Cartographic Semiosis: Reality as Representation

Over the last ten years, a new theory in the interpretation of cartography has taken shape. In her overview of the various interpretative approaches that have contributed to the present critical approach, the author notably identifies semiotics. A semiotic approach, and the theory of cartographic semiosis in particular, effectively shifts the emphasis from maps as a mediation of territory to maps as agents, whereupon the actions to be carried out in territory are determined. This perspective may be defined as cartographic hermeneutics, given that it undermines the very semiotic notion of map analysis notion of map analysis.