Mapping a New Kind of European Boundary: The Language Border between Modern France and Germany

ABSTRACT

During the nineteenth century, Europeans became fascinated with the idea of locating and mapping the borders between their languages. The barrier of language offered a new way of seeing, dividing and organizing European land according to cultural differences. The cartographic techniques that Europeans invented to map their language borders involved a combination of linguistic surveys, on-site observations and collaboration with locals. Once printed, language maps found a broad public audience and helped to structure debates over cultural identity in European borderlands. This article explores the nationalist and regionalist motivations behind linguistic map making along the French-German border, one of the most disputed in modern European history.     

Shared places,unshared identities: vernacular discourses and spatialised constructions of identity in the linguistic landscape of Trieste

Language as it appears in the public space is at the centre of investigations into linguistic landscapes. Language agents immersed in a given geo-historical context contribute to the construction of spatialised meaning and to the transformation of space into place. The visibility of a language in a linguistic landscape does not just index a reality, i.e. the use of one or more languages within a community, but contributes to the symbolic construction of a given space. The current study aims to investigate the peculiarities of place-making and -marking of the Slovenian-speaking community in the area of Trieste via an analysis of written signs displaying the minority language. The paper will show that the tension resulting from achieved equality in the legal status of Slovenian and the perception of unequal power relations between different ethnic groups is reproduced in the construction of the local linguistic landscape. The final part of the discussion will suggest that public use of the Slovenian language is central to the performance of a material border.     

The Atlas of the Languages of Iran (ALI): A Research Overview

There have been a number of important efforts to map out the languages of Iran, but until now no language atlas, or even a comprehensive and detailed country-level language map, has been produced. One of the recent initiatives which aims to fill this gap is the online Atlas of the Languages of Iran (ALI) (http://iranatlas.net). This article delineates objectives of the ALI research programme, atlas architecture, research methodology, and preliminary results that have been generated. Specific topics of interest are the structure and content of the linguistic data questionnaire; the handling of contrasting perspectives about the status of “languages” and “dialects” through a flexible multi-dimensional classification web; and the role of ongoing comparisons between language distribution assessments and hard linguistic data.     

Riding Routes and Itinerant Borders: Autonomy of Migration and Border Externalization

Despite technological upgrading of borders at the edges of Europe, “Fortress Europe” continues to fail as an effective means of controlling irregular migration. As a consequence, European states are restructuring their border regimes by externalizing migration management to non‐EU countries beyond the border and creating new programs and policies to do so. Autonomy of Migration (AoM) offers a distinct way for thinking about border control mechanisms and goals of managing mobility. AoM does not read this off‐shoring of borders through the lens of centralized and coordinated state powers, but develops an autonomous gaze that supplements these institutional readings of apparatuses of capture with a view that takes as its starting point the ways in which border architectures, institutions, and policies interact with and react to the turbulence of migrant mobilities. By engaging current EU externalization policies, this paper illustrates the shifting relationship between border control and mobility.     

Women's Work and Market Hierarchies Along the Border of Lao PDR

Contrary to claims by some neo‐liberalists that international borders are becoming irrelevant, market liberalisation can actually enhance the effect that borders have on the lives of the people living along them. This study examines how the opening of border trade between Laos and Thailand has influenced gender divisions of labour, and definition of women's work along the border zone. Studies were undertaken in two border areas in Lao PDR—Sayaboury province and Kammoune province. In the former, cotton‐weaving activities were studied and in the latter, sticky rice box production. The production and trading of these commodities brought crucial cash income to the women studied and their households. How the women benefited from these activities in terms of income and status depends on how other members of the family perceived these activities. However, the formalisation of the border trade has changed women's ‘sense of space’ and their relations with men and other women.     

Author and Reader Perceptions of the Literary Map

There is a continuing need in cartographic communication for reserarch directed toward better understanding of the perceptual properties of maps, particularly as they interrelate between map author and map reader (percipient). This research explores that area by examining the perceptions of authors of maps utilized in science fiction and fantasy, and readers who encounter these maps in the literature.

The first phase of the research demonstrates that authors generally have a positive attitude toward the literary map and view them as critical to the formulation of a story and important to proper understanding of the narrative. By contrast, readers tested in the second part of the study view literary maps as superfluous and in general have a negative attitude toward them.

The literary maps employed in this research fail to communicate effectively with the reader. Poor cartographic communication and the negative attitude of readers toward the literary map is explained in terms of functional illiteracy.     

Embodiment,linguistics, space: American Sign Language meets geography

ABSTRACT

The relational turn in geography has led to an understanding of space and place as actively produced agents in people’s everyday lives. Geographers have also long recognized the importance of language in understanding the social and relational nature of space. The study of American Sign Language (ASL) presents a unique opportunity to examine how language use and language creation influence the production of linguistic space. For users of ASL, space is incredibly significant. Because of the visual and spatial nature of ASL, the space surrounding a signer’s body is important not only for the signer to communicate, but also for others involved in the conversation to participate. Environments created during conversations in ASL reflect the cultural and linguistic perception of the American Deaf community. By taking a critical perspective on the production of space, it will be shown that those who use ASL, through the medium of bodily performance, create linguistic, and communication spaces that are dynamic and visual. The embodied language of ASL and the Deaf community is a perspective geographers have yet to address.     

