The Meanings of Landscape : Essays on Place, Space, Environment and Justice

Compiling nine authoritative essays spanning an extensive academic career, author Kenneth R. Olwig presents explorations in landscape geography and architecture from an environmental humanities perspective. With influences from art, literature, theatre staging, architecture, and garden design, landscape has come to be viewed as a form of spatial scenery, but this reading captures only a narrow representation of landscape meaning today. This book positions landscape as a concept shaped through the centuries, evolving from place to place to provide nuanced interpretations of landscape meaning. The essays are woven together to gather an international approach to understanding the past and present importance of landscape as place and polity, as designed space, as nature, and as an influential factor in the shaping of ideas in a just social and physical environment. Aimed at students, scholars, and researchers in landscape and beyond, this illustrated volume traces the idea of landscape from the ancient polis and theatre through to the present day. Cover 1 Endorsement 2 Half Title 4 Title Page 6 Copyright Page 7 Dedication 8 Table of Contents 10 List of Figures 12 Foreword 15 Acknowledgments 18 Introduction: Landscape, philology, and the environmental 20 Just ask Alice 20 Landscape’s double meaning and the spatial appropriation of place and nature 24 Place and space 26 The “nature” of landscape 27 The perspective of natural science 28 The perspective of art and theater and the prospect of modernity’s nature 29 The organization of the book 32 Recovering the philological foundations of the environmental (geo)humanities 32 The chapters in brief 35 Note 36 Chapter 1: Recovering the substantive nature of landscape 37 Personal preface 37 Introduction 39 The duplicitous meaning of landscape 40 The “territorial” meaning of landscape 41 Landschaft as territory and community 42 Landschaft, social estate, and community justice 43 The Landschaft as a body politic 44 The land and law in Landschaft 44 Landschaft art 45 Landscape and country in England 48 Landschaft and country 50 Nature, custom, and landscape 51 Natural law and landscape 54 Palladian landscape 55 The landscaping of Landschaft 58 Fascist landscape 61 The morphology of geography’s Landschaft 62 Rethinking the substantive meaning of landscape 63 Notes 65 Chapter 2: Landscape, place, and the state of progress 69 Prologue 69 Introduction 71 Progressive custom 71 The political landscape 72 Court vs. country, lord vs. landscape 73 Landscape as the scene of state 76 The progress of landscape 79 The materialization of the landscape of progress 82 The transformation of progress 83 The stages of progress 84 Revolutionary progress 86 The non-place of modernity 88 Custom vs. modern progress 89 Conclusion: From utopianism to topianism 90 Notes 91 Chapter 3: Choros, place, and the spatialization of landscape 95 Introduction 95 The Platonic chora 96 The substantive choros of the Greek polis 96 Ptolemaic chorography and landscape as scenic space 97 Plato, Ptolemy, chorography, and chora 97 Platonic cosmology and landscape 99 Space, place, region, and choros/chora 102 Conclusion 105 Notes 105 Chapter 4: Are islanders insular? A personal view 107 Preface 107 Prologue: A personal tale of two islands 108 Is no man not unto an island? Islandic civilizational primacy 111 The noninsularity of the insular 114 Ptolemaic navigation 116 Islecentricism? 118 In the mind’s isle 119 Notes 121 Chapter 5: The case of the “missing” mask: Performance, theater, ætherial space, and the practice of landscape/architecture 123 Prologue a tale of two cities 123 Landscape/architecture and theatrical practice 125 The case of the missing mask 127 Substantial masks versus ætherial performance space 130 Ætherial versus spatial scenery 136 Personifying Britain as landscape 137 Turning the substantive place of the theater “outside in” and then “inside out” 138 An expostulation with Inigo Jones 141 Landscape and Pygmalion 142 Conclusion 145 Notes 146 Chapter 6: Performing on the landscape versus doing landscape: Perambulatory practice, sight, and the sense of belonging 148 Performing upon landscape versus doing landscape 150 Sensing landscape and the sense of belonging 151 Herd animals and the doing of the pedestrian landscape 152 Doing and practicing landscape 154 Doing custom versus performing tradition 155 “All we like sheep ...” 