Symbols and Symbolism

Symbols are important objects of analysis for geographic inquiry. Historically, the study of symbols, symbolism, and symbolization has been a key aspect of cartographic design, particularly in discussions of[Page 474] geographic visualization. Cartographers have long been interested in the use of symbols and their role in representing points and patterns across geographic space. In this context, symbols might be thought of as literal stand-ins for real-world objects. Over time, critical cartographers have challenged this reading of cartographic symbols in their interrogation of maps as cultural and political products. As such, the analysis of symbols has broader theoretical application in human geography, where investigating cultural symbolism is of interest to cultural and social geographers. In this expanding analysis, symbols have been examined as part of geography's interest in symbolic interactionism, a social theoretical tradition that has long been important in anthropology and sociology. Put simply, scholars interested in symbolic interactionism presume that the world of social categories and practices—and the symbols that constitute those categories and practices—is constructed through social (and spatial) interactions among people.

The study of symbols and symbolism in the social sciences (e.g., anthropology, sociology) during the 20th century focused on the investigation of culture and society as symbolic systems constituted through spoken language, exchanges, gestures, writing, photography, and so forth. A cultural symbol, in a naive anthropological sense, is anything that is put in place to represent something else. Complicating this naive definition, it is theorized that through cultural exchange and interaction, symbols are pushed through various interpretive cultural frameworks. Because symbols are part of broader culture systems, it is impossible to disentangle the individual use of a particular symbol from the cultural framework or society in which a person chooses to deploy that symbol. Therefore, methodologically, to comprehend a symbol and symbolism (the representation of the symbol), it is necessary to investigate the sociocultural context in which the symbol has been assigned meaning. In anthropology, these investigations often are qualitative and include ethnography, life history interviews, and participant observation. In these studies, symbols of the economy, political systems, and religion, for example, all are important aspects of symbolism (i.e., sociocultural practice); thus, symbols are thought to play important roles in all aspects of society. Put simply, social scientists interested in symbols and symbolism have theoretically extended how we think about the complex cultural construction and production of these objects and processes.

In concert with anthropology's and sociology's broad concern with representation and representational practices, particularly in the realm of the symbolic, geographers have maintained an interest in critically investigating their own symbols and symbolic processes. Geographers have, for example, critically interrogated cartographic symbols and symbolism. J. B. Harley and others have analyzed the map and its symbols as cultural texts. This view pushes the tradition of analyzing maps away from the emphasis on their mimetic capabilities and accuracy. In so doing, critical cartographers have argued that map symbols do not escape the broader social context in which they have been chosen and that geographers must examine both the position of the mapmaker and the sociocultural and spatial context of the map's use when considering the symbolic meaning of a particular map or map image. The analysis of maps and mapping as cultural products has been extended to other representational systems in geography such as geographic information systems (GIS).

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