ENG 314-001

Toby Lester, a hearing mapper, and Deb Monroe, who maps her own body, have two totally different ways of mapping. Lester became obsessed with the noises in his office and started mapping the pitches and types of sounds he heard in his every day life. After researching he concluded that certain pitches can actually change the mood of the person who is hearing them. He explained that the computer and air conditioning unit made for a positive sound, but the microwaving of a bagel in the morning made for bad sounds.

His form of mapping grew from the curiosity inside him about why he was humming to the noises around him. Monroe’s mapping came from a completely different place in her life. She became obsessed with checking herself for tumors, diseases, cancers, etc. She did self-check breast exams multiple times a day and was convinced that she had different things wrong with her.

Although both Lester and Monroe began mapping out of curiosity, their types were different. First of all their environment was different. Lester mapped his office and home, whereas the map used by Monroe was her own personal body. Lester researched different sounds, pitches and the reaction they caused, the same way Monroe researched diseases; however, Lester wasn’t paranoid and obsessed with the outcome the way Monroe was. Her one husband thought her constant checking was odd.

Personally, I really like the idea of mapping sounds. You have to really know, or quickly learn, what different sounds/pitches are called, and then do the research to find out how they affect people. That seems like a lot more work than what Monroe was doing by just looking up the side effects on prescriptions and finding out the symptoms of cancer. Monroe’s situation seems more like a disease in itself that she needs to go see a psychologist for, not something to be broadcast on NPR and admired as a new mapping technique.

I think we can learn a lot from Lester. If we went to every office building and found out what sounds made people angry/depressed, and then replaced them with more positive ones we could change the work environment for the better. I think we could also learn from Monroe to be able to map the body, but just not in an obsessive way, like she did.

Toby Lester and Denis Wood each represent new ways of mapping an environment, though their methods rely on completely different senses. Lester uses his ears to map the harmonic qualities of his home and workspace, while Wood uses visual cartography to illustrate his neighborhood, Boylan Heights.

When we wake in the morning, it seems that it’s not until our eyes have retained focus that we’re able to establish where we are in our surroundings. We tend to think of vision as our default sense, especially when it comes to creating a mental map of an area to be stored in our memories. But the other senses are equally as important, as Lester has discovered. By identifying the pitch of the sounds found in his environments, Lester creates a sound map, an idea that has gained attention due to growing sound pollution in urban areas. Lester’s approach is original though, in that his sound mapping takes harmonic intervals into account. By associating intervals, such as the augmented fourth, major third, and minor third, with different moods and emotions, Lester’s mapping highlights cultural interpretations of sound. Lester’s Western uprising causes him to be relieved that the interval between his computer fan and heater is a major third, associated with happiness, while other cultures may prefer the minor third.

Lester’s mapping reveals cultural preferences, but using another sense, Wood is able to create maps that point out socio-economic tendencies. While mapping a large area using vision is a centuries-old process, Wood uses his eyes to map more than geography and streets. By mapping jack-o’-lanterns, graffiti, and the frequency that families appear in the neighborhood newsletter, Lester is able to map income and social status within Boylan Heights. Each of Wood’s maps come together to tell a story about the neighborhood that no roadmap could tell.

In the episode “Mapping” of This American Life, several people who create different maps are profiled. In the first section of the episode a man named Dennis Wood is interviewed and he describes a set of maps he has created that represents different aspects of his home town. In the second portion of the episode a man named Toby Hester discusses the different sounds in his office and how they represent different moods.
Dennis Wood describes a collection of maps that he has created to illustrate several things in his neighborhood in North Carolina. The maps are all quite different from each other, but they all represent different dimensions of the town. Wood has created maps of the sewer lines, the power lines, traffic signs, and a map of where pumpkins are located on Halloween. Through his creation and studying of his maps, Wood has found that his small neighborhood is in fact a “living organism”.
Similarly, by mapping with regards to constant sound, Toby Hester found that his office had a life of its own. While sitting at work Hester began to notice the constant hum of his air conditioning unit, and the sounds his computer made. While Dennis Wood creates maps that represent different locations in his neighborhood, Toby Hester views his office through constant sounds and their ability to create and influence different moods. Therefore, he believes that the sounds heard in his everyday life have a direct impact on his mood.
Although both men create maps of the areas surrounding them, they do so in very different ways. While they use different methods to do so, their techniques in map making illustrate how different senses can be used to describe ones surroundings.

