Barry Boots
Dr. Barry Boots' contributions to geography both in Canada and
internationally have been truly outstanding and multifaceted.
Summarizing Barry's contributions to geography is a difficult task;
however, even a brief overview of his career demonstrates that he
is eminently deserving of the Canadian Association of Geographers'
Award for Scholarly Distinction in Geography.
Barry Boots began his career at the University of Bristol in
England. During his time at Bristol, Dr. Arthur Getis was a
visiting lecturer. Their meeting led to a productive research
period at Rutgers where Barry completed his PhD under the
supervision of Arthur Getis. This was to lead to their classic
book, Models of Spatial Processes, published in 1978.
Barry has distinguished himself by contributing heavily to the
spatial analytical literature. He is sought by some of the
outstanding spatial analysts in the world to create memorable books
and papers. Each book he has authored or co-authored has become a
standard in the field of spatial analysis. If citations are any
guide, Boots' work has proved to be invaluable to a large number of
spatial analysts. His co-authored book on spatial tessellations is
a landmark in the area of spatial form. According to Google Scholar
this book has been cited 1,192 times. His co-authored articles on
Moran's I, the most important spatial autocorrelation statistic, is
necessary reading for anyone concerned with spatial dependence and
spatial heterogeneity. Recently, he has co-authored several papers
on map comparison and has developed local pattern measures for
categorical data that equip researchers with the statistical tools
needed for accurate testing of hypotheses about patterns on
maps.
A central theme that runs throughout Barry's research is his
overriding interest in spatial patterns and the processes
associated with these patterns. His status as one the foremost
authorities on point pattern analysis, spatial autocorrelation, and
Voronoi diagrams has been earned not only through his nearly 100
scholarly publications, but also through the remarkable diversity
of application areas and disciplines that his work has advanced. To
demonstrate his remarkable intellectual dexterity, consider the
following sample of journals in which he has published:
Annals of the American Association of Geographers, Modelling and
Simulation, Canadian Journal of Zoology, Economic Geography,
Journal of Glaciology, Journal of Environmental Management, Journal
of Retailing, Papers in Regional Science, International Journal of
Geographic Information Science, Ecological Modelling, Geographical
Analysis, International Journal of Remote Sensing, Soviet Geography
and Metallography.
Dr. Boots has become one of the leading quantitative geographers
in Canada. In North America, among geographic researchers, he is
considered one of the foremost proponents of spatial analysis. This
field has been growing rapidly of late, stimulated by the
technological developments in the geographical information
sciences. Boots' name goes hand-in-hand with these developments. In
addition, his former co-editorship of The Canadian Geographer has
placed his name before most research geographers in North America.
Internationally, beyond North America, Boots is highly regarded as
a leader in modeling spatial systems. He was the chair of the IGU
Commission on Modeling Geographical Systems and in that capacity
organized important international conferences, books, and special
issues of journals. He continues as the only Canadian member of
that Commission. His work is cited by a cadre of international
specialists in spatial analysis. In particular, his work has great
prestige in Japan where he has developed a long term productive
collaboration with leading Japanese spatial analysts.
Barry Boots has also made extensive contributions to the
community of geography. His generosity in advising graduate
students and mentoring young faculty is second to none and for this
contribution alone he deserves recognition. While all of us aspire
to excel as scholars, few are able to make sustained and
significant impacts across all aspects of the profession. Barry
Boots is one person who has achieved this goal, and in doing so, he
has helped shape geography in Canada and worldwide.
|
