Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
The interest in semiology and semiotics also led to an increasing recognition
that all codes are polysemic in the sense of having two (or more) levels of meaning.
While traditional cartographic theory presented the map as a purely denotative
message,
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it is now unquestioned that maps and every individual sign can have
other, possibly unintended, meanings than the one envisaged by the cartographer.
The 'connotation' of signs describes the interaction that occurs when the sign
elicits feelings or emotions in the user, which are often culture-dependent. For
example, in cartography colour is frequently used to denote specific territorial enti-
ties, yet the choice of colour can also have profound effects on the symbolic mean-
ings generated. Many of these choices are even intentional and play on culturally
embedded connotations, as for instance the traditional colour given to maps of the
British Empire, where the pale red/pink had connotations of 'health/vigour'
(Vujakovic, 2002).
MAPS AS SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONS
Recent developments in cartography have gone well beyond the model of cartog-
raphy as a communication system with maps as presentations of stable, known
information. Cartography is now increasingly understood as operating in a field of
power relations, and maps as being created in exploratory mapping environments
in which knowledge is constructed. According to Crampton (2001: 235), two main
developments in cartography have marked an epistemic break with the assumption
that maps are unproblematic communication devices. These are (1) investigations
of maps as practices of power-knowledge; and (2) 'geographic visualisation'
(GVis), which uses the power of mapping to explore, analyse and visualise spatial
datasets to better understand spatial patterns.
The social constructivist approach to maps as practices of power-knowledge
has been mostly linked with the work of J. B. Harley (1989), Denis Wood (1992)
and John Pickles (1992). In discussing maps as practices and relations of power
and knowledge, Harley, building on the work of Michel Foucault and Jacques
Derrida, was particularly influential for changing the views on cartography and
maps as unbiased representations of reality. Harley tried to unravel the relation-
ships of political interests, power and the hidden agendas of maps: the 'second
text within the map' (Harley, 1989: 9). This approach promotes a more subtle
reading of cartography, and an understanding that maps 'do not communicate so
much as provide a powerful rhetoric, and therefore can be critically examined as
texts themselves' (Crampton, 2001: 238).
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The second area which, according to Crampton (2001), supported the epis-
temic break with the understanding of the 'map as mirror of reality' is the area of
geographic visualisation. By the early 1980s the interests of cartographers were
occupied by microcomputers and the development of geographic information
