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Nicosia,
Cyprus. The flag of Turkish Northern Cyprus imposed on a hillside of the Kyrenia
Mountains. This flag is clearly visible from Greek Southern Cyprus and is a fine example of how nations
impose symbols of territoriality upon the landscape. It serves to remind others that they do not
belong in this place and that they lack power over that particular region.
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Eastern Turkey. Eastern Turkey
is the poorest part of the country, especially in isolated rural areas such
as this. The climate quite arid, but
is probably subject to occasional moisture and even flooding, which is why we
see such a broad, dry river valley below.
The marginal climate of the area means that it is better for a
pastoral economy rather than an agricultural economy. Thus the sheep grazing in the river
valley. The road is paved, however, not
for the locals, who probably don’t have cars (but obviously do have donkeys),
but rather for tourists who have come to visit some nearby ruins. The pillars are likely not in their
original location, but serve to symbolize to the tourist their arrival in a
unique place. We can also note the
more religious nature of Eastern Turkey as
opposed to the urbanized western part of the country, due to the fact that
the lady is wearing a headscarf.
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Near Sada, Yemen. A small brickmaking
operation in the semiarid north of Yemen. Most buildings in this region are made of
the local dirt. Too few trees grow in
the region for wood to be used for anything except building frames. Likewise, Yemen is a poor country that
cannot afford to import wood from abroad.
While three men seem to be working, four are not. While they might be on a break, it is
likely that this is a result of them being unemployed, which is common in a
place like this. This may be the most
exciting place in the neighborhood.
The pipe they are sitting by is an irrigation pipe. I could hear many water pumps thumping in
this valley, indicating that the government has made some investments to
improve agricultural production in their country. This is critical if they are to grow enough
food to support the ever increasing population of Yemen.
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Hajjah, Yemen. As Yemen slowly modernizes, the
population has become increasingly urbanized and the economy increasingly globalized. In the countryside, this means that some
places are becoming depopulated and some farmers have abandoned their
fields. These agricultural terraces
have been abandoned and it seems that a pastoral economy of a more marginal
region has developed. The abandonment
may have occurred because the same food crops that were once grown here are
now grown more efficiently in other places (inside or outside of Yemen) and
modern transportation can easily deliver these crops to the towns. The local farmers were basically put out of
business. Also note that the shepherd
is a young girl. She is clearly not
attending school. Children are
commonly a source of labor in pastoral and agricultural societies, and
education is often not considered critical. This is especially true in the
case of women in both Islamic and non-Islamic countries.
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Durres,
Albania. Albania
is likely the poorest country in Europe and
was ruled by an isolationist Communist government until the early 1990s. To legitimize their power, the government
attempted to instill paranoia in the population. In order to make it appear as if the threat
of invasion was immanent, the government built thousands of these pillboxes
throughout the entire nation. They
were never used. The influence of the
communist government can also be seen in the fact that apartment buildings
were constructed right next to the beach.
In most capitalist countries, this land would have been determined to
be most valuable for the tourist industry.
Albania
had no tourist industry and therefore saw the beach as readily available land
for the working class to live on. In
1996, when this picture was taken, there was still no tourist industry at
all, and the beach goers are probably locals.
As Albania
turns to capitalism, these buildings will likely be turned into hotels or
vacation homes.
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Sarajevo,
Bosnia. The sign states “City of Serbian
Sarajevo” and stands in a location where the city of Sarajevo has been
divided between Orthodox Serbians and Muslim Bosnians. The sign itself hints at who should venture
beyond this point and who should not, even though
the border is technically open. The
graffiti on the sign indicates that this is contested territory, and not all
people agree that there should be a Serbian Sarajevo. In fact, the United Nations still has a
large presence in Sarajevo
in order to keep violence from breaking out.
If they weren’t there, this sign would not even be here because this
would likely be a fortified border or no border at all, if one group were to
conquer the other.
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Freiburg,
Germany. This scene is an average neighborhood in Germany. Due to land shortages and land use restrictions
in a densely populated country such as Germany,
many more people live in apartment buildings than in the U.S. or Canada. Note that the two mobile homes in the
background are much smaller than those found in North
America as well. Germany simply
does not have the space to accommodate larger ones, even in their
campgrounds, let alone their residential streets. The fountain probably dates from the 1970s
or 1980s and contains sexual themes that would not likely be tolerated in the
United States. Germany has always had a culture
that was more open about the nature of the human body and this is often
reflected in their landscape.
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Northern Germany. As Germany has modernized in the
past 500 years, small hamlets where a few farmers lived grew into larger
towns. These towns were often spaced
only a few miles apart, since transportation was limited to foot, horse or
cart. The land between was where the
local farmers ploughed their fields.
In order to protect its agricultural land, Germany has strict laws
regulating the growth of its towns. It
encourages the growth of multiple villages, rather than allowing a single
town to grow into other towns. The
results of this can be seen in the landscape.
These villages have not grown along the roads, as might occur in a
less regulated environment, but rather grow in a more circular fashion that
keeps them from growing together. The
hillside in the bottom of the picture is being used for vineyards, while the
rest of the agricultural land is devoted to more typical temperate crops.
