Journals, Cartographic

Summary

This article surveys the definition, historical development, research emphases, and publishing models of cartographic journals. It defines them as regularly issued periodicals containing scholarly articles on cartography, distinguishing them from newsletters, monographic series, conference proceedings, and general geographical journals that publish cartographic work only occasionally. Drawing on bibliographies, periodical directories, library catalogues, and earlier content analyses, the article traces their twentieth-century expansion. Sweden’s Globen, founded in 1922, was the first enduring cartographic journal; rapid growth followed the launch of Kartographische Nachrichten in 1951. More than thirty-five journals appeared between 1951 and 1975, approximately fifty were active by the mid-1980s, and the total remained broadly stable thereafter. By 2009, library records suggested that roughly 180 cartographic journal titles had existed across a geographically diverse range of countries. Changes in journal titles, closures, and new launches mirrored shifts in the discipline, particularly the transition from aerial photography and automated cartography toward satellite remote sensing, geographic information systems, and geographic information science. Content analysis of leading journals identified automated cartography, historical studies, and user-oriented research as dominant themes, with automated cartography showing especially strong growth. Although scholarly and professional societies were the principal publishers, commercial firms became increasingly influential during the late twentieth century. From the late 1990s, online full-text publication, digitized backfiles, subscription databases, and electronic-only periodicals transformed access and distribution; the early twenty-first century also brought freely accessible online journals. Overall, cartographic periodicals document the emergence of cartography as an autonomous and international discipline while revealing its changing research priorities, technological foundations, institutional structures, and modes of scholarly communication.