Introduction

 

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The AGS Bowman Expeditions Program is based on the belief that geographical understanding is essential for maintaining peace, resolving conflicts, and providing humanitarian assistance worldwide.  Accordingly, the AGS sends a team of geographers to a selected foreign region, where, in order to increase U.S. and international understanding of that region, it gathers cultural and physical GIS data, conducts original research on a geographical topic chosen by the lead investigator, builds collaborative relationships with foreign scholars and institutions, and reports findings in scholarly journals, popular media, and on the internet. 

 

The prototype project in Mexico is producing a multi-scale GIS database and digital regional geography, using participatory research mapping (PRM) and GIS, aiming at developing the a digital regional geography, or so-called “digital human terrain,” of indigenous peoples of the country.  Other AGS Bowman Teams of university scholars and students are presently in the Antilles, Colombia, and Jordan.

 

Project goals for all AGS Bowman Expeditions include the production of better information about and understanding of foreign cultures (ie. Human Terrain), physical environments, and geographic interdependencies between the people and the land.  In each region, Bowman Expeditions will focus on the most significant issues affecting economic prosperity, environmental sustainability, political stability, and cultural identity.

 

The better use of geographical knowledge is necessary for a healthy, prosperous, and peaceful planet, but global leadership has neglected geography for so long that geographical ignorance can drive foreign policy, as has been especially apparent in the United States during recent years.

 

The AGS Bowman Expedition Prototype México Indígena demonstrates:

1) the importance, complexity, and difficulty of creating digital regional geographies of foreign areas;

and that

2) geographers are best prepared to produce these digital regional geographies that individuals in government, university, or professional life can use with ease, efficiency, and speed.