The Dictionary of Human Geography

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abstract symbols to represent roads, railways,

political boundaries and hydrographic features

such asrivers, streams andlakes (Collier, Forrest

and Pearson, 2003). Toponyms (place names

and feature names) reflect local usage as well as

government efforts to standardize spelling and

nomenclature (Monmonier, 2006). mm

Suggested reading

Forrest and Kinninment (2001).

topography The detailed study and de-

scription of aplaceas much as to the materi-

ality of its features or landforms more

generally. In recent years, topography has

been mobilized as a research method, ‘to

carry out a detailed examination of some part

of the material world, defined at anyscale

from thebodyto theglobe, in order to under-

stand its salient features and their mutual and

broader relationships’ (Katz, 2001, p. 1228).

In this sense, it has been used incritical

human geographyto delineate the social pro-

duction of localities as much as the knowledge

about them, understanding both to be the

contested outcomes of particular interests

and actors. The intent is to discern the sedi-

mented process of place-formation from the

localityitself and in so doing, situate ‘places

in their broader context and in relation to

other areas and geographic scales’, thereby

offering a means of understanding structure

and process simultaneously (Katz, 2001,

p. 1228). Just astopographic mapsconnect

sites of equal elevation through contour lines,

so too can particular relationships across lo-

calities be revealed and examined using top-

ography. That is, the trace or effects of

particular processes on various places can be

demonstrated through this methodology to

suggest their translocal bearing. This under-

standing led to the notion of ‘counter-topog-

raphies’, which are seen as a way to theorize

the connectedness of disparate places by virtue

of their relationship to a particular political–

economic or social process, such as demo-

cratic inclusion,privatizationorgentrifica-

tion. Focusing on the de-skilling of young

people, for instance, Katz (2001a) produced

a counter-topography linking New York City

and rural Sudan. The connections drawn are

analytical rather than homogenizations.

Counter-topographies are concrete abst-

ractionsthat offer a means of recognizing

the historical and geographical specificities of

particular places while also enabling the infer-

ence of their connections in relation to specific

material social practices. The intent in linking

different places analytically is to produce an

alternative geographical and political imagin-

ation that might work translocally in the name

of common interests (cf. Pratt, 2004; alsocon-

trapuntal geographies). Thegeographical

imaginationassociated with topography as a

method and the political possibilities of coun-

ter-topographies as concrete abstractions have

been best realized byfeminist geographers.

Looking at political transformation in Mexico,

Lise Nelson (2004) drew out a topographical

analysis to examine the historical experiences

of rural women engaging in regional and even

national commerce, and the ways in which

their engagements led to reconfigurations of

their subjectivities along with the contours of

their political practices. Her work demon-

strates how ‘the shifting norms and practices

ofgenderandcitizenship’ in a single place

both propel and are propelled by changing

local–global dynamics. Telling far ‘more than

a ‘‘local’’ story’, the renegotiations ofsubject-

ivityreveal as they alter the social relations of

poweranddifferenceacross scale (Nelson,

2004, pp. 180–2). Pratt and Yeoh (2003)

use topography as a means of examining

transnationalism with greater specificity

and attentiveness to difference. Revealing the

‘multistranded connections transnational sub-

jects make’ as they move acrossspaceand

scale, they develop the notion of ‘comparative

transnationalisms’, and theorize their diverse

but interconnected manifestations on the

ground (Pratt and Yeoh, 2003, p. 164). ck

Suggested reading

Katz (2001); Nagar and Swarr (2005).

topology A field of mathematics studying

the spatial properties of an object or network

that remain true when that object is stretched.

These include connectivity and adjacency.

Imagine stretching a rubber band between

two fingers. Likening the band to avector

line segment, then the start node (the one

end) remains connected to the other despite

the stretching. Treating the band as a polygon,

the one side remains to the left of the other

throughout. Topological encoding is useful in

GIS for error trapping and spatial queries.

networksmay be represented as graphs and

analysed usinggraph theory. rh

Suggested reading

Wise (2002).

topophilia A term coined by geographer

Yi-Fu Tuan (1974, p. 4) to describe the

Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_T Final Proof page 762 31.3.2009 9:40pm Compositor Name: ARaju

TOPOGRAPHY