Perceptual geography
The geography of perception or perception geography is a sub-discipline of geography . She examines how people perceive geographic spaces . It sees itself as part of human geography , but also of perceptual psychology . The geography of perception assumes that people perceive spaces very subjectively and individually very differently.
introduction
Martha Muchow can be regarded as a pioneer in perceptual geography . Kevin Lynch , an architect and urban planner, began studying the perceptual behavior of city dwellers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the mid- 1950s , suspecting connections between human perception and the type and quality of architecture . He found out through empirical studies that people create a kind of mental image of their environment, which is also known as a cognitive map .
Cognitive maps are characterized by the fact that they
- are distorted in relation to the space they depict,
- Show simplifications compared to reality,
- are group-specific and
- are composed of a small group of basic elements that have different meanings for the structure of the city in different cities.
These cognitive maps primarily have functions related to spatial orientation and order. The type of subjective creation of this mental representation of space from the processing of actually uniform ( objective ) sensory impressions can only be grasped indirectly. Stegmann states that the processing of stimuli and thus the development of individual perceptions are influenced by prior subjective knowledge, sociodemographic determinants and individual psychological constants. As a method of investigation, Lynch used memory logs and , above all, map sketches that the test subjects represented from memory. Since the cognitive maps have a distinct application relevance, they quickly found further use in other spatial scientific disciplines .
The five basic elements
ways
For most people, paths are the predominant elements in a room (for example in a city). The residents move regularly, occasionally or randomly through paths (streets, alleys, sidewalks, public transport routes, ...). They perceive rooms as a collection of design elements that are arranged along these paths . The width of a path is particularly important for perception, but the function as a borderline also increases its importance.
Boundary lines
Boundary lines or edges are linear urban elements that are not (or not only) used or evaluated by the observer as paths. They separate different areas, are the limits of the context. In addition to a separating aspect, such as the border between areas with different densities, these edges also have connecting functions, which join two areas as hems / seams or relate them. Although edges do not play as important a role as the paths for the observer, they are an important structuring element especially where areas / regions are summarized by such boundary lines. The importance of boundary lines is judged on the strength of the difference between the separate areas and their continuity. Often border lines coincide with traffic routes, especially roads and railway lines.
Areas
Areas are medium-sized to large areas of a city that are depicted two-dimensionally in the imaginary world. They are perceived as areas to go in and out of . Each of these areas has an individual character in the imagination, which is defined from a set of characteristics. As a rule, the areas must always be identified from the inside, while from the outside they only play a role as a design / orientation element if they can be recognized by characteristic elements (e.g. high-rise buildings in a high-rise complex). The set of features that define an area is characterized by thematic continuity. Design elements can be:
- Outlines,
- To form,
- Details,
- Symbols,
- Building types,
- Types of use,
- Population,
- Traffic,
- Building condition,
- Topography, etc.
The uniformity of facades in terms of material, eaves height, state of preservation and the image of the residents, as far as this is recognizable in the street scene, makes a significant contribution to identifying areas.
Foci
Focal points are the central points of a city. Often they are the target or starting point of a movement in urban space. They are accessible to the observer and are often defined by the meeting of several streets (intersections, roundabouts) or by the concentrated meeting of a large number of features in a relatively small space.
The focal point - also perceived as the location of travel / movement interruptions - is viewed as important by the observer because it is at this point that he has to make decisions . The environment of such conscious decision points is usually perceived particularly clearly, so that respondents usually equate reaching an area with passing a focal point. Typical focal points can therefore be, for example, certain subway stations (transfer stations or stations that correspond to specially designed areas on the surface).
Landmarks or landmarks
Memories or landmarks act as visual reference points. They are often identical to particularly conspicuous structures (e.g. towers) or landscape elements. Characteristically, observers who are more familiar with a city use a whole network of reference points for orientation. The marks have the character of something unique, special that breaks the continuity of the environment . Important characteristics that a high proportion of respondents in a city unanimously named,
- usually have a simple and clear shape (e.g. Eiffel Tower, Victory Column, Brandenburg Gate, TV Tower),
- can also be recognized from a distance and
- show a clear contrast to the surroundings.
The spatial protrusion of a mark can be caused on the one hand by differences in size, which also controls recognition from a distance and thus the level of awareness, on the other hand by other clear contrasting elements (for example a "spruced up" building in a rather desolate environment or the opposite).
Relationship of the basic elements to one another
The entirety of the basic elements functions as the “raw material” from which the image of a city is composed in the observer's imagination. Only the combination of the features and their relationship to one another results in a spatial effect that can be represented in the form of a cognitive map . Various basic elements can both create an overall impression synchronously, as well as blur impressions of the respective individual elements through a contrasting effect.
