Propagand and Lie in Modern Cartography

How Maps Lie

Maps are utilized daily in most areas of people’s lives and as the technology and equipment to gather the geospatial data develops; there are more variety of maps created and designed to fulfil different purposes and needs of the user/viewer. With the advancement in the telecom industry everyone can view maps with their mobile devices like a Smartphone for example, they have access to the internet and the user can download or view whatever type of map they need.

It is important that one is knowledgeable and understand the information represented on a map and how the map was designed by the cartographer. A map is created from collated data, those data are collected from a three dimensional surface on earth that is analyzed and represented on a two dimensional media like a screen or paper. A lot of data is gathered from a specific area on a geographical location and if every bit of data is represented on a map it becomes unreadable and illegible, the viewer would have a difficult time understanding the map and it would be a pain to interpret. So, because information of such quantity would make maps clustered and unintelligible, maps are therefore distorted to make them intelligible. It’s not possible to represent every physical object that are present on a geographical area on a map, there are certain roads and shortcuts that cannot be represented or else the map would be cumbersome and annoying to look at, every building on a geographical area cannot be present, there are some buildings that have to be omitted or else the map would be clustered and The designing of a map is technical and also an art and simplicity is the best sophistication, when information is broken down to the barest minimum they become interesting and attract the viewers eyes. According to Mark Monmonier, a brilliant Professor of Geography, he states that: “To avoid hiding critical information in a fog of detail, the map must offer a selective, incomplete view of reality. There's no escape from the cartographic paradox: to present a useful and truthful picture, an accurate map must tell white lies”.

Maps need to tell lies in a need to simplify information represented on a two dimensional map. They can also be inaccurate and misleading with certain information represented on them. With this understanding maps can be used to manipulate certain information and that can be a positive or negative practice, because maps need to omit some information they have inaccuracies irregularities and incorrect information. For instance, population maps of a particular geographical town of a country can be manipulated and distorted, the population of that area can be increased exponentially so that the government officials that are carryout the census of that area would receive the funds to cater to that geographical area, the initial purpose of funding is to cater to the population of that area but the funds are not utilized for that purpose instead they are squandered by corrupt government officials, this is very prevalent in African nations with a plethora of corrupt government officials.

Maps can change and influence a person’s perception of his immediate environment and of the world; back in the past cartographic propagandas were created. These were maps that were created with the aim of influencing and persuading the masses. They were created for the sole purpose of propaganda. They are communicative mediums for passing across messages and are made subjective by those with ulterior motives and political agendas. Maps are made to represent a semblance of reality and because of that they can be used to distort information and the truth. In the book “How to Lie with a Map” Monmonier gave rules for which he named “polishing the cartographic image”. He gave eleven of these rules in his book which are: “Be shrewdly selective, frame strategically, accentuate the positive, if caught, have a story ready, minimize the negative, dazzle with detail, persuade with pap, distract with aerial photographs and historical maps, generalize creatively, enchant with elegance, when all else fails, try bribery.”

For cartographic propaganda to fulfil its purpose reality must be manipulated in the sense that things are omitted or added to create an illusion of what is truly happening in the world. These type of maps are not necessary designed to present a geographical are but is designed for the sole purpose of conveying a message. Maps like these were prevalent at that time, they were designed to serve to incite the masses to support the war and for recruitment purpose and gain support for different political agendas. Maps are subjective and it’s important to know that and deal with them as they should, a subjective medium.