Interactive display of surnames distributions in historic and contemporary Great Britain

Abstract

We introduce a method to calculate and store approximately 1.2 million surname distributions calculated for surnames found in Great Britain for six years of historic population data and 20 years of contemporary population registers compiled from various consumer sources. We subsequently show how this database can be incorporated into an interactive webenvironment specifically designed for the public dissemination of detailed surname statistics. Additionally, we argue that the database can be used in the quantitative analysis of surnames in Great Britain and potentially offer valuable insights into processes of contagious and hierarchical diffusion of populations as well as the regional distinctiveness of demographic change and stasis.

Geography, ethnicity, genealogy and inter‐generational social inequality in Great Britain

“…Detection of origins may also be obfuscated by the effects of rural – urban migration that had already occurred prior to the first available (Lan & Longley, 2022) digital census data. Van Dijk and Longley (2020) nevertheless establish that most rural White British bearers of regionally concentrated surnames reside in the environs of where the surnames originated. Here we use kernel density estimates to filter names that have three or fewer regional concentrations in 1851.…”

“…Kernel density estimates (KDEs) of the 1851 population‐weighted geographic distributions of bearers of the family names (a) Charlton and (b) Bale. The blue contours enclose areas where bearers of the name were most concentrated, using the population‐weighted density measure of Van Dijk and Longley (2020). [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]…”

From Data to Narratives: Scrutinising the Spatial Dimensions of Social and Cultural Phenomena Through Lenses of Interactive Web Mapping

“…Many social and cultural phenomena are often developed within certain geographic contexts or neighbourhoods, which exhibit very clear spatial patterns, for instance, ethnic ghettos or enclaves (Johnston et al 2002) spotted in many multicultural cities due to the uneven geographic distributions of ethnic communities across different urban settings . However, the spatial logic of social and cultural landscapes is sometimes not explicit until they are superimposed on various maps showing the spatial context of the events, using a variety of cartographic representations and techniques such as dot maps, contour maps, flow maps, choropleth maps and mashups (e.g., Gibin et al 2008;O'Brien and Cheshire 2016;van Dijk and Longley 2020). The stories, narratives, and patterns of social and cultural phenomena along spatial dimensions are more pronounced when they are geo-visualised using maps and cartographic design as a way of visual storytelling (Roth 2021).…”

Family names, city size distributions and residential differentiation in Great Britain, 1881–1901

“…Using Great Britain-wide individual-level data from available censuses, 1881 and 1901, we examine the assimilation of geographically localised Anglo-Saxon names (Kandt et al, 2020; van Dijk and Longley, 2020) and the household characteristics that their bearers bring into the 50 largest settlements in 1881. At a macro level, these changes are related to the GB-wide rank-size distribution, while linked micro-level analysis allows identification of the degree to which new arrivals bear social similarities to existing residents and share newly developed or existing residential areas.…”