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Topic outline

 

  • Time: 8 hours
    Level: Introductory

 
 

Introduction

  • Introduction Resource
  • This unit looks at the prevalence of maps in everyday life, their uses and their importance. From mental maps to public transport and street maps it moves on to historical and history-making maps. Along...
 

1 Reading maps

  • 1.1 What makes a map? Resource
  • During 1999 The Millennium Mapping company launched a project that planned to change the way we looked at and record the UK. The intention was to take imagery of the entire country thus producing an immediate...
 

2 Maps as everyday experience

  • 2.1 How do we use maps? Resource
  • Reading about maps, I have been struck by the number of times that the idea of ‘maps as part of our everyday experience’ has been mentioned. In fact, I was thinking about it recently, when I was preparing...
  • 2.2 Mental maps Resource
  • One of the maps mentioned in the description of my journey to London is the idea of the ‘mental map’. This concerns the notion that we all carry maps in our heads. When asked for directions to a place,...
 

3 Maps as knowledge

  • 3.1 Maps as history Resource
  • Maps represent knowledge of the time and space within which they are compiled and produced. In this way they form part of the historic record. An old map is a picture, albeit selective, of the past and...
  • 3.2 Maps and the circuit of knowledge Resource
  • The circuit of knowledge starts with a question or questions. For example, look at Figure 1 and Map 3, A and B. Figure 1 shows how the circuit of knowledge can be used to investigate a question, using...
  • 3.3 Maps and the modern world Resource
  • Maps play a fundamental role in the functioning of modern Western societies. They are important as legal documents in both the public and private spheres: your proof of the boundaries of your property...
 

4 Reading maps

 

References and Acknowledgements

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