Synopses & Reviews
Maps from virtually every culture and periodand#8212;from Babylonian world maps to Saul Steinbergand#8217;s famous
New Yorker cover illustration, and#8220;View of the World from 9th Avenueand#8221;
and#8212;convey our tendency to see our communities as the center of the world (if not the universe) and, by implication, as superior to anything beyond these immediate boundaries. Mapping has long been a tool by which ruling bodies could claim their entitlement to lands and peoples. It is this aspect of cartography that James R. Akerman and a group of distinguished contributors address in
The Imperial Map.Critically reflecting on elements of mapping and imperialism from the late seventeenth century to the early twentieth century, the essays discuss the nature of the imperial map through a series of case studies of empires, from the Qing dynasty of China, to the Portuguese empire in South America, to American imperial pretensions in the Pacific Ocean, among others. Collectively, the essays reveal that the relationship between mapping and imperialism, as well as the practice of political and economic domination of weak polities by stronger ones, is a rich and complex historical theme that continues to resonate in our modern day.
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Review
andquot;The Worldmakersandnbsp;makes a powerful intervention into the early modern literary study of epic poetry and essayistic and philosophical prose; into conceptions of and#39;worldand#39; within those genres as well as in the Western history of ideas; into conceptions of modernity governing Western science, philosophy, literature, and ethics; and, not least, into the postcolonial project of decentering European culture through a globalized view of the world. Among recent books on these topics, it joins the fine company of such works as Roland Greeneand#39;s Five Wordsandnbsp;and Timothy Hamptonand#39;s Fictions of Embassy.andnbsp;Ramachandran approaches the task from her own distinctive perspective, based in fine-grained literary analysis with a firm grasp of cultural and intellectual history and the theoretical consequences that follow from juxtaposing texts against the history.andquot;
Review
andquot;The Worldmakers is an impressive, wide-ranging, beautifully researched book with a skillfully articulated argument about a momentous shift in and#39;global imaginingsand#39; in early modern thought and literature. The topic is one that could easily become vague and elusive, but Ramachandran succeeds time and time again in giving it clear focus and definition. In the process, she also makes genuinely fresh, compelling critical statements about some major, much-studied texts and authors.andquot;
Synopsis
Maps from virtually every culture and period--from Babylonian world maps to Saul Steinberg's famous New Yorker cover illustration, "View of the World from 9th Avenue"--convey our tendency to see our communities as the center of the world (if not the universe) and, by implication, as superior to anything beyond these immediate boundaries. Mapping has long been a tool by which ruling bodies could claim their entitlement to lands and peoples. It is this aspect of cartography that James R. Akerman and a group of distinguished contributors address in The Imperial Map.
Critically reflecting on elements of mapping and imperialism from the late seventeenth century to the early twentieth century, the essays discuss the nature of the imperial map through a series of case studies of empires, from the Qing dynasty of China, to the Portuguese empire in South America, to American imperial pretensions in the Pacific Ocean, among others. Collectively, the essays reveal that the relationship between mapping and imperialism, as well as the practice of political and economic domination of weak polities by stronger ones, is a rich and complex historical theme that continues to resonate in our modern day.
Synopsis
Ayesha Ramachandran tells a new story about a familiar phenomenon: how and#147;the worldand#8221; as a cultural key word was reimagined in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Before and#147;the worldand#8221; in its totality as seen from the Moon became an undisputed fact, how did European philosophers, scientists, mapmakers, and writers imagine an all-encompassing global vision in the wake of their encounter with the New World. and#147;The Worldmakersand#8221; moves beyond histories of globalization to explore how and#147;the worldand#8221; itselfand#151;variously understood as an object of inquiry, a comprehensive category, and a system of orderand#151;was self-consciously shaped by human makers through rhetoric, aesthetics, and#147;poiesis,and#8221; and the speculative imagination. Gathering a diverse cast of characters, from Dutch cartographers and French philosophers to and Portuguese and English poets, Ramachandran describes a literary and visual history of and#147;firstsand#8221;: the first world atlas, the first modern essay, the first global epic, and the first modern attempt to develop a systematic natural philosophyand#151;all this in an effort by early modern thinkers to capture and#147;the worldand#8221; on the page. It will be read eagerly by students of comparative early modern European literature, history and philosophy of science, and cartographic and intellectual history.
Synopsis
In this beautifully conceived book, Ayesha Ramachandran reconstructs the imaginative struggles of early modern artists, philosophers, and writers to make sense of something that we take for granted: the world, imagined as a whole. Once a new, exciting, and frightening concept, andldquo;the worldandrdquo; was transformed in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But how could one envision something that no one had ever seen in its totality?
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The Worldmakers moves beyond histories of globalization to explore how andldquo;the worldandrdquo; itselfandmdash;variously understood as an object of inquiry, a comprehensive category, and a system of orderandmdash;was self-consciously shaped by human agents. Gathering an international cast of characters, from Dutch cartographers and French philosophers to Portuguese and English poets, Ramachandran describes a history of firsts: the first world atlas, the first global epic, the first modern attempt to develop a systematic natural philosophyandmdash;all part of an effort by early modern thinkers to capture andldquo;the worldandrdquo; on the page.
About the Author
James R. Akerman is director of the Newberry Libraryand#8217;s Hermon Dunlap Smith Center for the History of Cartography and editor of Cartographies of Travel and Navigation and coeditor of Maps: Finding Our Place in the World, both published by the University of Chicago Press.
Table of Contents
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
INTRODUCTION
JAMES R. AKERMAN
CHAPTER ONE
The Irony of Imperial Mapping
MATTHEWand#160;H.and#160;EDNEY
CHAPTER TWO
and#8220;Exalted and Glorified to the Ends of the Earthand#8221;: Imperial Maps and Christian Spaces in Seventeenth- and Early Eighteenth-Century Russian Siberia
VALERIEand#160;A.and#160;KIVELSON
CHAPTER THREE
Contending Cartographic Claims? The Qing Empire in Manchu, Chinese, and European Maps
LAURAand#160;HOSTETLER
CHAPTER FOUR
The Confines of the Colony: Boundaries, Ethnographic Landscapes, and Imperial Cartography in Iberoamerica
NEILand#160;SAFIER
CHAPTER FIVE
Hydrographic Discipline among the Navigators: Charting an and#8220;Empire of Science and Commerceand#8221; in the Nineteenth-Century Pacific
D.and#160;GRAHAMand#160;BURNETT
CHAPTER SIX
The Cartography of the Fourth Estate: Mapping the New Imperialism in British and French Newspapers, 1875and#8211;1925
MICHAELand#160;HEFFERNAN
Notes
Contributors
Index