Reviving Unfamiliarity—The Case of Public Resistance to the Establishment of the Danish–German Euroregion

In common sense perceptions of lay people, borders are perceived as essentialist, as things that demarcate inhabitants in one state from those in another, but being defined as state borders is too narrow a perspective on the spatial divisions of people. In sociological theory, borders are considered as social constructions. Borders are socially constructed; however, the kinds of constructions take on different forms. State borders―or political borders―initiate and work in a complex set of relations with other types of borders such as cultural, linguistic and economical. Whilst borders in political theory are considered the outcome of institutional processes, often as a consequence of political power struggles, for example, wars, borders are addressed differently in other theoretical approaches. A dominant paradigm in border studies perceives borders as social constructions created through both institutional practices and everyday social interaction. The social construction of borders takes place in the specific daily life interaction among people. The article focuses on two central concepts in its analytical strategy. First, the concept of unfamiliarity is introduced as a concept that addresses the mental categorizations that are created in interactions across borders. Second, the concept of “borderwork” by Rumford is introduced as an analytic tool in order to identify processes of border constructions in individuals’ daily interaction. The main aim of the article is to establish the relationship between borderwork and unfamiliarity. The analytical frame has been adapted to the specific case of introducing a Euroregion in the Danish–German border region, and it is demonstrated how interplay between unfamiliarity and borderwork may contribute to explain the resistance towards formal cross-border interaction. Furthermore, the case analysis draws attention towards the subtle mechanisms that contribute to maintaining borders as barriers in a formally debordered Europe.     

Geographic patterns of Zhuang (Tai) kinship terms in Guangxi and border areas: a GIS analysis of language and culture change

Historically-speaking, centuries of interactions between Han Chinese newcomers from the north of China and indigenous Tai-speaking ethnic minorities in the south have left deep, indelible traces in the language and culture of the latter and raise questions of identity and language policy in modern times. The language and culture in this study is Zhuang, one of many Tai languages and the largest minority language in China today. Using kinship terms as an example, we employ the analytical tools of Geographic Information System (GIS) to map and analyze the spatial pattern of sinification of kinship terms and attempt to explain the process of cultural and linguistic interaction that may have led to such distribution in the Zhuang domain. We use published data on Zhuang kinship terms from thiry-four representative locations in Guangxi and border areas (four in eastern Yunnan and one in western Guangdong) and semi-quantify them according to their pronunciations: three for Han-like pronunciations, one for more clearly Zhuang, and two for linguistic forms in between. The spatial pattern of kinship term sinification scores based on interpolation of the sampling locations shows that high degrees of sinification are located in areas close to the coast or international border with Vietnam, with gentle land slope and close proximity to major transportation hubs, reflecting the importance of both physical features and economic development in those areas in facilitating interactions between the two cultures in the sinification process. The degree of sinification of kinship terms also varies with their positions in a family kinship tree, perhaps reflecting Han social customs and male dominance in society more than traditional Tai kinship systems, which are generally more bilateral in nature.     

Language,geography and identity: The case of the Welsh in London

This paper explores the role of language in the construction of Welsh identities in London. It begins by mapping out some key theoretical connections between language, geography and identity, and argues that a reading of diaspora theory might be helpful in conceptualizing Welsh identities in the British capital. In particular, diaspora theory stresses that identities are made up of multiple social axes that need to be seen relationally. Diasporic identities make connections with more than one place challenging the notion of culture and language as delimited by the boundaries of particular national spaces. For many Welsh people in London, language is an important part of their attempts to meet others who share a common identity. London-Welsh societies facilitate this need, defining language in different ways, and interweaving the linguistic with other social axes to form powerful senses of belonging. Whilst London is a key migration destination, it is also a space of Welsh identities that draw centrally upon language, but make different geographical connections with Wales. The paper concludes by arguing that a diasporic reading of such processes allows a wider and more progressive understanding of the Welsh language, and highlights the importance of geography in doing so.     

Johannes Janssonius’s Map of Dalmatia and the Ottoman–Venetian Borderland (1650)

The paper presents a comparative analysis of the map of Dalmatia by Johannes Janssonius and maps by his contemporaries. Janssonius’s cartographical models and the sources of the printed text accompanying his map are identified. The roles of Croatian cartographers and Venetian and Ottoman reports dealing with the border are uncovered. The importance of Janssonius’s map in disseminating knowledge about the little-known geography and history of Dalmatia, and the ways in which the map influenced perception of that country in the Ottoman Empire borderlands in general, are assessed.     

