Scribner Seminar, London FYE 2024
The World Through Maps (London Edition)
Jordana Dym
Professor of History
Many people think of maps as mirrors of the world 鈥� objective or neutral reflections of the spaces and themes they show. Yet most historical and contemporary maps are agents of knowledge and power; they reveal a lot about the peoples, spaces, and times they portray as they influence the societies that create and consume them. In this class we will learn to read historical and contemporary maps for more than geographical information and consider the way that maps and mapping shape our understanding of the world. Drawing on methods used in history, art history, literary studies, and geography, we will consider map production, circulation in case studies that focus on Britain at home and overseas. Topics will include mapmaking and use in imperial encounters, how non-Western peoples resisted colonialism, and whether there can be a 鈥渃artographic ethic鈥� in maps that show subjects as varied as zoos and city streets, international conflicts, geological formations, and the spread of disease.
As we visit public and private map collections in London, there will be opportunities to think about how we engage with maps that are made for and by kings, generals, pilgrims, tourists and children; maps that are sketched on paper, inked on vellum, woven into tapestry, molded in clay, flashed across computer or movie screens, and created on foot as we navigate city streets. Student-created and -led guide walking and/or virtual tours will wrap up the course, demonstrating how historical maps helps us navigate and understand today鈥檚 London cityscape.
Jordana Dym is a Professor of History and Chair of the International Society for the History
of the Map (ISHMap, 2019-2023) and editor of the map history journal, Imago Mundi
(2022-). Her research and teaching interests include Latin America, the history
of cartography, book history and public history. Recent courses have focused on the
history of travel and travel writing, war and peace, maps, and archival storytelling.
She enjoys building international connections for and with students and has led 吃瓜爆料
programs in France, Mexico, Cuba, Guatemala and Puerto Rico. She twice directed 吃瓜爆料's
Latin American, Caribbean and Latinx Studies minor program, and was the inaugural
director of the John B. Moore Documentary Studies Collaborative (MDOCS) (2014-2018).