Kohti elämismaailmaa

Maantieteellisen miellekartan piirtäminen eksistentiaalisen semiotiikan näkökulmasta

Abstract

This article discusses the process of drawing a geographical mental map as a tool for fostering young
people’s thinking skills in geography. When students draw mental maps of their immediate surroundings,
such as the home and school environment, they come into contact with values; for instance, what they
consider as their favourite places and which places they avoid. The theory of existential semiotics by Eero
Tarasti is the first attempt to discover the life of signs ‘from within’; that is, how signs are derived from
values. This study sheds light to the ways in which these values are actualised during the process of drawing
a mental map. Our aim is to open up Tarasti’s terminology in the contexts of pedagogy and geography. In
addition, we are seeking a method to approach young people’s everyday life experiences in teaching and
researching geography. As a result, we suggest a new meta-language for visual methodologies; this language
concentrates on describing the steps of drawing rather than conducting a content analysis of the maps.
This article integrates human geography, existential semiotics and visual methodologies.