基于旅华美国游客手绘认知地图的中国旅游目的地意象研究

手绘认知地图是典型的非结构化的研究方法,以旅游为主题的手绘认知地图能够深入的探索旅游者对目的地人、地方或事物所持有的意象,尤其在跨文化的研究中独具意义.本研究通过客流跟踪的调研方式,获得了我国八个主要入境旅游城市美国团队游客的手绘认知地图。在此资料基础上从空间认知元素和空间认知结构两方面对跨文化旅游者目的地意象进行了分析,并讨论了其相对于居民城市意象的共性和个性。最后,发现跨文化旅游者目的地意象认知元素因旅游主题性而超越了城市的一般物质形态,空间认知符号化特征显著,并且呈现出明显的尺度差异。     

城市语言景观研究进展及展望

语言景观是城市景观的重要组成部分,同时也是重要的人文地理表征。新世纪以来语言景观日益引起语言学家和地理学家的关注和重视。1997年西方社会语言学家首先提出了语言景观(linguistic landscape)定义,21世纪以来涌现出大量城市语言景观研究成果;国内语言景观主要集中在城镇书法景观的地理学研究,主要包括书法景观与城镇景观的关系、书法景观的空间属性、书法景观的人地关系等。论文从三个方面对城市语言景观进行了评述。最后从语言地理学视角,对未来城市语言景观重要研究内容进行了展望,认为城市语言景观将可能成为语言地理学深入研究的有效途径和新方向,尤其是在城市象征空间塑造及其地方建构中语言景观研究将大有作为。     

Chronicle for 1993

Abstract

Theory is not a goal in itself but a means of enriching the history of cartography by stimulating new research questions and objectives. In this paper the concept of ‘transparent maps’ (carriers of an image of the external reality of the world) and ‘opaque maps’ is introduced. The notion is approached structurally (standards of graphical representation, drawing, geometry, text); through the sociology of the map (map makers, institutions, the public); and through seeing maps in their cultural and historical context (an approach which raises issues of the definitional boundaries of the history of cartography and which is arguably one of the most stimulating perspectives today as fostered by, in particular, contributors to the History of Cartography). Finally, attention is drawn to three important topics for the research agenda: the links between maps and culture; maps as a language of communication and as instruments of power; and the links between perception, logic and mnemonics.     

The representation of non-Irish immigrants in recent Irish films

This paper examines the representation of ethnic and racial minorities in Celtic Tiger and post-Celtic Tiger films such as Adam and Paul (2004), Pavee Lackeen (2005), Once (2006), The Front Line (2007), and New Boy (2007). Key areas of analysis include: how is immigration represented on screen? Whose character's point of view predominates? How much space do these ethnic minorities occupy in the shot? In order to answer these research questions, I draw on a plurality of theoretical paradigms currently employed in film theory, mainly narrative theory, critical race theory and feminist theory. As I show, the differences between these films are paramount and will inform the different ways in which recent Irish cinema represents racial and ethnic Otherness. In some films, immigrants appear mainly as decorative props and they largely function as cinematic elements which emphasise the marginalisation of other “inner” Irish outsiders, particularly drug addicts and Travellers. By contrast, other films make serious attempts to see “into” or “through” immigrant characters by fictionalising not only the point of view of natives but also of newcomers themselves.     

Can Lost Maps Speak? Toward a Cultural History of Map Reading in Medieval China

Despite the fact that virtually no Chinese maps have survived from the first millennium, it is nonetheless possible to reconstruct a rich context associated with their production, use and perception from a variety of written sources. Three cases from the Tang dynasty (618–907 ce) are presented in this article in which the characteristics of the missing maps emerge through their associated texts, which have outlasted them. These examples include two documents that once accompanied maps presented to the emperor and an anecdote that refers to a map of the remote southern frontier. They demonstrate that the maps were designed not only to encapsulate imperial territory but also to serve as guideposts for aspirational travel. They were also perceived by their users as invitations to experiences both desirable and undesirable.     

民族语言现状与非物质文化遗产的抢救——以青海土族语蒙古语为例

本文仅就青海土族语言和蒙古族语言的现状进行初步分析,提出了民族语言是记录民族文化的符号系统,抢救民族非物质文化遗产,必须首先抢救濒危的民族语言的观点。     

Economic geography under postcolonial scrutiny

Because the economy is not found as an empirical object among other worldly things, in order for it to be 'seen' by the human perceptual apparatus it has to undergo a process, crucial for science, of representational mapping. This is doubling, but with a difference; the map shifts the point of view so that viewers can see the whole as if from the outside, in a way that allows them, from a specific position inside, to find their bearings. ( Buck-Morss 1995 , 440)     

Going beyond the grid: literary mapping as creative reading

Drawing from the importance of narrative inquiry in contemporary geographical reasoning and teaching, this paper focuses on some practices set around the relationship between maps and literature. Reader-generated maps, maps produced starting from the reading of a literary text, are at the core of a reflection on the potentialities of literary mapping in higher education; relating maps and literature in an educational environment, I suggest creative reading and creative mapping as co-constructive practices that are able to guide students in addressing and internalising the complexity of spatial categories. Reflecting on the students’ literary mappings, I focus on the various ways that the literary map contributes to mobilising the space of the text, guiding students in approaching spatial issues from a different (and creative) perspective. Time, point of view and literary trans-scalarity are the key narrative concepts that guide and inform possible inductive ruminations on literary mapping as a learning strategy. Following the core question of “what literary mapping might be and do in the digital age”, I aim to resituate contemporary discussions on literary mapping in an educational environment.