AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MAPPING

1. OBJECTIVE:  This exercise is a part of your introduction to me, but it also will lead you to think geographically and to observe your surroundings with your geographical eye.

2. PROCESS:  This activity involves producing a hand-drawn map of your “turf” during a specific period of your life.  You might select ages 3-7, 5-10, 6-12, 11-15, etc.  The map may include whatever you remember and think is significant to you. 

3. ASSIGNMENT:  Accompanying your map must be an explanation of what you have drawn and its relation to your experiences at that time of your life.  Explain why this place is important to you and how it shaped your following years.  You must write at least 350 words (Note:  my overview is 388 words so you have some length comparison).  MS Word allows you to get a word count by clicking on the drop down menu "Tools" at the top of the window and selecting "Word Count . . . .".

2. CONSIDERATIONS:  Variables you may want to contemplate while doing the map (use at your discretion).

   1. Travel behavior and migration

   2. Changing land use in your area

   3. Location of friends and rivals

   4. Your sense of rootedness, sense of place, sense of belonging to a specific area

   5. Barriers to your movement --- physical and social

   6. Boundaries that influenced your activities

   7. Ethnic or racial clustering

   8. Location of crisis events that influenced your activities

   9. Places of privacy --- places you were afraid to go

   10. Places you disliked --- places you liked

3. MAP BASICS:  Keep in mind some fundamentals of maps (use at your discretion)

   1. Have you indicated the approximate scale of the map?

   2. Have you indicated direction?

   3. Have you labeled places you consider important?

   4. Have you used a key of symbols to simplify the information?

   5. Is the map simple and uncluttered enough to be viewed and understood, yet complex and detailed enough to convey sufficient information about the relationship between you and the situation you have mapped?

4. RESULTS:  You may want to hand-draw this map, however in the end, you must get the map to me.  Use some type of draw program or scan your hand-drawn map so that you are able to email a digital file to me.  In addition, you may just drop it by my office or in the mail to UNA Box 5167.  The best way to get your map to me is to email it!   Don't forget to send in the explanation of what you have drawn and its relation to your experiences at that time of your life.

Adapted by Bill Strong from Robert Morrill.  Last update:  12.29.02  lkm