The article by Smith and Mark gives an overview of ontologies, and then explores how geography is defined by non-geographers. For me, this article (and the other by Sinha et al) brought up questions of the expert/non-expert dynamic. Particularly, one sentence was especially interesting to me: “Geographers, it seems, are not studying geographical things as such things are conceptualized by naïve subjects. Rather, they are studying the domain of what can be portrayed on maps.” This definitely ties into our discussions in class: geography doesn’t always have to be about maps and lat/long coordinates. How can we make more new and interesting ways to present geographical information? I would say that this is where GIScience enters the picture: as geography shifts from being cartographical, GIS provides a way to interpret and present geographic information that doesn’t necessarily need to be a map. However, clearly the non-expert, non-geographer hasn’t seen this shift yet, and still thinks of geography as just maps.
These thoughts are interesting for me to reflect on as I work on my own project, emotional mapping. From the perspective of the non-geographer, most people would not think to portray them on a map, therefore not making them geographical. The authors point out that geographical objects are not only located in space, but are usually part of the Earth’s surface. So, since it is difficult to argue that they are part of the Earth’s surface, can emotions be mapped? Are they geographical? I’m not sure of the answer yet. For now, I would suggest that they are dynamic features on the landscape of the Earth, which each person experiences differently.
-denasaur