Catalog Description: From mapping protests to the polar ice caps, colonialism to crises, board games to the baroque, this course offers an introduction to critical cartography and the politics of maps. Broadly centered on the contemporary carto-politics of the Pacific, each lecture focuses on a different field of mapping - such as protest mapping, ocean mapping or star mapping - comparing the techniques and conceptual underpinnings of cartography as a representational tool. It explores the way in which maps continue to reflect and shape our worlds, how they are used as tools for both description and argumentation across arts, science, engineering and the humanities.
Units: 4.0
Prerequisites: None
Formats:
Fall and/or Spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of lecture and 2 hours of discussion per week
Grading Basis: Letter
Final Exam Status: Final exam required