Space is critical to storytelling and how we think about the importance of places. Story maps, also called narrative maps, tell a story that is connected to space. Unlike data maps which plot quantities of information onto a map as points or shaded areas, story maps can offer context and interpretation as part of the mapping experience.

Space is something that is created and recreated by humans. We embed meaning into space to make it significant to us, and that significance can shift over time (or carry different meanings to different people). Techniques like story mapping offer a medium for visualizing narratives across space by pairing written text/media with representations of space through maps.

Students in ENVS 188: Introduction to Geographic Information Systems (GIS) used ArcGIS StoryMaps to transform their geospatial data into narratives. Please browse projects from Winter 2024 and 2025 classes below: