Rethinking the Power of Maps
Denis Wood takes a fresh look at what maps do, whose interests they serve, and how they can be used in surprising, creative, and radical ways.
Denis Wood takes a fresh look at what maps do, whose interests they serve, and how they can be used in surprising, creative, and radical ways.
Denis Wood shows how maps are not impartial reference objects, but rather instruments of communication, persuasion, and power.
Beginning in the pre-modern world, the Volga and Mississippi Rivers both served as critical trade routes connecting cultures in an extensive exchange network, while also sustaining populations through their surrounding wetlands and bottomlands. In modern times, “Mother Volga” and the “Father of Waters” became integral parts of national identity, contributing to a sense of Russian and American exceptionalism. Rivers, Memory, and Nation-Building discusses their histories, through which we derive a more nuanced view of human interaction with the environment, which adds another lens to our understanding of the past.
Driving Germany is an in-depth exploration of the relationship between environmental and trafiic history in Germany, set against the political and ideological background of National Socialism.
The Upper Guinea Coast in Global Perspective takes an anthropological approach to Africa’s Upper Guinea Coast. It portrays a historically globalized region which has adapated creatively to major transformations and still remains a major actor within global networks.