wow, the map was really popular… i’m not surprised. there’s something endearing, in my opinion, about maps… maybe they remind me of the huge maps covering walls in elementary school or the colorful wooden puzzle of america that i still keep on my coffeetable.
speaking of maps, ellen was telling me the other day about the peters projection map, which i had vaguely heard about before. so i checked out some websites… wow. not only is this thing cool, but it’s a TRAVESTY that our schools don’t teach kids about it. i.e. americans have a completely WRONG picture of how the earth really looks, including the size of the u.s.
if you don’t know much about it, here’s a blurb from the site followed by the link:
World mission and aid-giving agencies use the Peters map because it serves to represent the developing countries at their true proportion. The Peters map has been widely adopted elsewhere, but remains a curiosity in the United States. Why is this? Among related factors are these: (1) our resistance to join the rest of the world on the metric system (even the British have changed from inches and fahrenheit to centimeters and celsius), (2) national surveys showing U.S. schoolchildren have among the lowest levels of geography awareness of all developed nations, and (3) many professional cartographers have resented the “politicization” of their field. Arno Peters was one of the first to assert that maps are unavoidably political. http://www.petersmap.com/table.html
in other news, work has gotten a bit better (although i’m heading into another reading season) so i am trying to be a better correspondent (this means i will try to email people i have been thinking of/missing/etc.) and all around friend. meanwhile i am fantasizing about future jobs in austin…
speaking of work, i was reading “the prophet” on the shuttle today and read a section that i *immediately* wanted to post on xanga. if you haven’t read this book, by kahlil gibran, YOU ARE MISSING OUT. seth gave it to me a little while ago, and i’ve been slowling soaking in the beautiful language and breathtaking imagery…� this is the kind of book that you wish you could�place (entirely) on yr bathroom mirror, on yr office walls, in a locket around yr neck. it’s amazing.
so here’s an inspiring/frustrating (in light of my current situation) passage about the purpose of work:
“You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth. For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons, and to step out of life’s procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission towards the infinite.
When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music. Which of you would be a reed, dumb and silent, when all else sings together in unison?
Always you should have been told that work is a curse and labour a misfortune.� But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a part of earth’s furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born, and in keeping yourself with labour you are in truth loving life, and to love life through labour is to be intimate with life’s inmost secret.”
we always used the map that was jagged on the top and bottom (teachers explained it in terms of peeling the earth’s surface like peeling the skin off an orange). and i like this part of the peters projection site: The Peters Map is the map for our day.
(I wandered here from ameliorator) From a poem called “Employment” by George Herbert:Man is no star, but a quick coal/of mortal fire.Who blows it not, nor doth control/a faint desire/lets his own ashes choke his soul.
Read the whole thing here.