"a kind of map" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
For example, "I found a kind of map that showed the trails in the park."
She believes the books we read are a kind of map of who we are.
Folksonomies are a kind of "map", indeed, but different than ontologies.
It acts as a kind of map, helping him to identify a patient's troublesome brain circuits, which he then targets with his various therapeutic techniques.
But just as the audience judges the Bond films, the films judge the audience, providing a kind of map of cultural change over the years.
"With La Belle et La Bête, I took the screenplay and timed the words and made a kind of map of where they appear in the film.
Bremer says she was inspired by Krzywinski's work to create a kind of map of pi, in which each digit is assigned both a color and a direction.
Nor, finally, do I support military intervention as a kind of map-rearranging tool of statesmanship: The costs in blood and treasure are too high, and American power too limited, to treat regime change and nation building as tasks to be undertaken outside of truly extraordinary, aftermath-of-World-War-II-type circumstances.
As the apparently random narratives begin to connect, a kind of mapping of Paris past and present emerges, all shaped by real human experiences in the city.
Seven out of the top 10 travel apps are primarily based around mapping services (and number-two in Nielsen's list, GasBuddy, is a kind of mapping service with a special aim, helping you find cheap fuel, so you might even say eight).
Another significant development involves "ontologies"—a kind of knowledge map to facilitate data organization and mining for certain predefined purposes (Noy and Musen 2003; Rubin et al. 2006; Stoeckert et al. 2006).
Back at home, I found myself looking at Diane Arbus's "Untitled" as a kind of road map — a road map into the land my nephew now inhabited, where his eyes rolled upward as he contemplated things I couldn't see at all.
