Reconciling Nature and Culture in a Global Context? - Rainforest ...

Reconciling Nature and Culture in a Global Context?Lessons from the World Heritage ListThe relationship posited between maps and landscapes approximates the Ptolemicconnection between geography, the representation of the ‘whole known world’ (Gibson 1989:52) and chorography, which emphasises limited sections of the world or regions 60 . Thus,regional maps were described as landschaffen or ‘shaped lands’ (Haber 1995: 38) and theirproduction constituted an exercise in chorography. It would seem that prior to the late1400s, there is no single term to describe pictorial representations of natural scenery. Theterm landscape came into use at this time as a way of designating the details, which madeup the background of a painting 61 .The perceived affinity between landscapes and maps is also captured in the word‘landscape’ itself. Gibson informs us that in many European languages, the term signifies “aprovince, a district or, more generally, any extensive area of land” (1989: 53). As Haberpoints out, “the term ‘landscape’ combines ‘land’ with a word of ancient Germanic origin, theverb ‘scapjan’” (1995: 38). In the evolution of Germanic languages, ‘scapjan’ became‘schaffen’ though it still retained its original meaning, ‘to shape’ (Haber 1995: 38). As Haberobserves, this shaping of the land was largely regarded as the outcome of “natural agents orforces” (1995: 38), and thus landscapes were seen as ‘natural vistas’ in their own right orwere presented as a ‘natural’ backdrop to fore-grounded human activities.The concept of landscape we are familiar with today is of landscape as a pictorial subjectmatter rather than as a geographical region. However, the regional connotation of the wordlandscape still persists in terms of the scope or prospect of the subject matter. Although theconcept of landscape has been unhooked for some time from its original art associations(see Bender 1995; Hirsch and O’Hanlon 1995), there is still a dominant view of landscape asan inscribed surface, akin to a map or a text, from which cultural meaning and social formscan simply be read.Susan Kuchler refers to the view of landscape as inscribed or associated surface as the“landscape of memory”, wherein memories (or meanings) are somehow captured in orrepresented by the form of visual landmarks. Kuchler points out that in this view, the idea oflandscape is not “affected by the project of its representation and remembrance” (1995: 104).Kuchler contrasts this view of landscape as the encoding of memory and meaning with thenotion of “landscape as memory” (1995: 85). In this perspective, landscape is implicated inboth the dynamic and interactive social processes of memory-making as well as being one ofthe products of these ongoing processes.The historian Paul Carter is another scholar who takes issue with the idea of space as abackdrop or stage upon which significant events, such as European discovery or anIndigenous ‘Dreamtime’ take place. Similarly, Carter is critical of a view, which presentsphysical surroundings as merely this. As Carter points out in his book ‘The Road to BotanyBay’, what is symbolised is not ‘the physical country’ per se but “the enactment of [analready] historical space” (1987: 349). In other words, references to such things as physicalcountry can only be made by means of the cultural representations of those things. Carterdraws our attention to the importance of realising that a landscape, whether Indigenous orEuropean, signifies more than just another way of representing or symbolising geographicalentities or natural surroundings. Indeed, representation constitutes just one facet of people’s60 The Dutch concept of landschap originally referred to a small area of land, which was viewed as aninset of a much larger region or context. The concept of chorography emerged as a way ofrepresenting and talking about this form of confined perspective. In this respect, landschapcoincides with the German meaning of the word Landschaft (see Bender 1995: 2).61 Gibson (1989: 53) records that it was common practice in contracts between artists and theirpatrons for a detailed inventory to be drawn up which referred to all of the elements, which would beincorporated into the final painting.63