Strange Maps

[Treffie]

I think this website/blog is brilliant, it has some factual maps of use but also others that are nonsensical.

http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/

This one is interesting

Electoral Votes in Poland



And this one (interesting for me, of course!). Distribution of Welsh speakers in Wales.

[SPQR]

Interesting site, thanks for posting it.

I found this one amusing:

[Lenny]

Now that's an interesting map!

The blues are where the hardline conservative "nationalist" party won; the oranges are where the more moderate/centrist party won.

What explains this? It's clearly that the orange counties are populated by "immigrants" to that land (and their descendants); people who have no roots locally. After the expulsion of the native Germans in 1945, Poles moved in and resettled all that land.

I guess this proves that rootless people will always vote more left-wing, even in a monoethnic political situation (they're all Poles). It's about a perfect correlation, if greater Warsaw is ignored.



Or as this commenter put it:

It seems to me that the most likely explanation of this division is that the ex-German areas were the ones with the greatest population churn after WW II. This would include Pomerelia (the “Polish Corridor” between Prussia and Pomerelia) and the Poznan region (formerly the Warthegau). Though these areas were majority Polish, they had substantial German populations from the Middle Ages, and were further Germanized in the 1815-1918 era.

But then in 1945 the entire Germanophone population was expelled, replaced by Polophone transferrees from the east and south. It seems very probable that this new population was a mixture from all parts of “old Poland”, and thus lacked the longstanding local ties and family connections that existed in “old Poland”, and that even in the Corridor and Poznan this effect was very strong.

Comment by Rich Rostrom — December 16, 2008 @ 11:06 pm
http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/200...-map/#comments

And this Pole echos that:

these [new] regions of Poland fostered a lifestyle among their inhabitants who felt little ancestral connection to their home cities, and who easily moved to other parts of the country if better opportunities existed there, in very stark contrast to the staid, conservative and land-based pre-war population. Naturally such peoples are more likely to accept change and will often vote more liberally than those still tied to their ancestral home region. Compare a place like New York City in the U.S. which has a huge proportion of its population not actually born in the city, to somewhere like rural Alabama where a majority of the population can trace their ancestry in the region back centuries.

Comment by Tomek — December 20, 2008 @ 8:57 pm

Wie wär’s mit folgender Erklärung:

Die West-Polen haben fast sämtlich einen Migrationshintergrund, sind also nicht so in der Scholle verwurzelt wie ihre östlichen Landsleute. Ergo sind ihre ländlich-völkischen Ansichten weniger ausgeprägt.

[Stossy]

Interesting site, thanks for posting it.

I found this one amusing:

Ah well. I guess that we, Europeans, made up the names 'The West' and 'The East'.

But if it is seen through the eyes of an American... well then he won't get it I guess .

[Æmeric]

Why are the tropical Islands of the Pacific call the "South Pacific" when in reality they are in the central part of the Pacific between the Tropics of Cancer & Capricorn, some of the islands actually being north of the Equator. I guess it is from the home point-of-reference of the New England & British seaman.

[Æmeric]

Ah well. I guess that we, Europeans, made up the names 'The West' and 'The East'.

But if it is seen through the eyes of an American... well then he won't get it I guess .

I get it. I just don't think most Americans actually think about.

[Vulpix]

Easy explanation I think. The "West" vs. "East" distinction was not invented with this (self-referential) type of map in mind:



But rather... with this kind of map, where "the West" is actually west .

[stormlord]

Easy explanation I think. The "West" vs. "East" distinction was not invented with this (self-referential) type of map in mind:



But rather... with this kind of map, where "the West" is actually west .

You do know of course that a European map is self referential too? Seeing as how the world's round and all, it's just that we were self referential first.

[Vulpix]

You do know of course that a European map is self referential too? Seeing as how the world's round and all, it's just that we were self referential first.

Of course. I was just pointing out the self refence to location in the first map (with an "x" for "me", can it get any more self-referential ?) for contrast with the other map layout.

Several ways of representing a world map exist:





One depicting the Southern hemisphere on top :



In sum, I was pointing out which "map layout" inspired the "East" vs. "West" antithesis.