by Maps and everyday life are now so intertwined for most people that it is hard to imagine a world without them. Most of us use at least one map every day. Some of us use a lot, especially now they are one of the dominant interfaces in our digital society, alongside the scrolling screen, camera view and search engine.
We are also being mapped – subliminally or overtly – through GPS and the location data tracks we leave, the journeys we take, and the types of activities we engage in as we go about our daily business.
Then there are other, more analogous ways in which maps are a part of our lives: childhood pirate treasure maps and atlases that show a world ripe for adventure; maps of railway platforms or cycle docking stations; and maps on the back of leaflets posted through the door.
Maps also have other, less practical uses. They hang proudly in our homes and offices, are used to decorate things like coffee mugs and mouse pads, and even create fashion.
Cartography has become one of the most successful technologies we have developed to understand the world around us. At the same time, maps have become important cultural and artistic objects that we cherish. They can be useful and pragmatic, beautiful and poetic, political and powerful, meaningful as well as uncommon.
Shaping social and cultural life
Over the past ten years, culminating in my book All Mapped Out, my work has led me to question what maps mean to people as they go about their daily lives, and in turn how maps shape their experiences.
Maps have received considerable attention from researchers and industry over the years, primarily with the aim of producing the most accurate and usable map for a particular purpose, or by studying how powerful interests are represented on maps.
Professional cartographers, working with pencil and paper and now with advanced geospatial technologies, aim to produce more detailed maps for ever greater uses, and the subfield of critical cartography has shown that shows what ends on a map. makers of world views.
But only recently has work begun to explore what they do to shape social and cultural life.
Maps and what we do with them cannot be universally defined. Thoughts and ideas about maps often conflict with the truth about how and why maps are used. By bringing together my own research studying map users in London, with the work of others who have researched mapping practices around the world, I want to show how different cultures, communities, contexts and technology shape the uses of maps .
One way to explore this is to look at the impact GPS technology has had on mapping our movements. Today, millions of people use this technology to reveal their fitness routines, supporting an industry worth billions.
But self-tracking isn’t just about maps and measurements. These maps become meaningful as objects inscribed with personal cartography. It feels good to see where we’ve been; it is a sign that we have achieved something.
Some people have taken this further by using fitness trackers as tools for artwork, using the GPS functions to inscribe pictures and words on the map as they move across the land. GPS art, as we know, is gaining popularity as people realize the potential of self-tracking beyond the mere exercise of mapping for personal goals.
It began long before the proliferation of smartphone apps and fitness trackers, when artist Jeremy Wood began working in 2000 recording and mapping his movements using a handheld GPS device. This included tracking his daily travels and even recording his lawn mowing routes through the seasons. This shows how a popular mapping technology – GPS – has many effects beyond its intended ones.
Mapping Contexts
In my work there are several overlapping themes that trace how maps relate to culture and society. I want to do more than identify maps that changed the world, or outline the history of maps and society. Instead, I want to show that every map has the potential to change the world and shape society. It’s just where you look and who you’re interested in.
With my book I hope to encourage another look at maps, first through the lens of navigation, perhaps the activity most strongly associated with maps, then through movement and how maps shape our perception of it.
I also look at the power and politics of maps that show which interests are served by particular maps, and investigate the cultures of map making today. With easy-to-use digital mapping tools now available online, combined with the proliferation of advanced mapping technologies now used by professionals, the power of mapmaking and the cultures that develop around maps are more diverse than ever.
Because maps and mapmakers are constantly changing, studying what we do with maps is an exciting area of development. It means that our understanding of maps must change as they continue to shape society.
So it’s time to rethink. There is still the view that the maps are neutral and objective, that they are paper and now digital, accurate and functional, despite the frequent use now that the maps are arguments about the world. Why is this? And how do we move beyond it?
I hope to create a conversation – one that has so far only been held in a small corner of map studies – to encourage people to think beyond society’s assumptions about maps and how we use them.
This article from The Conversation is republished under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Mike Duggan receives funding from the British Academy and Leverhulme Trust, the EPSRC and King’s College London. It is affiliated with the Livingmaps Network
