More Than a Landscape

A region’s geography has a strong influence on its image.  Or perhaps I should say, it has a strong impact on its perceived image.  For one thing, geography is more than simply the physical characteristics of a place.  Of course, the first thing one thinks of when describing geography is the physical characteristics of a place, but in truth, there are multiple forms of geography.  For instance, cultural geography refers to the culture, traditions, and society within an area, rather than focusing on physical traits such as mountains and rivers.  Indeed there is also more to physical geography than just landscapes.  For example another aspect of geography describes the geographical location of a region.  This becomes an important question with Latin America.  Besides encompassing a large area on the map (as shown to the right), it can be argued that Latin America extends beyond these boundaries.  The boundaries of Latin America are becoming more and more blurred.  In “the Companion to Latin American Studies,” Gareth Jones describes Latin America as being deterritorialized and says that “Latin America might be a distinct place on a map, but its geography is everywhere” (Jones, 2003). 

Globalization has contributed significantly to this aspect of geography through the transfer of commodities as well as ideas.  Jones also talks in depth about “imaginative geographies” and their effect on global cultural flows (Jones, 2003).  Instead of describing a landscape, these imaginative geographies describe different aspects of a culture and are called ethnoscapes, mediascapes, technoscapes, financescapes, and ideoscapes.  As you might infer from the names, these terms describe things like ethnicity (or the people who make up a culture), media, ideas, technology, and finances – which deal with global markets (Jones, 2003).  These “imaginative geographies” illustrate the point that different forms of Latin America’s geography are spreading across the world, which brings us back to Jones’ point about deterritorialization.  Besides extending Latin America’s culture, people, and ideas to other countries, there is a negative side to this evolution.  These global cultural flows have contributed to a displaced Latin America, where there is a disconnect between the perceived location of Latin America and its actual cultural and geographic make-up.