CULTURED SYMBOLS / THOUGHTS ON THE CULTURAL CONTEXT OF CARTOGRAPHIC SYMBOLS

The history of cartography is so deeply embedded in ordinary map-readers by the process of development and socialization that it is simplistic to approach symbols as little more than perceptual mechanisms. Even the symbols used by three-year olds, at least with respect to hillsigns, are less perceptual than cultural products, though the embedding of the one in the other (because of the embedding of the processes of discovery, or adult development, in the processes of transmission and education) ensures that they finally represent an organic fusion of both. In mastering increasingly abstract cartographic symbols, the maturing individual masters his entire culture history, elaborated in response to both social expediency and the structure of discovery (development). In creating successful new symbols, the generative cartographer will necessarily follow a similar path. Le developpement et la socialisation de l'individu font qu'il prend pour acquis les symboles cartographiques et les considere tout au plus de...