Dennis Wood made the maps based on sight and it was interesting because I did not realize you could sew your city or take them to court if you trip on a crack in the road and get hurt. Nonetheless, Wood highlights the fact that a map must ignore everything else and focus solely on one thing. Wood used his eyes to make the map and reveal the areas in his Raleigh neighborhood that would have the most frequency of people.

Nancy Updike used the sense of smell to make her map. An electronic nose was made to evaluate the smells. This map is similar to the map of sight because the electronic nose was made to recognize one particular smell at a time. It is different from the sight map that solely focuses on one thing because the nose “smells” an area and takes a survey of all of the molecules in that one place. Then the numerous smells can be analyzed. To the human nose it may make one thing come to mind, but there could be hundreds of different molecules in one spot. It is very different because the sense of smell does so much more than evoke a place on a map. Various smells bring to mind different memories to different people and can trigger other things like taste.

Wood's relationship to mapping is very different from Nancy Updike. Personally, I think the map of sight is very useful. The city should know what state the roads and sidewalks are in so that they can fix them, especially if there are citizens getting hurt by the roads. I have seen plenty of people eat the concrete walking or skateboarding and if the city knew about it then it could all be fixed.

From these mappers, I think we can learn to focus on one thing and ignore everything else. Maps are made to highlight one specific thing and if you add more then the map becomes too complex and can become very confusing and hard to read.

Denis Wood and Jonathan Gold both create maps to better understand their neighborhood. Wood uses his sight to map different aspects of his neighborhood, like gas lines, sewer lines, telephone lines, cable lines. He even maps pools of light cast by street lights at night, traffic signs, graffiti, pumpkins during Halloween and times his neighbors were in the newsletter. Gold decided to map the tastes of different restaurants on Pico Boulevard in Los Angeles.

Both Wood and Gold used specific rules for their maps. Wood would not combine items on his maps. Signs got their own map, as did graffiti and the pumpkins. Gold only mapped the taste aspect of Pico Boulevard. He didn’t map what sounds he heard or how he felt at the restaurants; only what he tasted.

Another interesting aspect is how they both approached researching what they mapped. Wood took pictures and used his memory from what he saw. Gold had a specific list of rules he followed on what restaurants he ate at, and the order in which he ate at them. This shows that the most important part of mapping is the research involved.

Wood and Gold are two interesting mappers to contrast. Wood is a professional cartographer, but Gold created his map out of interest. Obviously, Wood is interested in maps, but it is part of his job. Wood looked at his maps more scientifically, comparing them and concluding that people with pumpkins on their porches are also the people who are in the neighborhood newsletter the most. Gold approached his project because it was something he was interested in, personally.

Another element both Wood and Gold had in common was that they mapped for others benefits, as well as their own. Wood’s traffic sign map was meant for people who didn’t live in the neighborhood. Gold’s map would also help people while deciding where to eat on Pico Boulevard.

Deb Monroe and Jonathan Gold used mapping in very different ways to cope with their surroundings. Deb Monroe used touch. By feeling and pressing areas of her body, she was able to create and entertain illnesses and anxieties underneath the tissues and delicate insides of her body. Ms. Monroe mapped illnesses from her head down to her knees, and maintained control over her body by touching the parts she was concerned about.
Jonathan Gold did not have trouble coping with overly stressful surroundings, but needed an outlet from his work. By mapping Pico Boulevard by visiting restaurants and food stands along the street, Mr. Gold was able to find purpose in his community.
Although both Deb Monroe and Jonathan Gold had different external reasons for undertaking their mapping expeditions, the internal reasons were the same. They both suffered from some sort of anxiety. Deb Monroe was a hypochondriac and used touch to control the other stresses in her life. Jonathan Gold had an insecure future with his career, and needed purpose to his everyday routine. Through mapping, both individuals found a coping mechanism for their uncertainties.
It was really fascinating to listen to Deb Monroe's story about mapping her body through touch. I can't imagine being so overwhelmed with outside stressors that she would become obsessed with breast cancer. Part of her story makes me angry; I know that her distraction with her troubles and obessions must have taken time away from her husband and children. This aspect of mapping is disturbing because it has a lot more to do with a psychological disorder, and not just the senses.
Jonathan Gold's mapping has more to do with our project because the motivations are more similar. Deb Monroe is extreme; Jonathan Gold's purpose for mapping Pico Boulevard was because the tastes interested him. Our purpose is to find and map something that will interest both us and the community.

