The Dictionary of Human Geography

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and Gregory elaborated these claims for geo-

graphy. In the place of a single privileged scien-

tific method, Gregory outlined a plurality of

scientific epistemologies, each one determined

by the specific knowledge-constitutive interests

that give rise to them (he identified three:

technical, interpretative and emancipatory).

Corresponding to each knowledge-constitutive

interest was a particular form of science: empir-

ical,hermeneuticand critical (seecritical

theory). Since then, it has become common-

place to treat geographical enquiry, like all

forms of intellectual enquiry, as an irredeem-

ably social practice, although this has been

understood in ways that often differ signifi-

cantly from Habermas’ original theses, and the

rise of acritical human geographyhas been

accompanied by a series of searching enquiries

into the effects produced throughrepresenta-

tionand other modes of apprehending the

world (seenon-representational theory).jpi

cartogram A customized map projection

that adjusts area or distance to reveal patterns

not apparent on a conventional base map.

For area cartograms this adjustment might be

specific, as when the areas of countries or

provinces are made proportional to their

populations (Dorling, 1993), or expedient, as

when small places such as Luxembourg or

Rhode Island are rendered sufficiently large

so that their symbols on achoroplethmap

are readily visible. Similarly, distance cartograms

might adjust distances to reflect transport

costrelative to a particular place (Monmonier,

1993, pp. 198–200) or rearrange transport

routes to promote clarity, as on the widely

imitated London Underground map. mm

Suggested reading

Gastner and Newman (2004).

cartographic reason The belief that carto-

graphic and geographical representations

are direct representations of an external and

independent world or, as the philosopher

Richard Rorty (1979) put it more generally,

they are the ‘mirror of nature’ (see alsocartes-

ianism;objectivity). In this view, the task of

cartographyandgeographyis to represent

the external world faithfully, and the criterion

for success and hence ‘truth’ is the degree

to which this correspondence is achieved.

This view ofrepresentationdepends upon

a cartographic theory of correspondence in

which, to take themetaphorat its most literal,

information about the world is accurately

transmitted (primary sense data) through a

medium (the map) to a receiver (the map

reader) (for a critical reading, see Pickles,

1992). The accuracy of the transmission of

the information from the real world to the

reader is a measure of the accuracy and hence

effectiveness of the mapping process. This

representational notion ofsciencepresumed

that the world was external and independent

of the observer and that the nominally scientific

observer could describe the world in ways that

corresponded directly to the reality of

the world. Such foundational and objectivist

epistemologies have variously been referred

to as observer epistemologies or, in an acknow-

ledgement of the effects that they produce, the

‘god-trick’ (Haraway, 1991d) and the ‘Cartesian

Anxiety’ (Bernstein, 1983). It was this latter

term that Gregory (1994) adapted as the carto-

graphic anxiety to characterize a particular mode

ofgeographical imagination.

Some commentators have associated such

critiques of cartographic reason with the

influence ofpostmodernismonhuman geog-

raphy, but some of the most telling interven-

tions have been inspired bymodernismand its

sustained interrogation of representational

practices. Thus for Olsson (2007, p. 4), the

thought of such atabula rasa, a pristine ‘world’

uncontaminated by the act of knowing, is

literally unimaginable, and theories of human

knowledgethatpresumesuchabeginningpoint

or possibility are deeply flawed. Instead, for

Olsson, the drawing and interpreting of a line

is the cartographic act exemplified. It is always

an act that creates meaning; every drawing of a

line is the creation of a distinction, the delimit-

ing of an identity, and the creation of abound-

ary. As Pickles (2004) shows, by inscribing

lines, creating distinctions, and drawing bor-

ders, cartography and, by extension, geo-

graphy, can be seen as a part of a diverse array

of cultural practices and politics that are con-

stantly producing and reproducing worlds (see

also Farinelli, Olsson and Reichert, 1994). jpi

cartography (1) The design and production

ofmapsby individuals or organizations; (2) the

scientificstudyofthetechnologyofmapmaking

and the effectiveness of maps as communica-

tion devices; and (3) the scholarly examination

of the societal role and impact of maps. The

term’s association with mapmaking reflects lex-

ical roots incarte(French for map) andgraphie

(Greek for writing). Although mapmaking is an

ancient art,cartographyis a nineteenth-century

word, introduced in 1839 by Portuguese

Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_C Final Proof page 66 31.3.2009 9:45pm

CARTOGRAM