Description:
I seem to have lost the original visualization, so I’ll just describe as best I can the choices I made in creating my version. The question Prof. H posed yesterday about what factor should be the most privileged in constructing a data representation really got me thinking about which of those 4 factors have inherently guided my thought processes and my creativity. I mentioned this in my comment on Maya’s visualization, but I really think this question highlights how 1) anything interpretive or creative is subjective and 2) I personally privilege accessibility/comprehensibility. To be honest, I’m not really a fan at all of frequency ratios. For someone like me, the original dataset that only showed the frequency rations was hard to understand without great intellectual effort. I wanted to figure out a way to supplement these ratios with a visual component to accompany and to give these numbers some “immediate” significance. I think the bar chart format allows for an easy and concrete way in which we can interpret the significance of the frequency ratios at first glance. I do, however, appreciate interactivity in data representation as well. I scrolled past Cynthia’s visualization and liked how you could learn more about specific territories in Hawaii by hovering over them- but then we have to ask ourselves which information will be available at “first glance” and which is only accessible when you interact with it? These choices end up producing very different narratives with the same set of data…
Hi Ailee,
First off, I agree with your point that anything interpretive is subjective. If the reader is not directed or told exactly the point you are trying to get across, the data is going to mean different things for everyone. For instance, in your graph the data that stood out to me the most was the fact that the ratio was higher for blacks fleeing vs not fleeing. My immediate assumption would have been that those who aren’t fleeing would be more likely to be killed as there is a possible confrontation, but the opposite was the case.
Your choice to make the data into a bar chart does give the it immediate significance. I also like how aesthetically you ordered the different figures so that the ratios scaled ascendingly and descendingly. One possible change that could change the narrative could be adding either another minority groups data or the data for the population as a whole. That could add a whole other layer of depth.