While Denis Wood, a self-proclaimed “poetic cartographer,” and a musical man named Toby Lester are both considered mappers, their motivation to do so is very different.

Denis Wood's neighborhood maps range from important aggregations of useful data, such as the locations of all above ground wiring, to silly and seemingly fruitless plotting, such as the exact whereabouts of all Halloween pumpkins in the community. While most of his maps fall in the latter category, Woods, nevertheless, keeps collecting data. This is not because he ignores or denies the almost fanatical specificity some of the maps exhibit. On the contrary, Wood realizes the impracticality of a single map featuring the locations of jack-o-lanterns and goes on to explain that this map, in the context of others, helps portray the overall feeling and "je ne sais quoi" of the neighborhood to outsiders, something that was previously privy to only its inhabitants. Woods has a passion for recording the spatial relationship between just about anything and has no shame about its perceived unimportance by others. He is fervently working to create "poetic cartography" and after listening to his interview, it is apparent that Wood is, when it comes to mapping, as passionate as a poet.

Although Toby Lester may be just as passionate as Denis Wood, it's certainly not about mapping in the conventional sense. After listening to the broadcast, it is obvious that Lester is a musical man. Not only was he 'tuned-in' enough to recognize that appliances surrounding him were constantly humming their own musical note, but he also had the drive to investigate further with the use of a pitch pipe. Using the pipe, he was able to discern the exact chord the typically unobserved drones of his workplace came together to make. He even went as far to research historical Catholic texts that associate meanings to each particular chord, finding that his office was playing the combination of notes that the Catholic's referred to as "the Devil in the music." While, no doubt, a passionate man, Lester's motivation is much different than Wood's.

While Wood spends his time trying to map out as many things that he can, Lester spends his time mapping out one specific thing that he was already interested in. I consider myself a musical person and had a discovery similar to Lester's a few years ago. After honking my car's horn and realizing it was on key with a song on the radio, I wanted to know what note was made. When I arrived at my house I honked the horn one last time, hummed the note to myself as I entered my house, made my way to my piano, and mapped the note... F-sharp. I, like Lester, unconsciously stumbled upon mapping. I was led to do so because of my thirst for musical knowledge and not because I have a need to map everything that I can. Wood maps because of his love of mapping while Lester unknowingly happened upon mapping because of his preexisting interest in music.

1.10.10
This American Life: Wood vs. Lester

In this episode of This American Life the five senses are evaluated in different mapping techniques, Denis Wood and Toby Lester are both very bright and noticed bits of life that many others may not.

Denis Wood has worked with maps for quite some time now, focusing on mapping things that the eye sees. From his hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina, he works in his neighborhood, Boiling Springs, to pin point certain things throughout his neighborhood. I believe he said one of the first maps that he decided to put together was a map of all the lines (head lamps, sewer lines, telephone lines, television lines as well as phone lines) in his neighborhood. During the podcast, it was said that this made the town “a living organism” the way all the lights and colors were shown throughout the city. Every traffic sign was even drawn on the map.

The map that I found most interesting from Wood was his pumpkin experiment. He mapped all the houses that had pumpkins on the front porches around Halloween and than compared that to roughly how many times that house, or household, had appeared in the city paper. He realized that the farther away from the Halloween decorated houses he got, the less of a chance that the household would have been in the paper. He mentioned that a lot of the homes that are chosen to be in the city paper are ones of higher importance or those of historical value, but those aren’t the only ones placed in the paper, as he saw with mapping the pumpkins.

Toby Lester also mapped out parts of the city and even his work area at his office, but in a different way. He used sound opposed to sight to map out different parts of the area. It all started in his office when he noticed the constant humming of his heater, and than his computer and eventually he had high and low notes that he was distracted by throughout his day to keep him from his work. He measured and studied the harmonic intervals from these objects just as Wood did in his city.

