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Between The Map And The Territory: Taking The World Apart In The Age Of Un-Discovery, Carla Lacey Fisher Schwartz

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

The map is demonstrative of a basic human impulse, the desire to understand our surroundings and our position within the world. Through the activity of mapmaking, we aspire to comprehend comprehensively, but the very nature of the map allows for only partial understanding. Despite this objective for total knowledge, the blank space of a map is a necessity; in order for a map to be useful it must leave some aspects out. This blank space, along with other blanks in visual representation, is an active silence, and holds meaning in its absence.

While the map attempts to represent a territory, …