ICHC 2024

The 30th International Conference on the History of Cartography will take place the first week of July 2024 in Lyon, France. Its theme is “Confluences—Interdisciplinarity and New Challenges in the History of Cartography.” The call for papers is open until 20 November 2023. Two associated exhibitions have already been announced, one on distant spaces, the other on maps and images of travel.

Maps of the Pacific

Carte très curieuse de la Mer du Sud
Henri Abraham Chatelain, Carte très curieuse de la Mer du Sud, 1719. Map, 76.6 × 137.9 cm.

Maps of the Pacific is an exhibition of the State Library of New South Wales’s holdings of maps, charts atlases and globes relating to the Pacific Ocean. “This exhibition traces the European mapping of the Pacific across the centuries—an endeavour that elevated the science and art of European mapmaking. Redrawing the map of the world ultimately facilitated an era of brutal colonisation and dispossession for many Pacific First Nations communities.” Open now at the library’s exhibition galleries in Sydney, the exhibition runs until 24 April 2022. Free admission.

In related news, the library’s Mapping the Pacific conference (previously) has been postponed to March 2022.

Upcoming Conference: Mapping the Pacific

Taking place on 25 and 26 August 2021 in Sydney, Australia, Mapping the Pacific will be a hybrid (in-person and streamed) conference that will explore “the traditional wayfinding knowledge of the Pacific community, European exploration and the mapping of the Pacific from the early modern era through to the 19th century.” Registration is not yet open.

Update 17 Nov 2021: Conference postponed to March 2022.

2021 Ruderman Conference Announced

Registration is now open for the third biennial Barry Lawrence Ruderman Conference on Cartography. As in previous years, the conference will be hosted by Stanford’s Rumsey Map Center but this time it will take place online, and run from October 20 to 22, 2021. The theme this time around is Indigenous mapping.

This theme is of paramount importance, especially as Indigenous peoples around the world continue to fight for their recognition and rights to land and resources. Simultaneously, institutions are increasingly examining their roles in exploitative imperial expansion and settler colonialism. The history of colonial encounter and of indigenous agency can both be glimpsed in historical maps, many of which were made by Indigenous peoples or thanks to crucial, and often unacknowledged, Indigenous contributions. More recently, mapping technologies are helping Indigenous groups to monitor resources, protect language, survey territory, govern, and provide evidence for reclamation and recognition procedures. Scholars, many of them Indigenous, are voicing their critiques and interventions using geographic and cartographic frameworks.

Alex Hidalgo, Mishuana Goeman, and Eric Anderson and Carrie Cornelius will provide keynotes. The conference will run from October 2o to 22, 2021 and is free to attend (virtually). More information; registration form.

Mapping the Global Imaginary

In February 2019 a conference on the blurred line between factual and fictitious mapping in history, Mapping the Global Imaginary, 1500-1900, took place at Stanford University’s David Rumsey Map Center. Which I somehow missed. But no worries: videos of the conference panels are available online (see above for the first one), as is the talk by the keynote speaker, Sumathi Ramaswamy.

Map Talks Online, Past and Future

Map Time is “a series of short conversations with experts on maps and mapping from across the globe” hosted by the Harvard Library and the Leventhal Center on Instagram Live. Held every Thursday at noon, through August. Schedule and upcoming speakers here. Past talks are available on YouTube.

How to Do Map Stuff is a full day of live online mapping workshops that will take place on Wednesday, 29 April. Coordinated by Daniel Huffman, speakers will host their own livestreams at announced times (the working schedule is here).

Presentations made at last year’s British Cartographic Society/Society of Cartographers conference were recorded on video. The BCS reports that they’re now available online via this web page.

What Happened to the Society of Cartographers?

The Society of Cartographers posted a notice on Twitter announcing the formal dissolution of the Society after its upcoming (and now presumably final) Annual Summer School Conference. That conference will be held in conjunction with the British Cartographic Society’s Annual Conference on 11 and 12 September at the Ordnance Survey’s Southampton headquarters.

Apart from reactions like Kenneth Field’s, there is no other information about the Society’s dissolution available online, though I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s been discussion in members-only areas. What on earth happened? (Comments open.)

Previously: Whither the BCS?

2019 Ruderman Conference Announced

The 2019 edition of the biennial Barry Lawrence Ruderman Conference on Cartography has been announced. Like the inaugural conference in 2017, it will take place at the David Rumsey Map Center at Stanford University, this time from October 10 to 12. Gender is the theme of this year’s conference.

For this year’s meeting, all the papers will focus on the relationship between gender, sexuality, and cartography. While some scholars have examined the interplay of gender identities and mapping, particularly with regard to the role of women as buyers and sellers in the historical map market, this work remains isolated and has yet to make a significant impact on the wider field. This conference hopes to offer a counterpoint to this trend by bringing together diverse approaches and hosting interdisciplinary discussions.

The keynote speaker is Susan Schulten. Registration costs $100, or $25 if you’re a student.

Grand Canyon Mapping Conference and Competition

The Mapping Grand Canyon Conference, to be held at Arizona State University from 28 February to 1 March, 2019, “explores the art, science, and practice of Grand Canyon cartography. […] Free and open to all, the conference promises a full two-day program of map-based story-telling, transdisciplinary analysis, state-of-the-art geospatial and cartographic demonstrations, engaging hands-on activities, and open community dialogue.”

The conference also includes a Grand Canyon map competition. Open to students, the competition seeks entries in three categories: artistic map, data driven map (static) and data-driven map (dynamic). Deadline is 20 January 2019. [NACIS]

The Harvard Map Collection at 200

The Harvard Map Collection is celebrating its 200th anniversary. There’s an exhibition, Follow the Map: The Harvard Map Collection at 200, which runs through October 26 at Harvard’s Pusey Library, as well as a symposium, Follow the Map: Reflecting on 200 Years of the Harvard Map Collection, which takes place October 25 and 26; Susan Schulten will be delivering the keynote. [WMS]

Update: Here’s the exhibition catalogue.