Spatial Humanities 2024

Approaching landscape through language
09-25, 13:30–14:30 (Europe/Amsterdam), MG1 00.04 Hörsaal

The importance of understanding diverse ways of valuing "natural" landscapes has been thrown into sharp focus by the development of new typologies of nature's values (Pascual et al. 2023). Despite the acknowledged importance of diverse values, little work has explored these issues through the explicit lens of language. In my talk I will set out a series of different conceptual models through which landscape can be explored, including framings such as Landscape Character Assessment, Cultural Ecosystem Services and Nature's Contribution's to People. I will explore different ways in which language can be used to explore elements of these conceptualisations, presenting the results of both corpus-based and empirical studies in a range of European languages and settings. Using these studies and framings I will discuss the strengths and weaknesses of different methodological approaches to operationalising landscape values, and link these to work in spatial humanities.