9780801870903 : the-new-nature-of-maps-harley-laxton-andrews

Paperback / softback

352 Pages

$30.00 USD

Format	Paperback / softback
Published	October 3, 2002
ISBN-13	9780801870903
Language	English
Pages	352
Illustrations, black and white	36
Height	9.00 Inches (US)
Width	6.00 Inches (US)
Thickness	0.75 Inches (US)
Unit weight	1.25 Pounds (US)
List Prices	$30.00 USD, £22.00 GBP
ONIX	v2.1 Reference

The New Nature of Maps

Name: The New Nature of Maps
Price: 30.00 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: J. B. Harley
ISBN: 9780801870903

Essays in the History of Cartography

By J. B. Harley Edited by Paul Laxton
Introduction by J. H. Andrews

Johns Hopkins University Press

In this collection of essays J. B. Harley (1932-1991) draws on ideas in art history, literature, philosophy, and the study of visual culture to subvert the traditional, "positivist" model of cartography, replacing it with one that is grounded in an iconological and semiotic theory of the nature of maps. He defines a map as a "social construction" and argues that maps are not simple representations of reality but exert profound influences upon the way space is conceptualized and organized. A central theme is the way in which power—whether military, political, religious, or economic—becomes inscribed on the land through cartography. In this new reading of maps and map making, Harley undertakes a surprising journey into the nature of the social and political unconscious.

About the Authors

J. B. Harley lectured in historical geography at the Universities of Liverpool and Exeter before moving to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His ideas on the meaning of maps have influenced not just geographers and map historians but also students of art history and literature. At Milwaukee he began, with David Woodward, the multivolume History of Cartography, the first volume of which was published in 1987. Paul Laxton lectured in the Department of Geography at the University of Liverpool for more than thirty years. He is now an independent scholar. J. H. Andrews is a retired professor of geography at Trinity College, Dublin and author of A Paper Landscape: The Ordnance Survey in Nineteenth-Century Ireland and Shapes of Ireland.

Reviews

"The father of critical cartography, and therefore the idea that a map should be understood as more than just a set of directions, was J. B. Harley...The New Nature of Maps... display[s] great erudition."

- Nicholas Lemann - New Yorker

"Harley was an iconoclast, subverting traditional approaches to map-making by drawing together art history, literature, philosophy and visual culture. It's a view that can now be savored in his collected essays, The New Nature of Maps."

- Nick Saunders - New Scientist

"With supreme tact, sympathetic insight into Harley's personality and his own deft scholarship, Laxton has produced... a book worthy of Harley."

- Catherine Delano-Smith - Nature

"Inlcuding Andrew's introduction... we have a debate within the volume, not only postmodernism and its critique, but also other examples of Harley's anit-positivist and anti-Eurocentric approach alongside a potent understanding of the processes and problems of map making."

- Jeremy Black - Imago Mundi

"The 'new nature' of maps reflects the sea change in the discipline of the history of cartography that has occurred, to a remarkable degree instigated by Brian Harley."

- John Cloud - Technology and Culture

Publisher	Johns Hopkins University Press
BISAC Subject Headings	SCIENCE / Earth Sciences / Geography (41 Titles) HISTORY / Historical Geography (6 Titles)
BIC Subject Headings	Geography (37 Titles) European history (538 Titles) History of the Americas (986 Titles)
US school grade range	From 17

Format	Paperback / softback
Published	October 3, 2002
ISBN-13	9780801870903
Language	English
Pages	352
Illustrations, black and white	36
Height	9.00 Inches (US)
Width	6.00 Inches (US)
Thickness	0.75 Inches (US)
Unit weight	1.25 Pounds (US)
List Prices	$30.00 USD, £22.00 GBP
ONIX	v2.1 Reference