James R. Akerman (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226422787
- eISBN:
- 9780226422817
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226422817.001.0001
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cartography
This volume considers consider the roles mapping has played in the passage from colony to nation—or, from dependent to independent state. The eight contributions, including a synoptic first chapter ...
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This volume considers consider the roles mapping has played in the passage from colony to nation—or, from dependent to independent state. The eight contributions, including a synoptic first chapter and seven case studies of mapping and decolonization in Latin America, Africa, and Asia from the late eighteenth century to the beginning of the twenty-first, concern the engagement of mapping in the long and clearly unfinished process of decolonization and the parallel process of nation building from the late eighteenth to the twenty-first centuries. In general, decolonization involves practices by which colonized peoples become more engaged or reengaged in mapping their own spaces and territories. But the cartographic record shows that, in mapping their new states, decolonizing communities distinguish themselves from their former colonizers and consolidate new identities only gradually and incompletely. Drawing on examples of administrative and official cartography, iconic and propagandistic mapping, popular and educational genres, and art, the contributions to this volume show that decolonizing the map of new nation-states is never a singular process. The dominance of colonial and former colonial elites, creoles (criollos), and intermediaries in the mapping of new states is complicated by ideological conflicts, countermapping, social movements, and democratization.Less
This volume considers consider the roles mapping has played in the passage from colony to nation—or, from dependent to independent state. The eight contributions, including a synoptic first chapter and seven case studies of mapping and decolonization in Latin America, Africa, and Asia from the late eighteenth century to the beginning of the twenty-first, concern the engagement of mapping in the long and clearly unfinished process of decolonization and the parallel process of nation building from the late eighteenth to the twenty-first centuries. In general, decolonization involves practices by which colonized peoples become more engaged or reengaged in mapping their own spaces and territories. But the cartographic record shows that, in mapping their new states, decolonizing communities distinguish themselves from their former colonizers and consolidate new identities only gradually and incompletely. Drawing on examples of administrative and official cartography, iconic and propagandistic mapping, popular and educational genres, and art, the contributions to this volume show that decolonizing the map of new nation-states is never a singular process. The dominance of colonial and former colonial elites, creoles (criollos), and intermediaries in the mapping of new states is complicated by ideological conflicts, countermapping, social movements, and democratization.
Daniel Foliard
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780226451336
- eISBN:
- 9780226451473
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226451473.001.0001
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cartography
While the twentieth century’s conflicting visions and exploitation of the Middle East are well documented, the origins of the concept of the Middle East itself have been largely ignored. With ...
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While the twentieth century’s conflicting visions and exploitation of the Middle East are well documented, the origins of the concept of the Middle East itself have been largely ignored. With Dislocating the Orient, Daniel Foliard tells the story of how the land was brought into being, exploring how maps, knowledge, and blind ignorance all participated in the construction of this imagined region. Foliard vividly illustrates how the British first defined the Middle East as a geopolitical and cartographic region in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through their imperial maps. Until then, the region had never been clearly distinguished from “the East” or “the Orient.” In the course of their colonial activities, however, the British began to conceive of the Middle East as a separate and distinct part of the world, with consequences that continue to be felt today. As they reimagined boundaries, the British produced, disputed, and finally dramatically transformed the geography of the area—both culturally and physically—over the course of their colonial era. Using a wide variety of primary texts and historical maps to show how the idea of the Middle East came into being, Dislocating the Orient will interest historians of the Middle East, the British empire, cultural geography, and cartography.Less
While the twentieth century’s conflicting visions and exploitation of the Middle East are well documented, the origins of the concept of the Middle East itself have been largely ignored. With Dislocating the Orient, Daniel Foliard tells the story of how the land was brought into being, exploring how maps, knowledge, and blind ignorance all participated in the construction of this imagined region. Foliard vividly illustrates how the British first defined the Middle East as a geopolitical and cartographic region in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through their imperial maps. Until then, the region had never been clearly distinguished from “the East” or “the Orient.” In the course of their colonial activities, however, the British began to conceive of the Middle East as a separate and distinct part of the world, with consequences that continue to be felt today. As they reimagined boundaries, the British produced, disputed, and finally dramatically transformed the geography of the area—both culturally and physically—over the course of their colonial era. Using a wide variety of primary texts and historical maps to show how the idea of the Middle East came into being, Dislocating the Orient will interest historians of the Middle East, the British empire, cultural geography, and cartography.
Jess Bier
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780262036153
- eISBN:
- 9780262339957
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262036153.001.0001
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cartography
Mapping Israel, Mapping Palestine is an analysis of the ways that segregated landscapes have shaped digital cartography in Jerusalem and the West Bank since 1967. Extending work on how technology is ...
