Download PDF How Maps Change Things A conversation about the maps we choose and the world we want Ward L Kaiser 9781770645660 Books
Download PDF How Maps Change Things A conversation about the maps we choose and the world we want Ward L Kaiser 9781770645660 Books
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How Maps Change Things A conversation about the maps we choose and the world we want Ward L Kaiser 9781770645660 Books Reviews
- One of the most thought provoking books I've read in a while... explaining why maps matter, why geography matters, and the possibilities we have. Kaiser definitely has a viewpoint; some readers may find it overstated, but it is important reading. Each chapter could more or less stand alone and I appreciated the guided questions provided. I have recommended it to many people. As a retired teacher of geography (and other things) I would have used this for my students, if only to cause discussion. As Kaiser says, "every map is an invitation to conversation." In today's world, it is essential to have that conversation.
- Very interesting read. Not at all what I expected. An inspiration and learning experience. Truly a worthwhile read for all.
- Read this book and loved it! Everyone should read it. I would have titled it How Maps Change the World. The content is profound but the style is accessible; even populist. Readers will get hooked on this fine piece of work!
Brian Arthur Brown, author of Three Testaments Torah, Gospel and Quran - The book was way to political, and for me on the wrong side of the political spectrum. It seemed to say that if equal area projections had been used in the past, most of the third world problems would have never happened.
- Over the past several years I’ve had the good fortune to be a bit on the inside track with colleagues heavily engaged in discussions about the meaning and effects of mapmaking. It has been suggested, that some cave paintings in Neolithic times may have been maps or something of the sort created by the hunter gatherers of the time. Be that as it may, as an interculturalist attempting to assist people to understand identity narratives different from their own, I have found that mapmaking and particularly work done by authors such as Ward Kaiser offer wonderful perspectives from which to see how socially constructed our worlds may be. Observing their development makes clear how we create and reconstruct parts of our worlds to suit our needs and sometimes fight our battles.
A great many intercultural tools are largely based on cognitive and psychological perspectives, inquiries, profiles and assessment instruments rather than tangibles. While every effort is being made to provide scientific rationale or at least analysis for such tools, by and large their most significant value lies in people’s ability to review what they see as their inner discourse and share and compare with others as they explore where commonalities and conflicts are likely to occur.
In my opinion not enough attention has been paid to the tangible creations of culture, its architecture, artifacts and other everyday items as telling stories that contribute to our understanding of diverse cultural perspectives. Maps are distinctively artifacts, and they are particularly interesting from the point of view that they combine perspectives on physical reality that are frequently diverse while at the same time that they may make claims about the nature of that which is portrayed, what is assumed to exist in certain areas as well as the claims of possession that they make.
Ward Kaiser’s book, How Maps Change Things provides a seminal approach to what we are continually dealing with when trying to understand the dynamics of cultural construction and discussing cultural diversity, because maps are so tangible and so clearly an act of construction. One can create activities around maps in the classroom or training room, not only on the larger level of world and regional geographical maps but in a large number of other areas as well. I frequently do this in my work with groups. There has been an explosion of infographics in the last couple of years, where all kinds of differences are plotted on a geographical basis, any of which can enlighten or obfuscate our perceptions or convictions about how cultural realities are located in a place or a population. Of the making of maps there will be no end… and they will continue to change things.
Emphasizing the function of maps adds culture revealing artifacts to cultural understanding. I have used the insights of this book's approach in recent keynote speeches that I have given to my professional Association SIETAR both in Argentina and Australia as well as making them part of a workshop for SIETAR friends this past year. SIETAR is the world's largest organization of professional interculturalists, its members coming from the field of professional management consulting, universities, NGO's, and social services as well as arts and the media.
In the intercultural field the label “essentialism†has moved to the forefront in the critique of intercultural theory, challenging the accuracy of the assumption that cultures can be somewhat easily defined, even labeled in terms of belief and behavior. Without denying the identify ability of certain commonalities, such labels are at best only random snapshots of the shadow of something that is forever being born, developing and diversifying as well as coalescing and expressing itself. Culture is in short a living process, Seeing how maps are created to reflect and fix our perceptions and desires as well as change things, makes them a key to developing cultural competence. - Author Ward Kaiser in his book How Maps Change Things ([...]) asks "What's a Map For? Maps send messages," he says. An example is the Mercator map, first produced in 1569, a map for navigation. When used for navigation, the Mercator is a dependable and useful map. For other purposes, Kaiser and other map people claim it is not accurate. They claim that the Mercator "enlarges some parts of the world and diminishes others (Greenland is the same size as Africa on the Mercator!) Where size is concerned, better not depend on the Mercator."
In 1974 in Germany, the Arno Peters map was first published, claiming to be an "equal area map...for the equal value of all peoples," and is now available in English, French, Spanish, Italian, Swedish, and Danish. How Maps Change Things is about maps, yes, but also about politics, faith and the values we hold dear, human relations, justice and peace and budgets and environmental concerns. We will each look at it with our own worldview, what the Germans call Weltanschauung. Our value system will go with us, no matter what we are thinking, discussing, sharing, reading, reviewing. God bless you as you read through 2014.
---Lois Sibley - There's a Latin proverb that goes "Every translator is a liar" -- meaning that every translation emphasizes some things at the expense of others. This book uses the saga of the Mercator projection -- the standard world map -- and the Peters projection -- an equal area projection -- as the main example showing how a mapmaker's choices inherently reflect a certain world view. There's a lot of information here in a relatively light style.
This issue isn't moot. Notice how the map at the microfinance site kiva.org minimizes Africa (despite this being one of the main places they urge loans to) because of the usefulness of the Google mapping applications -- based on that old Mercator view of the world. - The time has come for our nation's educators to provide strong geography curriculums and How Maps Change Things by Ward L. Kaiser seems to be one of the first excellent resources. The book has the potential to benefit college and university teacher education programs, as well as middle and high schools across the USA. This ebook is clearly written with thought provoking illustrations. ... How Maps Change Things would actually be fun to teach in a 6th or 9th grade social studies, a high school economics, a teacher education methods course and a multicultural literacy course. It is a versatile text that has a readability level for easy comprehension and retention. I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in our world and our place in it.
Dr. Patricia Ruggiano Schmidt, Le Moyne College Literacy Professor Emerita
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