Maps as Media

Nothing is safe from the effects of media distortion. We think of maps as factual representations of our world, but in fact, they can be quite deceptive if a person is not aware of the distortions. Some of the distortion is unintentional because it is just very difficult to make a 3-D world into a flat map. But mapmakers have decisions about how to distort our round world into a flat one and the personal biases of the mapmakers can create different viewpoints. For instance, who decided that North should always be at the top of a map? It looks so normal to us now that we assume it to be the truth, but there really is no top or bottom of our revolving, floating through the universe, planet.

One way to get a different viewpoint of the world is to take a look at maps distorted by an assortment of criteria. Worldmapper.org is a really neat website that gives a lot of good information. Yes, it is still distorted information, but it makes you think about the information that we are normally given.

And thinking about things is never a bad thing.