Back when I was a graduate student with heaps of time to spare, I developed this fondness with cartography, and collecting guide maps as souvenirs has been my favorite hobby ever since I decided to be a wandering learner. But seriously for friends who know me very well, they always think I am doing it for a different reason, a philosophical reason. It all started with Foucault, right after reading his discourse regarding the Question of Geography. Hence I encourage everyone to read this piece and you will never take maps as they appear on the surface but as a complex interaction of spatiality, power, and knowledge. But I will not dwell much on an esoteric discussion for this blog.
Interactive maps nowadays are almost ubiquitous that they have become a life essential, at least for a city dweller. Living in Boston as a Fellow, maps to me have many uses – as a tool to navigate the old, narrow streets of this city that seem to show no pattern and as a useful strategic decision making tools for my fledgling public health practice. I map my life every day.
For all of their uses in the past, maps can be interpreted as a brutal reminder of colonization. In one library exhibit I visited, maps are indispensable instruments for navigating the then unknown world by great voyagers during the Age of European Discovery– Captain James Cook, Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan, and among others. Old maps would later indicate a demarcation of imperial powers as the rising Spanish, Portuguese, and English empires have raced against each other in possessing vast lands to exploit. The discovery of the New World, maybe a celebration for the Kings and Queens but a painful history for the indigenous peoples as territorial maps were contrived for military takeover and control.
But in public health, we see maps differently. And indeed spatiality becomes an integral part of power creating our health knowledge. Early the public health profession was somewhat born in that same mold but with different results. Mapping cholera outbreak in the 18th century gave birth to epidemiology and became a very important public health practice as we are seeing it today. Here in the US, we use maps to identify our health issues and set our priorities for health intervention. The unique role of public health departments in translating their legal mandates to create progressive, evidence-based programs and equity-oriented policies has been very effective in realizing the optimal benefits of health equity to newer heights. The combined skills in epidemiology, public health policy, and community organizing are powerful analytical tools in making sense of the maps for all the neighborhoods we strive to promote, preserve, and protect. In turn, maps are helpful, strategic decision making tools for policymakers in stepping up well-informed public health investments. In their more practical uses, health activists are redrawing maps to engage a wide number of residents in active lifestyle through technology enabled jogging trails, cycling paths, and wellness trail.
So the next time you see those maps, try to drift away from the conventional utilitarian thinking but reflect more on how some people have led us to directions that are mirror reflections of power-transformed-to-knowledge. A bit confusing but worth trying.