Denis Wood and Jonathon Gold both focused on mapping subjects that would not only familiarize themselves, but also others with their neighborhoods. Denis Wood basically ended up mapping socio-economic status, although I think it was unintentional. He mapped everything thing in his neighborhood that he could think of, including who was in the newsletter, who had pumpkins at Halloween and how leaves looked with light breaking through them. Turns out the houses that are mentioned in the neighborhood newsletter, always stay the same - even when the occupants of the houses change. He came to the obvious conclusion that the newsletter has a lot to do with who has money in the neighborhood. My favorite part of his section though was that he mapped out how the leaves looked with sunlight coming through them - I never would have thought that something so poetic could be mapped.

Jonathon Gold started off with only the intention to map about different tastes in his neighborhood. He ended up learning a lot about different cultures, and being able to see all the similarities that are really there between them. Gold wanted to share what he learned about other cultures, and that you don’t have to be scared of other cultures and mapping allowed him to share this with his community. At first Gold’s mapping seems systematic, but at the end you can tell he relaxes and enjoys what he’s doing more when he feels like he more freedom in deciding what restaurants to go to.

I think Gold's related most to our project but he was interested in learning about other people and wanted to share that information and have people learn from what he'd done.

Toby Lester is a hearing mapper who became obsessed with background noise that most people have become quite used to, while Deb Monroe is also an obsessed mapper except for the fact that she is only mapping her body.

Lester one day noticed all of the background noise in his life and took great interest in the way the noises sounded, but also if they impacted a person’s mood. He is concerned with how different sounds, pitches and noises affect people. He has found that some noises can be good and influence people in a positive way while other ones can influence them in a negative way.

Similarly to Lester, Monroe became a mapper after hearing about something and taking more interest in it. Unlike Lester, Monroe uses her eyes and sense of touch to map her body while the main component to Lester’s mapping is listening and hearing sounds. I think that the difference between the way they map is that Lester is looking for the effects that sounds have on people while Monroe is looking for a more clear answer of whether she has a disease, tumor, etc. or not. Monroe is only concerned about mapping herself and trying to figure out what is wrong with her while Lester is trying to make generalizations about certain sounds.

I find the technique that Lester uses to map very intriguing because it is something that I occasionally think about. In my case, I tend to focus very little on “background noise”, like the noise of the heater, computer or television until I need quiet. During this time, I like for things to be quiet and often get distracted by even the faintest sounds. I think that Lester’s technique can possibly help many people if he finds strong correlations between sounds and people’s moods. I think that this would be something very interesting to map around Wilmington comparing the sounds that we hear in different places.

At first I thought that Monroe was crazy for mapping herself and becoming obsessed, but I think that her mapping has obviously helped her. Even though her husband may find her constantly checking herself odd, she has had many ailments over the years and has survived them all because of this. Although I feel like Lester’s form of mapping has a potentially greater good for society than Monroe’s, I still think that her form is useful on an individual level.

Denis Wood uses sight to map everything within the confines of his suburban neighborhood in Raleigh, North Carolina. He uses the most common form of mapping that we see most regularly on a daily basis: mapping by sight. Usual maps of this subject would include such maps pertaining to weather, directions, etc. But Wood takes it to the next level by mapping out one distinct aspect on countless maps. This includes such things as mapping which houses get mentioned the most often in the neighborhood newsletter. He noted that there is certainly a pattern as to which people (address) is mentioned the most often. He finds it interesting to map out patterns that might lead to something helpful with the people in the neighborhood that would need to gather or find out particulars of the area in which they live. He uses very concrete, factual information to create these maps that cannot easily be disputed. Wood seems to be very interested in the social dynamics of his neighborhood, and by tracking many different aspects, he is able to use his interest of his surroundings and turn it into pertinent information.

This method of mapping is very different from the mapmaker that I found most interesting: Jonathan Gold. Gold goes to Pico Ave. in Los Angeles and maps the entire street by taste. This is completely different than what Wood does. While Wood is plotting distinct things such as trees, or powerlines, Gold is using himself as the variable to test the restaurants. His work is highly subjective, as taste is arguably one of most subjective senses. Most people can agree on things that they see, or touch, but taste is most certainly different to everyone. However, Gold’s mapping would be extremely useful and purposeful to the audience that wanted to find a suitable restaurant on that particular street. It seems that both of these mapmakers were able to take something that they personally were interested in, and turn it into an information system for the public.