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Mapping Israel, Mapping Palestine is an analysis of the ways that segregated landscapes have shaped digital cartography in Jerusalem and the West Bank since 1967. Extending work on how technology is socially constructed, it investigates the ways that knowledge is geographically produced. Technoscientific practices are situated in landscapes that are at once both social and material, and this influences the content of digital technology in sometimes unpredictable ways. Therefore it is necessary to reflexively engage with materiality and space in order to enable more diverse forms of knowledge. Maps are an iconic symbol of modernity, and they have been central to debates over the future of Palestine and Israel. This has only intensified as Geographic Information Science (GIS) mapmaking has led to increasingly minute forms of surveillance and control. Intended to display objective facts, maps inspire extensive discussions. However, the framing of these discussions cannot be divorced from the participants’ asymmetrical mobilities within the very terrains that they seek to portray. Therefore it is essential to investigate how Palestinian, Israeli, and international cartographers are unevenly affected by the segregated landscapes which their technologies have helped to create. Mapping Israel, Mapping Palestine addresses these important issues by bringing together the disciplines of critical geography, postcolonial theory, and science and technology studies (STS). It presents an analysis of the maps and mapmaking practices that result when diverse cartographers chart the same landscapes that so condition their movement. It investigates the myriad ways that the segregated landscapes of the Israeli occupation shape knowledge about the occupation.Less
Mapping Israel, Mapping Palestine is an analysis of the ways that segregated landscapes have shaped digital cartography in Jerusalem and the West Bank since 1967. Extending work on how technology is socially constructed, it investigates the ways that knowledge is geographically produced. Technoscientific practices are situated in landscapes that are at once both social and material, and this influences the content of digital technology in sometimes unpredictable ways. Therefore it is necessary to reflexively engage with materiality and space in order to enable more diverse forms of knowledge. Maps are an iconic symbol of modernity, and they have been central to debates over the future of Palestine and Israel. This has only intensified as Geographic Information Science (GIS) mapmaking has led to increasingly minute forms of surveillance and control. Intended to display objective facts, maps inspire extensive discussions. However, the framing of these discussions cannot be divorced from the participants’ asymmetrical mobilities within the very terrains that they seek to portray. Therefore it is essential to investigate how Palestinian, Israeli, and international cartographers are unevenly affected by the segregated landscapes which their technologies have helped to create. Mapping Israel, Mapping Palestine addresses these important issues by bringing together the disciplines of critical geography, postcolonial theory, and science and technology studies (STS). It presents an analysis of the maps and mapmaking practices that result when diverse cartographers chart the same landscapes that so condition their movement. It investigates the myriad ways that the segregated landscapes of the Israeli occupation shape knowledge about the occupation.
Karen C. Pinto
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780226126968
- eISBN:
- 9780226127019
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226127019.001.0001
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cartography
There are hundreds of cartographic images scattered throughout the medieval and early modern Arabic, Persian, and Turkish manuscript collections. The plethora of extant copies produced in a variety ...
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There are hundreds of cartographic images scattered throughout the medieval and early modern Arabic, Persian, and Turkish manuscript collections. The plethora of extant copies produced in a variety of locales across the Islamic world for eight centuries testifies to the enduring importance of these medieval Islamic cartographic visions. This book examines the rich corpus of Islamic maps to show that they can be read as iconographic representations of the way medieval Muslims perceived their world and that, just like text, they can be analyzed to reveal insights into the history of the period in which they were constructed. In these maps we see images informed by the work of other societies, by myth and religious belief, and by physical reality. This work disentangles the Islamic maps, traces their inception and evolution and reveals their picture cycles. It shows how these maps can be deconstructed to reveal the identities of their constructors, painters, and patrons. This book draws on complex debates in the realms of art history, history of science, and world history of cartography, as well as the philosophy of aesthetics, symbolic anthropology, and visual theory. It explores the applicability of newer and more innovative techniques for approaching the visual record of Islamic history. The author aims to bring Middle Eastern maps into the orbit of modern and postmodern theoretical paradigms. This is achieved through a series of analytical lenses that present alternate ways of viewing Islamic maps.Less
There are hundreds of cartographic images scattered throughout the medieval and early modern Arabic, Persian, and Turkish manuscript collections. The plethora of extant copies produced in a variety of locales across the Islamic world for eight centuries testifies to the enduring importance of these medieval Islamic cartographic visions. This book examines the rich corpus of Islamic maps to show that they can be read as iconographic representations of the way medieval Muslims perceived their world and that, just like text, they can be analyzed to reveal insights into the history of the period in which they were constructed. In these maps we see images informed by the work of other societies, by myth and religious belief, and by physical reality. This work disentangles the Islamic maps, traces their inception and evolution and reveals their picture cycles. It shows how these maps can be deconstructed to reveal the identities of their constructors, painters, and patrons. This book draws on complex debates in the realms of art history, history of science, and world history of cartography, as well as the philosophy of aesthetics, symbolic anthropology, and visual theory. It explores the applicability of newer and more innovative techniques for approaching the visual record of Islamic history. The author aims to bring Middle Eastern maps into the orbit of modern and postmodern theoretical paradigms. This is achieved through a series of analytical lenses that present alternate ways of viewing Islamic maps.
