Define Tufte’s 4 fundamental graphical designs (data-maps, time-series, space-time-narratives and relational graphics) and discuss their use in graphical practice using excellent examples from literature.Maximum 2 pages, explain all the technical terms that are used in your essay.
b)The next image (Figure 1) is a classic of Charles Joseph Minard (1781-1870), the French engineer, which shows the terrible fate of Napoleon’s army in Russia. This combination of data maps and time series, drawn in 1869, portrays a sequence of devastating losses suffered in Napoleon’s Russian campaign of 1812. Beginning at left on the Polish-Russian border near the Niemen River, the thick tan flow-line shows the size of the Grand Army (422,000) as it invaded Russia in June 1812. The width of this band indicates the size of the army at each place on the map. In September, the army reached Moscow, which was by then sacked and deserted, with 100,000 men. The path of Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow is depicted by the darker, lower band, which is linked to a temperature scale and dates at the bottom of the chart. It was a bitterly cold winter, and many froze on the march out of Russia. As the graphic shows, the crossing of the Berezina River was a disaster, and the army finally struggled back into Poland with only 10,000 men remaining. Also shown are the movements of auxiliary troops, as they sought to protect the rear and the flank of the advancing army. According to Edward Tufte, this chart is the best statistical graphic ever drawn. With Tufte’s principles of good representation of data in mind and your own opinion, analyze and comment this chart. For example, what are the qualities and weaknesses of this chart?How would you improve it? Maximum 2 pages, explain all the technical terms that are used in your essay.