157 Conclusion 157 Chapter 7: Heidegger, Latour, and the reification of things: The inversion and spatial enclosure of the substantive landscape – The Lake District case 159 Preface 159 Introduction 159 Part 1: The concept of thing – Heidegger and Latour 161 The reified thing 163 Thing studies 165 Defining things in the substantive landscape 166 The enclosure and inversion of the landscape of things 170 The European Landscape Convention 172 Part 2: Betwixt and between landscapes – The Lake District vs. the Yorkshire Dales 175 Community vs. nature’s space 184 Concluding discussion 187 Acknowledgments 189 Notes 189 Chapter 8: Transcendent space, reactionary modernism, and the “diabolic” sublime: Walter Christaller, Edgar Kant, and the landscape origins of modern spatial science and planning 191 Prelude 193 Perspectival space and the origins of the sublime 200 The space of Christaller’s reactionary modern models 203 Christaller and the bordering of a borderless Germany 208 Edgar Kant’s “landscapic” regions 210 Postlude 215 Acknowledgments 216 Notes 216 Chapter 9: Geese, elves, and the duplicitous, “diabolical” landscaped space and wild nature of reactionary modernism: Holgersson, Hägerstrand, and Lorenz 217 Duplicitous landscape 218 Nils Holgersson’s Swedish journey 219 Holgersson and geographical science 220 Holgersson and the two landscapes 221 The modern time-space geography of Holgersson 227 Nils Holgersson, Konrad Lorenz, and biological reactionary modernism 229 Fictional lies and real geese and Nazis 231 Holgersson’s “natural” landscape and ethnic cleansing 234 Goosey miscegenation, racial hygiene, and euthanasia 235 Past and contemporary non-Nazi reactionary modern parallels: Edward O. Wilson and George Monbiot 236 Rewilding landscape 238 Conclusion: Diabolic thought and reactionary modernism 240 Acknowledgments 241 Notes 241 References 242 Index 267 Compiling eighteen authoritative essays spanning an extensive academic career, author Kenneth R. Olwig presents explorations in landscape geography and architecture from an environmental humanities perspective. With influences from art, literature, theatre staging, architecture, and garden design, landscape has come to be viewed as a form of spatial scenery, but this reading captures only a narrow representation of landscape meaning today. This book positions landscape as a concept shaped through the centuries, evolving from place to place to provide nuanced interpretations of landscape meaning. The essays are woven together to gather an international approach to understanding the past and present importance of landscape as place and polity, as designed space, as nature, and as an influential factor in the shaping of ideas in a just social and physical environment. Aimed at students, scholars, and researchers in landscape and beyond, this illustrated volume traces the idea of landscape from the ancient polis and theatre through to the present day Recovering The Substantive Nature Of Landscape -- Landscape, Place And The State Of Progress -- Choros, Place And The Spatialization Of Landscape -- Are Islanders Insular? : A Personal View -- The Case Of The Missing Mask : Performance, Theater, Aetherial Space And The Practice Of Landscape/architecture -- Performing On The Landscape Versus Doing Landscape : Perambulatory Practice, Sight And The Senses Of Belonging -- Heidegger, Latour And The Reification Of Things : The Inversion And Spatial Enclosure Of The Substantive Landscape The Lake District Case -- Transcendent Space, Reactionary-modernism And The Diabolic Sublime : Walter Christaller, Edgar Kant, And The Landscape Origins Of Modern Spatial Science And Planning -- Geese, Elves, And The Duplicitous, Diabolical Landscaped Space And Wild Nature Of Reactionary Modernism : Holgersson, Hägerstrand, And Lorenz. Kenneth R. Olwig With A Foreword By Tim Ingold. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.