Place meanings and representations. Flashcards
Why do people perceive different places differently?
Places have meanings to the people that know them - this is their sense of place or how they feel about them.
How can different people feel different feelings about a place?
People or groups can attach different meanings to the same places, their perceptions are often based on their experience of said place; was it positive or negative, did they feel welcome, or outside.
How can people perceive places even when they have never been before?
This is due to how a place is represented to a person.
What is the representation of place?
How individuals or organisations such as businesses or council’s, portray places they know about to others.
How can places be presented differently?
People who are proud to come from a place may present it positively and someone with a bad experience negatively.
Different media outlets may present places differently based on their objectives. Tourism companies may portray a place as nice for their benefit, whereas newspapers present a place in a more negative light to sell more papers.
Why are place meanings and reputations important?
They can change behaviour towards places, positive feelings may make someone visit or invest in a place and vice versa.
Additionally important, as people base their identity on places they feel connected to.
What groups influence our perceptions pf place?
Governments - will try and influence how people feel about a place to attract tourism or investment.
Corporate bodies - May do so to generate profits, or because they have been set up to attract visitors (most countries have a ‘visit(country)’) which attract tourism.
- Communities or local groups may try to change place perception to improve the local economy or the lives of locals e.g. Ludlow food festival attracting visitors to the area.
How is the place marketing strategy used?
This is how places are ‘sold’ like products to consumers. The people who will potentially visit, move to or invest into the area. Marketing companies may be employed to attract people to a place - the Lake District is posted as the ‘Adventure Capital of the UK’.
What is reimaging?
This is about changing negative perceptions that exist of places. For example, many people perceived Amsterdam as a place riddled with prostitutes, drug culture and crime, so the ‘IAMSTERDAM’ movement began to highlight all of the more desirable parts of Amsterdam such as showing off the amazing bridges, bike culture or Johan Cruyff Arena and leisure activites. Became one of the most visited cities in Europe.
What is Rebranding?
Giving a place a new identity that appeals to people and investors. It’s achieved through reimaging, place marketing and tangible regeneration schemes. Many places create slogans and logos to help people identify particular aspects to a place. Glasgow’s rebranding included the ‘people make Glasgow’ slogan to highlight the importance of the people in making Glasgow a great place.
What are some different forms that places can be represented through?
Some ways to present places are quantitative and are based on data. Whereas other forms are qualitative and cannot be quantified numerically and may be more descriptive or creative.
Different forms can create contrasting representations of places. When investigating places it’s important to look at a variety of different sources to build up a complete picture of what a place is like.
How can statistics represent a place?
Statistics such as census data, can give u lots of quantitative information about what places are like e.g. population, crime, average incomes. They can come in the form of graphs or be more literal in the form of raw data.
These are objective measures so they are based on facts which may suggest they are a more reliable source of information about a place, however they can still be used subjectively; people can only show you what they want to if it suits them which can make them unreliable sometimes.
Also, although factual, they tell very little about the subjective elements of a place such as sense of place or how people feel about a place e.g. a place may seem to have low income levels, but the locals may really like their place; stats can be useful but do not show the whole story.
How can maps represent place? How reliable are they in portraying a place accurately?
Maps can be used to show any sort of data that has a location. This can show the physical features for example. They can also show quantitative demographic and economic data, eg different income levels by location.
Some maps can also show qualitative information such as levels of happiness - these may be more helpful than quantitative maps for information about sense of place.
Maps can show you reliable data, but they can also be misleading, e.g. historical maps may be inaccurate.
Films, photography and art.
Visual representations show what places look like, and can give you some sense of the character of place. However, they do only show what the creator wants to show, as they cannot show a whole place at once, which can be misleading.
Photographers only show what a place looks like in a given moment - photographs taken at different times in a day or year (seasonal) can make a place look and feel different. Photos can also be edited which can make places look different to reality.
Films and TV evoke a sense of place that is dependent on the nature of the story being told, e.g. a crime drama set in a city might give a different sense of place to a romantic drama set in the same city.
Paintings or sculptures can be less reliable than films and photos at portraying a place as it’s based on the artists interpretation. However they can be more effective in conveying sense of place and character though.
Stories, articles, poetry and music?
Written representations can be used to describe places, and can also evoke a sense of how it feels to be in that place. They usually only offer the perspective of the author though so they do not offer a complete picture, only a single interpretation.
Newspaper articles can give lots of detail about places but can exaggerate or only show controversial topics about a place, making them biased and often unreliable.
Stories, music and poetry can give an emotional impression of places, but only from the writers perspective.