Benjamin B. Olshin
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780226149820
- eISBN:
- 9780226149967
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226149967.001.0001
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cartography
This book, The Mysteries of the “Marco Polo” Maps, introduces the reader to a very curious collection of little-known maps relating to the voyages of Marco Polo. As far as history tells us, Marco ...
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This book, The Mysteries of the “Marco Polo” Maps, introduces the reader to a very curious collection of little-known maps relating to the voyages of Marco Polo. As far as history tells us, Marco Polo himself never drew any maps recording his travels to the east. Maps such as the 1375 Catalan Atlas use information from the famous Polo narrative in the depiction of Asia, but it does not seem that this or other such cartographic works were based on works that Marco Polo might have brought back. Fra Mauro’s fifteenth-century world map uses Marco Polo’s toponyms, and the Venetian historian, diplomat, geographer, and writer Giovanni Battista Ramusio (1485-1557) claimed that this work was a copy of one brought back from China by Marco Polo, but gave no evidence for his claim. In this new book, however, the reader can explore maps that may suggest new leads in the case—with a detailed look at these obscure but fascinating materials, some fourteen maps and related documents currently held in a private collection (with one at the Library of Congress). The text takes the reader of a broad adventure, with encounters in many areas of knowledge—from early exploration in Asia to medieval Italian history, and from tales of the remote reaches of the northern Pacific Ocean to ancient Chinese legends. This is an exciting exploration of knowledge, delving into old manuscripts and deciphering texts to find clues as to the origin of these mysterious maps.Less
This book, The Mysteries of the “Marco Polo” Maps, introduces the reader to a very curious collection of little-known maps relating to the voyages of Marco Polo. As far as history tells us, Marco Polo himself never drew any maps recording his travels to the east. Maps such as the 1375 Catalan Atlas use information from the famous Polo narrative in the depiction of Asia, but it does not seem that this or other such cartographic works were based on works that Marco Polo might have brought back. Fra Mauro’s fifteenth-century world map uses Marco Polo’s toponyms, and the Venetian historian, diplomat, geographer, and writer Giovanni Battista Ramusio (1485-1557) claimed that this work was a copy of one brought back from China by Marco Polo, but gave no evidence for his claim. In this new book, however, the reader can explore maps that may suggest new leads in the case—with a detailed look at these obscure but fascinating materials, some fourteen maps and related documents currently held in a private collection (with one at the Library of Congress). The text takes the reader of a broad adventure, with encounters in many areas of knowledge—from early exploration in Asia to medieval Italian history, and from tales of the remote reaches of the northern Pacific Ocean to ancient Chinese legends. This is an exciting exploration of knowledge, delving into old manuscripts and deciphering texts to find clues as to the origin of these mysterious maps.
Jessica Maier
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780226127637
- eISBN:
- 9780226127774
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226127774.001.0001
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cartography
This book recounts the history of a genre, the city portrait, through imagery of Rome. Among the most popular categories of early modern print culture, the city portrait was also one of the most ...
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This book recounts the history of a genre, the city portrait, through imagery of Rome. Among the most popular categories of early modern print culture, the city portrait was also one of the most varied, encompassing maps, bird’s-eye views, and other forms of urban representation. Through an exploration of seminal works dating from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, this book interweaves the story of this genre with that of Rome itself, addressing the key figures and specific contexts that shaped each image. Scholars, artists, architects, and engineers who shared a fascination with Rome’s ruins were spurred to develop new graphic modes for depicting the city. The resulting maps delicately balanced measured and pictorial forms of representation, past and present, realism and idealism. Portraits of Rome became canvases for documenting the rapid-fire urban changes initiated by a series of Renaissance and Baroque popes, for projecting ideas about the city’s current and future state, and for romanticizing, aggrandizing, or marginalizing its tangible signs of antiquity—or, for that matter, modernity.Less
This book recounts the history of a genre, the city portrait, through imagery of Rome. Among the most popular categories of early modern print culture, the city portrait was also one of the most varied, encompassing maps, bird’s-eye views, and other forms of urban representation. Through an exploration of seminal works dating from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, this book interweaves the story of this genre with that of Rome itself, addressing the key figures and specific contexts that shaped each image. Scholars, artists, architects, and engineers who shared a fascination with Rome’s ruins were spurred to develop new graphic modes for depicting the city. The resulting maps delicately balanced measured and pictorial forms of representation, past and present, realism and idealism. Portraits of Rome became canvases for documenting the rapid-fire urban changes initiated by a series of Renaissance and Baroque popes, for projecting ideas about the city’s current and future state, and for romanticizing, aggrandizing, or marginalizing its tangible signs of antiquity—or, for that matter, modernity.
