Episode #316
Playfair, Power, and the People Behind the Data: Lauren Klein on Data by Design
Lauren Klein joins me to talk about her new book, Data by Design , co-authored with a team of student collaborators. Over more than a decade of work, Lauren set out to place the history of data visualization in its full historical and political context, going well beyond the familiar “great men” narrative of Playfair and Snow. We talk about how she chose which historical visualizations to feature and redesign, the ethical questions that come up when working with data about the transatlantic slave trade and Indigenous mapping, and what it actually took to track down high-resolution scans of centuries-old charts. Lauren also shares what she wants readers, especially working data visualization designers, to take away: that visualization is only as powerful as how, and by whom, it's put to use. Subscribe to this podcast. Follow this show and everything dataviz on Instagram , LinkedIn , Substack , X , and YouTube . Check out the PolicyViz website to learn more about data and data visualization. Questions? Comments? Pitch ideas? Email me at: jon@policyviz.com Hosted by Zencastr where you can record, transcribe, edit, and automatically publish your meetings, podcasts, and more.
