THE MAPPING AND INCLUSIVENESS

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The tensions between 'place' – geographic and socio-political – personal identity in concert with cultural identity are significant factors in the determination of cultural realities and 'placedness'.

The quandary that inevitably comes to light is to do with whether or not it is 'place' that determines a 'cultural reality' or culture that defines 'place and placedness'. That tension is always there and it is a somewhat fluid set of ideas/understandings.

The evolving shifts in cultural understandings arguably demand that there also be shifts in the ways, the layered ways, places are understood. In the aftermath of colonial enterprise, laden as it is with layers of storytelling and its tensions, the 'layering' in many ways throws new light on the ways – multidimensional ways – 'place' can be, and is increasingly, understood in a cultural context.

Likewise, the ways place might be 'mapped' expands exponentially as previously downplayed and somewhat submerged sensibilities and sensitivities are exposed and arranged less hierarchically and more rhizomeically [EN/1].

Thus it is increasingly important to be more inclusive in cultural mapping processes and similarly more critically engaged with the multi-dimensionality that determines and defines 'place'. Thus who it is who is 'authorised' to be engaged in the mapping becomes increasingly important, such as:
• When, and by whom, are  places and precincts relevant to the layering of cultural realities, defined?
• Who is it, and by what means, is 'ownership and interest' defined and in what context?
• Who gets to be the authorised determiner of an interest or layered interest in a place?
• Who has the 'expertise' to navigate a cultural mapping process and with what resources?
• Who distributes this information to whom and when?

AND, there is a myriad of other questions that arise out of these questions albeit that the inhabitants of cultural landscapes need to be deeply engaged in their mapping. Without that mapping processes would lack credibility.

An exemplary model of this can be found in England via the 'group' COMMON GROUND [EN2] albeit that they operate in a distinct network of cultural landscapes/parishes that have developed their cultural realities over a very long period of time. These exemplars do not readily translate into 'antipodean cultural landscapes' given the relative histories and distinctive storytelling and histories embedded in each. Nonetheless, comparisons can be made and illuminating contrasts divined.

There are tensions to do with the layerings and the shared ownerships of and interests in 'place' to be considered when mapping cultural landscapes. The concepts and the research that backs up and informs the notion of 'Communities of Ownership & Interest' very quickly come into play when we begin to interrogate 'placemaking/placemarking/placescaping'.

Indeed, the business of Local Govt is almost entirely to do with 'placemaking' and it is a useful reference in mapping cultural landscapes but not that useful all by itself.