At the same time, certain basic elements only show room-defining properties in a typical combination, for example the combination of paths and focal points. Most observers seem to group the recognized elements together in larger arrangements called imaginary complexes. An important property of complexes of ideas and images is their changeability over time: The character of an area can, for example, be subject to major changes within a decade (e.g. gentrification of an urban renewal area), its delimitation can change. At the same time, the hierarchy of urban areas can also be subject to change. On the other hand, certain points of reference can retain their character even in times of change.
The procedure for sketching a mental map can provide information about the relationship between the basic elements :
- The image is often developed along known directions of movement.
- Many observers begin a sketch with boundary lines that demarcate areas, for example the shoreline of a body of water.
- Other observers begin by sketching the underlying structure, such as a rectangular street grid.
- It is also typical to start from a familiar central point from which all further areas and relationships are defined.
The totality of all basic elements that can be represented and represented in a mental map is in most cases distorted, but shows a strong topological correspondence with reality. The plan sketches can also have the character of city maps that have been projected onto any stretchable rubber blanket and then stretched.
Transfer of the perception approach to geographic issues
Lynch linked his studies with the hope of being able to derive an empirically justifiable urban planning from them. Above all, he wanted the qualities of planned rooms in terms of their characteristics
- Uniqueness and
- Measure clarity.
Geographers, such as Torsten Hägerstrand and Downs / Stea, applied the considerations raised here to geographical issues. Questions about the relative perception of spaces, insofar as these can be represented in people's imaginations, were examined in connection with studies on interactions , spatial diffusion and image analysis , among other things . Especially in the social science- oriented area of geography, the relative space has since been regarded as the actual “normal space”.
The so-called “imaginary geography” can be described as a more comprehensive approach. Edward Said's work "Orientalism" from 1978 can be described as pioneering in the context of a scientific discussion. Said discusses that the "Orient" is a construct of the West. Said questions the ability of Europeans to deal with the "Orient" - he interprets orientalism as a western discourse in which the "enlightened West" negotiates and rules the "mysterious Orient". Said introduces the term “imaginary geography” for the construction of the difference between “us” and “the others”. In contrast to the ideas of Said, who originally worked as a linguist, Derek Gregory introduces the term into the canon of human geography with his work "Geographical Imaginations" (1994). Considerations about imaginary geographies can be found among others. a. also in Morin (1958 - “semi-imaginary reality of man”), Shields (1991) and Balandier (cf. also psychology and philosophy, a good overview on this, Schultheiss, 1996). In the scientific discussion, considerations about imaginary geography continue to lead a shadowy existence, partly because the traditional behavioristic approach of perceptual geography is being questioned. Research into imaginary geography has been gaining in importance since the cultural turns that restructured the social sciences . Examples are the works of Urry and Shields: Urry discusses that the English Lake District was shaped by the “literally landscapes” of romanticism - today it is precisely this “romantic gaze” that encourages visitors to visit the Lake District . Using the example of Brighton, Shields shows that there are collectively overprinted ideas of space that can condense into “space myths”.
Individual evidence
- ^ Edward W. Said: Orientalism. S. Fischer Verlag , 5th edition 2017, ISBN 978-3-10-071008-6
- ↑ Kenneth R. Olwig, R. Shields: Places on the margin. Alternative Geographies of Modernity. Geografiska Annaler. Series B, Human Geography, v74 n1 (1992): 77
- ↑ John Urry: Consuming Places. Routledge, 1995, 257 pp., ISBN 0-415-11310-5
literature
- Roger M. Downs, David Stea: Cognitive Maps. The world in our heads. Harper & Row. UTB, New York, 1982
- P. Haggett: Geography. A modern synthesis . Stuttgart 1991
- Christoph Hennig: Wanderlust. Tourists, tourism and vacation culture . Insel Verlag , Frankfurt am Main 1997, ISBN 3-458-16841-9
- R. Kitchin, Blades M .: The Cognition of Geographic Space . London, New York 2002
- Detlev Klingbeil: Action spaces in the compression space. Time potentials and their spatial use. Munich Geographical Notebooks No. 41/1978
- Kevin A. Lynch : The image of the city . Ullstein Verlag 1965, 215 pp.
- Kevin A. Lynch: City Sense and City Design . Cambridge (Masach.), London 1991
- Barbara Piatti: The geography of literature. Locations, spaces of action, spatial fantasies. Wallstein, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-8353-0329-4 .
- G. Rose: Visual Methodologies. London.
- G. Schweizer, H. Gebhardt: At home in the big city. Location and spatial identification in the conurbation. Cologne Geographical Works No. 61/1995
- B.-A. Stegmann: Big city in the image. A perception-geographical study on spatial images and image marketing in print media using the example of Cologne and its districts. Cologne Geographical Works No. 68/1997
- Yi Fu Tuan: Space and place. The perspective of experience. London 1976
- J. Urry: The Tourist Gaze. Cambridge, 1990/2002