International Journal of Health Geographies, 6(48).
  doi:10.1186/1476-072X-6-48

2006

• Barford, A., Dorling, D., Smith, G.D. and Shaw, M. (2006). Life expectancy: women now on top everywhere. British Medical Journal, 332.
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2006). A New Approach to mapping the World: Visualizing Facets of International Health. National Medical Journal of India, 19(4)
• Dorling, D. and Barford, A. (2006). What's Wrong With This Picture? New Scientist, 2550 (Translated and re-published in Courrier Japon, 017).
• Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2006). Worldmapper: The world as you've never seen it before. Teaching Geography, 31(2).
• Dorling, D., Barford, A. and Newman, M. (2006). Worldmapper: the world as you've never seen it before. IEEE Transactions on Visualisation and Computer Graphics, 12(5).
• Dorling, D. and Barford, A. (2006). Humanising Geography. Geography, Autumn 2006, 187-197
• Moraru, M., Barford, A. and Dorling, D. (2006). The long war. Student BMJ, 14

Presentations

• Sixth Form talk 17 November 2009. Snapshots of our distorted world. Oxfordshire
• Geographical Association Sixth Form Lecture. 4 November 2009. Inequality. Bedfordshire
• Guest Lecture on Development course. 22 October, 2009. University of Northampton
• Hay Festival, 25 May 2009. The atlas of the real world. (with Danny Dorling). Hay-on-Wye World
• Social Science Forum, 10-12 May 2009. Free to be dissatisfied: a world attitude study. (POSTER) Bergen, Norway
• Sixth Form talk, 30 April 2009. Taking another look at the world. Birmingham
• Geographical Association Annual Conference, 17 April 2009. World views of world inequalities: findings from Mexico City, Guadalajara and rural Jalisco. Manchester
• Seminar at the Instituto de Geografía, UNAM. 13 March 2009. Actitudes hacia las desigualdades en México y en otras partes del mundo. Mexico City
• Department of Geography, University of Sheffield. PhD upgrade presentation. 27 May 2008. World views of world inequalities. Sheffield, UK
• London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, lunchtime seminar. 8 March, 2007. Visualising Health Inequalities: world maps of death, disease and unhealthy environments, London, UK
• Environmental Inequalities: Pollution, inequalities and health Seminar (run by ESRC/NERC), 16 January, 2007. Mapping health and environmental inequalities on a global scale, experience from the worldmapper project, Newcastle, UK
• InfoVis, October, 2006. Worldmapper: the world as you've never seen it before, Baltimore, USA
• GeoVis, September, 2006. Re-visualising our world, Manchester, UK

Funding / awards

• Dudley Stamp Memorial Trust grant administered by the Royal Geographical Society, 2009
• Gold Award from the Geographical Association for The Atlas of the Real World, 2009
• PhD funded by Economic and Social Research Council's +3 studentship
• 'Award for Excellence in Leading Geography' from the UK Geographical Association (joint award with Danny Dorling)
• MA supported by a University of Nottingham scholarship
• During BA awarded Sideny Sussex College Dowman Yeoman's scholarship
• BA fieldwork in Nepal supported by a 'David Richards Travel Scholarship' and a 'Vacation Study Grant'

Contact Details

Address: D5, Department of Geography, University of Sheffield, Winter Street, Sheffield, S10 2TN, UK
Tel: +44 (0)114 222 7973
Fax: +44 (0)114 222 7907
Email: Anna.Barford@Sheffield.ac.uk