Week 8 Lab- Population data

Creating visual representations of demographic data would be next to impossible without the powerful tool that is GIS.  Prior to the advent of this software technology, maps such as these would have to have been shaded in by hand, whilst paying close attention to the data as you worked.  Now I can easily input spreadsheet data and instantaneously have a clear, accurate and visually pleasing display of the data.  Even more importantly, I can update the data very quickly, maybe even in real time.  While I don't know how to link live data into a GIS map yet, it seems like a real possibility and an exiting tool for monitoring changes in spatial data. 

Asian population in the United States seems to be concentrated on the west coast, and more generally, in city centers.  I assume this has to do with the fact that the west coast is closer to Asia than the east coast.  Interestingly, Asians represent the fastest growing demographic in the United States; soaring 43% between the years 2000 and 2010 [News America Media, 2011].  I wonder if this trend continues, will we see more Asians in rural areas, or will the population distribution remain constant with the growth?  I theorize that the distribution would remain about constant, as many Asian immigrants come for higher education, and urban employment opportunities, as opposed to rural work such as farming.  

This map I find to be the most striking of the three I have included here today.  This is because of the heavy bias toward the west and south west areas, with relatively little showing in the eastern half of the country.  Diversity is the greatest along the coasts, especially in cities.  I assume that the concentrations in this demographic have to do with cities, more so than regions, as there are often small communities or groups of people of the same origins found in cities.  If data was available on a city level, and not just a county level, I would be able to corroborate this hypothesis by showing ethnic communities within the larger cities or towns.  GIS is an invaluable tool for analyzing population data; I would never have guessed how great a representation of some other race alone there is in Texas without it.  

Black population seems to be heavily concentrated in the south and southeast United States.  Is this because of the origins of Africans in the US?  Back in the days of slavery, most of the Africans were set to work in the same region that can be seen as having the highest concentration of black population today.  Having personally grown up in an area that was largely Black, I find this quite interesting.  My high school was 60% Black and 20% Latino.  Apparently this was actually uncommon across the west coast.  However, if you look closely at the San Francisco bay area, you will find a remarkably high percentage of Blacks.  This has to do with the mass migration of Black people from the south and southeast to the San Francisco bay during WWII, when there was a need for factory workers in the Richmond ship yards.  While the factories are long gone, the Black demographic remains remarkably high, and now there is actually a poverty crisis among the black population in this area.  My GIS map illustrates this trend simply, and poignantly reminds me of the history of African Americans in this country.