Counter-Mapping
Counter-mapping is a term attributed to Nancy Peluso (1995), who wrote about the production of maps by Indigenous forest users in Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo) to tell their own narratives of place and to push back against hegemonic definitions of land. Although almost three decades have passed, and counter-mapping efforts have evolved with changing technology and new socio-political contexts, many of the objectives outlined in Peluso’s article endure today:
The goal of these efforts is to appropriate the state’s techniques and manner of representation to bolster the legitimacy of “customary” claims to resources. The practical effect is far-reaching: the use of maps and a highly “territorialized” strategy redefines and reinvents customary claims to standing forest resources and harvestable products as claims to the land itself.
Counter-mapping as a critical practice has largely developed through political-environmental struggles regarding the (primarily colonial) extraction of natural resources and resulting efforts of conservation (Harris and Hazen, 2005). As such, counter-mapping is often engaged in grassroots organizing as a form of action against the colonial dispossession of land, living beings, and cultural heritage. Objectives of counter-mapping vary widely and can include policy change, legal (re-)claims to land, education, and cultural revitalization, among others. Counter-mapping therefore harnesses what Edward Said describes as the “cartographic impulse” of anticolonial resistance; that is, “to reclaim, rename, and reinhabit the land” (1994: 272-3).
Counter-mapping is also a practice that challenges what counts as “authoritative” knowledge. According to Amber Bosse (2021), who situates it within a larger framework of collaborative cartography, counter-mapping has largely been fueled by two factors: first, the recognition that spatial data is an important part of small- and large-scale decision-making processes; and secondly, that “spatial information has historically been collected, curated, and disseminated by and for a small segment of the population.” Counter-mapping shares many of the same approaches as participatory, community-based, or collaborative mapping in that they all tend to invite participation from people who might not consider themselves (or be considered) cartographers (Iralu, 2021).
As “cartographic work created in opposition to colonial cartography” (Iralu, 2021), counter-mapping is a political and educational endeavour and is practiced widely across diverse post-colonial, anti-colonial, and de-colonial contexts. It is not limited to Indigenous groups and it is important to recognize that counter-mapping varies considerably across heterogenous Indigenous communities. Furthermore, as Dallas Hunt and Shaun Stevenson (2017) remind readers, Indigenous (counter-)mapping has a rich history that predates colonial and digital mapping; however, it has indeed taken on new forms by the incorporation of digital