Pictures that Show us the Way: Geographic Information Systems and Visual Languages

A persistent goal in the study of visual languages is to understand how pictures acquire meaning. It has become clear that meaning does not reside in pictorial (or any other) representations as such, but in the application context. Plugging an application domain into an abstract visual vocabulary and syntax can generally not create useful and usable domain languages. What is needed is a careful study of applications and their needs for visual and multi-modal communication. This talk will present a rapidly growing field where multi-dimensional and multi-sensorial communication is essential: Geographic Information Systems (GIs). The needs and contributions of GIS in the area of visual languages will be discussed, leading to some thoughts on the foundations of pictorial semantics in this and other domains.