ABSTRACT
Environmental history is a discipline that analyses the relationships between society and the environment over time. In recent years, many environmental historians have begun to use geotechnologies – their methods, techniques, and tools – to process past environmental data. Geotechnologies, including geographic information systems (GIS), are exceptionally valuable tools to represent these relationships graphically and spatially over time, as this chapter shows. Technological advances such as Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDI) allow this information to be made available in a flexible and standardised way. The applications made with these tools and methodologies cover temporally and geographically diverse studies, such as the South American cases presented in this chapter: on historical cartography and toponymy in the Guarani Jesuit Missions (Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay), and the dynamics of the historical landscape in Petrópolis (Rio de Janeiro State, Brazil).
