Some people argue that maps tell stories. Personally I don't think so. Maps can’t talk. At least I never heard one doing so. It’s we humans that do the talking. It’s we ourselves that make up the story when we read a map, most often together with other materials, text, diagrams, flyers, etc. that surround it. To this encounter we bring our knowledge, our experience, our values, our gut feelings, and our perspectives. And maybe even some very concrete concerns or goals. It’s out of this interaction of our experience and mental luggage with this innocent piece of coloured paper or bunch of tiny dots on a computer screen that a story starts to develop. That's good news! Unless we want so, we never have to be the innocent victims of maps.
However we have to be careful, and cannot be overly confident. Most, or at least many, maps have this air of objectivity and truthfulness, and when we’re not awake it easily carries us away. “Camarón que se duerme, se lo lleva la corriente”, as the spanish saying goes. (Literally: the shrimp that falls asleep will be carried away by the flow).
Maps always embody a perspective. If you like you can also call it ‘a point of view’, ‘values’, ‘assumptions’. Maps thus never are a truthful reflection of our world. Such a map, as Jorge Luis Borges narrates, would be as big as the territory itself. But, just as important, it would also be as complex and ambiguous as the world we live in. Of no help at all! Maps must always reduce this complexity. They exist for no other reason. That why they are so useful ... and so tricky.
Making map involves innumerable choices. Of most of these choices mapmakers aren’t even aware. Maybe, we should not even speak of choices. Those are more taken for granted cultural assumptions, things that most people agree on an thereby become almost invisible. Assumptions that she may have internalized also trough the large and growing amount of maps she encounters in her life.Why do restaurants and golf courts show up on so many maps, while food banks and pawnshops are hard to find? How many map keys have you seen were the ‘local road’ is on top and the ‘freeway’ at the bottom? Ask, yourself, what would be your image of this earth if you never had seen the Mercator Map you were first shown in Grade 1, or NASA’s ‘blue marble’ which you may see when your supermarket starts charging you 5c. for each plastic bag. What would be your image of the country and city you live in? Would it be different without maps? Think about it! Maybe maps as much create as they represent the world ...
But also be the particular culture of the mapmaker's profession, gender, social class, etc.that has a saying in the map? Would a soil scientist, a farmer, and a housing developer draw the same soil map? I don't think so. Would the neighbourhood map of the social worker, the nurse and the crime buster, look the same? I'll leave the answer to you.
But also be the particular culture of the mapmaker's profession, gender, social class, etc.that has a saying in the map? Would a soil scientist, a farmer, and a housing developer draw the same soil map? I don't think so. Would the neighbourhood map of the social worker, the nurse and the crime buster, look the same? I'll leave the answer to you.
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| Blue Marble Raw salad or a well-cooked steak? Image: courtesy NASA |
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Warriparinga WetlandsA neat wetland. No sticky mud on this map!Ima ge: courtesy marion.sa.gov.au |
(click images to enlarge)
But not only the mapmaker and that which stands behind her - her boss, the unspoken but often very clear expectations of the client, institutions, laws, policies, you name it - put their stamp on the map. Also the technology and cartographic conventions have their own say. For much the mapmaker may believe she controls the technology, it may just as much the other way around. While the wetland may have a wide rim and numerous patches that are neither water nor dry land, and changes with the seasons and between wet and dry years, the database behind the map cannot deal with this capricious behaviour. “Draw a neat line, you know where”, it whispers. The blue symbol for wetlands is only one click away.The mapmaker does so. What alternative does she have?
However, sometimes the mapmaker also makes very purposeful decisions. When we talk in situations were things are delicate and stakes are high we carefully choose our words and tone of voice. To seduce, to calm down, to mislead, or to provoke. And if our words are both suggestive and ambiguous we may be able to probe the other’. And when they claim we said this or that, that this isn't so, we can always argue: ‘Well what I actually meant to say was ... “. Very diplomatic behaviour that often makes sense. A few steps further, like a sly lawyer, the mapmakers lies without doing so. Who knows where to draw the line?
Let's say that map don't tell stories, but that they may be suggestive of how we should do so. Sometimes very blunt, but more often quite subtle. On purpose.? A questions that is most often hard to answer with a reasonable amount of certainty. Most of the time we weren't granted permission to be in the kitchen were the map was cooked.
Let's say that map don't tell stories, but that they may be suggestive of how we should do so. Sometimes very blunt, but more often quite subtle. On purpose.? A questions that is most often hard to answer with a reasonable amount of certainty. Most of the time we weren't granted permission to be in the kitchen were the map was cooked.
So, if we don’t want to be carried away by the map, we must be aware of our own assumptions, of that the society we live in, of that of the mapmaker. And we might also better ask ourselves if the mapmaker might have reasons to try to steer the way we make sense out of her map. Those always innocent looking maps. Like newborn babies.
This blog is about this. About maps as workhorses and lobbyist. Always, boldly or subtly, trying to make a point. Time after time. Often even without knowing it.
But also about maps as diplomats. Maps that help us solve our differences or at least reach a temporal workable agreement by offering a language both clear and ambiguously enough to learn to understand each other, to accommodate and opt for compromise. Without loosing face, without creating winners and losers. Nobody was wrong, we were all right! Who cares about being right anyway?
But also about maps as diplomats. Maps that help us solve our differences or at least reach a temporal workable agreement by offering a language both clear and ambiguously enough to learn to understand each other, to accommodate and opt for compromise. Without loosing face, without creating winners and losers. Nobody was wrong, we were all right! Who cares about being right anyway?