Denis Wood, who has made a variety of maps for his home neighborhood, and Jonathan Gold, who has mapped food on a local street, are both passionate about their unique projects. Both Wood and Gold were inspired in one way or another and used that inspiration to create guides for their local areas.
Although Wood’s maps are sight oriented, whereas Gold’s are based on taste, each represent more than just landmarks or locations – they symbolize something deeper. For instance, Wood’s maps allow the reader to draw connections between the different subjects, like pumpkins on porches and number of times mentioned in a newsletter. From here, the reader can draw conclusions regarding the socio-economic makeup of the neighborhood, the ages of people in the neighborhood, or whatever else he or she may think up. Gold’s taste maps also provide information beyond how delicious or disgusting a restaurant may be. The reader can infer which ethnicity makes up certain blocks of the street depending on the dishes served in the restaurants. These maps allow readers to visualize how closely different nationalities can work together yet how varied their food can be.
Though Wood and Gold share an unexplainable passion for map-making, each has his own reasons and goals regarding his projects. Wood makes map according to what he sees – whether it be trees, streetlights, or jack-o-lanterns. Each map he makes cites just one object. His desired outcome is for the reader to look at each map individually and then draw conclusions or ideas about how the maps fit together. Wood compares his maps to a novel – the reader doesn’t get all the information in one place at one time. Each piece builds onto the next, creating complex “stories” from which the reader can learn something about the neighborhood.
Gold, on the other hand, is more inspired by the unique flavors found on Pico Boulevard. Rather than mapping one small area in a variety of different ways (as Wood does), he extends his single map down a huge boulevard, solely focusing on the food of the restaurants. His goals involve not only recommending or discouraging the various restaurants, but making people aware of the great diversity found on one street. He hopes to encourage the acceptance of all cultures and describes food as an efficient “medium” to do so.
I learned that it’s possible to map practically everything. It also seems important to be very specific in the objectives of the map – rather than trying to draw a map showing 10 different things, stick to one or two details and go from there.

I find it very interesting that Denis Wood was capable of mapping the pools of light from within neighborhoods. In addition, I love the sociological assessment that he makes about people that are mentioned in the neighborhoods newsletter in correspondence with the homes active participation on social events, such as the placement of pumpkins on their porches during Halloweens. I find it to be very interesting that this type of assessment may be found utilizing mapping techniques.

Contrastly from Denis Wood, Toby Lester uses a completely different aspect, and utilizes the sense of sound. These different directions offer different viewpoints on mapping and what it can encompass. Denis incorporates our strong immediate sense of awareness while Toby addresses the more subtle or malleable surroundings, as we tend to hear what we seem to focus on. This provides completely different information from one to another.

Toby Lester’s use of auditory awareness as a means of cartography is a very interesting approach. One could quite obviously use of sight and easily identify the use of smell as a specific approach. When one smells a specific food type, such as Mexican or a steak house, one is completely aware that those things are around. The utilization of sound, however is a dynamic approach in that there are no absolutes and no specifics, which allow for interpretation and individual analyzation.

When looking at these map makers, it can be assessed that the detail that these men employ in their work is something that should be heavily considered, examined, and utilized. The scrutiny used by the city of New York in effort to monitor, diagram, and catalogue every pot hole in the city is an effort that should be employed when we begin to create our maps.

Denis Wood created a map of his neighborhood (from traffic lights to Halloween pumpkins) which was a sight map, Toby Lester maps out sound instead. Denis Wood does not focus on one particular item in the realm of sight and because of that he has mapped out many aspects of sight related to his town. Unlike Wood, Lester simply maps sound in the places he spend a lot of time in. The majority of Lester’s mapping was done in his office and at his home, while Woods mapping took him all over his town.

Toby Lester found himself mapping these ambient sounds because he noticed he was trying to create a rhythm in them and after he did he recognized it was affecting his mood. To me, it seems that Wood’s map is more practical for everyday use. Lester’s map is definitely interesting, but would only be used if it was something that was of interest to an individual. Wood’s map would be applicable to a broader audience than Lester’s, which seems like more of a personal map.

Lester and Wood simply had different ideas and goals in mind when they created their maps. From my personal experience with trying to find specific things in my own neighborhood or town I think that Wood had others in mind when creating his map. I think that Wood’s map is more beneficial to people than Lester’s.

These individuals helped me to see the broad spectrum of options I have to choose from when it comes time to create my own map for the mapping project.