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Szeged,
Hungary. The main shopping street in Szeged is a pedestrian
zone, which is common in many European cities. Many people still don’t have cars in Hungary, so
this is still a matter of practicality rather than pure aesthetics. Szeged
was destroyed by a flood in the 1880s but managed to mostly survive the World
Wars, so most of the buildings here reflect the styles of the late
1800s. Hungary had been under a
capitalist government for 5 years when this picture was taken and we can
already see the presence of the global world economy with McDonalds, Kodak
and jeans. I’m still trying to come up
with an explanation for the disproportionate amount of pink clothing in this
photo, though….
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Nagylak, Hungary. Borders always provide insights into
landscapes. This is the Hungarian
border with Romania, which
is a major trucking route between Turkey
and Western Europe. One of the reasons why this route is so
popular (or was so in 1996) is that it avoids Serbia and its unstable political
climate, as well as its bribe demanding officials. Romania
and Hungary,
being independent countries, have different laws and regulations. It is often these differences that cause
delays at borders, as customs officials seek to ensure that their countries
laws aren’t being broken. Items
ignored in one country may be illegal in another. This can cause a significant increase in
the transportation costs and ultimately consumer costs, which is why the
European Union has strived to open the borders between its member nations.
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Barrow, Alaska. Barrow is an extremely isolated town in a
harsh climate, but due to the presence of oil money in its economy, the
landscape developed in a way unique to the world. Most interesting is the presence of the
Chinese restaurant in a town of 5000 inhabitants who are mostly Inupiat, far
from any Chinese North American enclave.
There is enough money here to support a market for this and the
population is cosmopolitan enough to want to eat foods that are completely
foreign to this environment. The town
probably would have enough money to pave its roads, but paving would be
impractical in on ground that is wracked by frost heaves every year. Additionally, the ground itself is frozen
for most of the year, which provides a solid surface on which to drive.
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Homer, Alaska. Landscapes can involve average people as
well. In this case, we need to
consider the cultural attitudes that made these people decide that camping on
a rocky beach on a cold weekend in Alaska
was actually a good idea. 50 or 100
years ago, this scene would have been unlikely. Culturally, these people feel that it is
important to separate themselves from urban life and
experience the out-of-doors. Why would
they believe this? Technologically
speaking, easy access to cars and buildings make it unlikely that any of
these people will catch hypothermia, so there is little to actually fear from
the environment. Also interesting is
the Fishermen’s Memorial in the background.
This memorial symbolizes those in this town who have died in working
in the towns fishing economy. Homer
romanticizes itself as a fishing town and honors those who have given their
lives in this way, but it is unlikely that any who
have died in support of the town’s tourist economy would be memorialized in
such a way.
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San Francisco,
California. The Haight-Ashbury neighborhood in San Francisco gained
fame in the late1960s as being the cultural hearth of the countercultural
hippies. While the neighborhood still
has a decidedly alternative feel to it and some people migrate here to be
around that particular lifestyle, much of the “alternativeness” of the
landscape is due to the commercialization of this culture for tourists. People tend to mythologize the past and are
fond of experiencing the positive aspects of historical locations, but often
prefer not to be reminded of some of the darker sides of these
locations. Themes such as peace, love
and a community spirit are commercialized and celebrated here, but other
themes such as violence, excessive drug use and similar ideas that may have
once been a very real part of this neighborhood are not much in evidence.
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Gary, Indiana. This particular landscape
exhibits what is likely a lower middle class house with the cooling tower of
a nuclear power plant behind it. What
may have been a bland image of a typical American house suddenly becomes
filled with many issues. The biggest
is the question of why a nuclear power plant was built in this location. The southern shore
of Lake Michigan is densely
populated and has traditionally had a lot of heavy industry, due to the
convergence of rail lines at Chicago
and the access the lakes provide to the east coast. Industry requires energy, and in the 1960s
nuclear energy provided a major source for that. The plant, however, was not located away
from populated areas in agricultural land, but was located in close proximity
to a poorer neighborhood. Since the
poor traditionally have limited political power, locating potentially
dangerous structures near them is more feasible than locating them near
people who have more political power.
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Southwest Wisconsin. This photo exhibits a typical Midwestern
agricultural landscape. The furrows of
the fields are contoured to the shape of the land to prevent erosion. The stream valleys are left vegetated to
prevent erosion as well. Both these
practice arose in the U.S.
in the 1920s and 1930s. Corn is being
grown a large part of which goes towards feeding dairy cattle, a few of which
can be seen in the background. The
dairy industry arose in the upper Midwest because of the close proximity to
market in industrial cities such as Milwaukee
and Chicago. The faster dairy could be transported to
market, the less chance of spoilage.
Due to faster trains and interstate highways, much of the nation’s
dairy production has shifted to places where it would have otherwise been
impossible in prior years, such as California
and Oregon. The temperate climate here is very similar
to that of northern Europe, where the dairy industry arose, thus the animals
and crops are quite similar between the upper Midwest and places like England.
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All photos taken by David
Snyder.
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