Menatti Landscape

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A Rhizome of Landscapes: a geophilosophical perspectiveabout contemporary global spaces

Laura Menatti

Department of Philosophy, University of the Basque Country, [email protected]

Abstract: Geophilosophy is an innovative and interdisciplinary approach to the study of place, space and landscape in the nowadays globa-lised world. In this paper I will analyse the concepts of rhizome and milieu, the former considered as a new model for the relation between

global and local landscapes, the latter as the core of the processual relationship between culture and nature. Furthermore I will address the

issue of the distinction between landscape and environment, considering the latter from an ecological rather reductionist point of view;

in doing so I will refer to the bridge-notion of affordance, meaning with this term the wide range of possibilities that place gives to our

perception. From this stand point I will explain the ethical and political consequences of these two theoretical remarks.

Keywords: aesthetics, affordance, ethics, geophilosophy, globalization, landscape, place, rhizome, space.

1. Introduction

Geophilosophy is a philosophical and interdisciplinary approach

which focuses on the study of the contemporary issues of place

and space, by conducting a genealogical analysis of terms such as

landscape, milieu and territory. Geophilosophy belongs to the do-

main of environmental aesthetics and it is quite considerable in

the denition and comprehension of contemporary landscapes. Theterm was rstly introduced by Gilles Deleuze (1991), then adoptedin Italy and France by some philosophers (e.g. by L. Bonesio, M.Cacciari) who have extended the scope of investigation and havedetached themselves from Deleuzes thought. Despite that, I argue

that one of the central gures in geophilosophy remains, without

any doubt, Gilles Deleuze, not simply because he invented the termbut because, as I will show, he offers the possibility of applying the

geophilosophical thought to the study of contemporary landscapes

by introducing the model of the rhizome. Furthermore my ap-

proach is aimed at widening the thought on landscape towards the

ecological perception by introducing the term affordance, used to

describe the possibilities that the environment can offer.

2. Geophilosophy: space, place and landscape

The term geophilosophy was introduced by Deleuze with the aimof reorienting philosophy from concentrating on temporality and

historicity towards focusing on spatiality and geography, because

thinking takes place in the relationship of territory and the earth

(Deleuze 1991, 86). Furthermore, according to him, ancient phi-losophy was born in Greece in the moment in which a deep bound

between thought, events and space was established, thus philoso-

phy was born as a non-accidental conjuncture between cultural

concepts and space.

Starting from this idea geophilosophy has developed in these years

a deep genealogical analysis of the concept of space, place and land-

scape. The distinction between the rst two terms constitutes oneof the theoretical bases of geophilosophical thought. It is inspired

by a distinction proposed by the phenomenological geography of

Eric Dardel (1952) between geometric and geographic space; theformer considered homogeneous, uniform, neutral, and quantita-

tive; the latter, instead, qualitatively differentiated. Thus, for geo-

philosophy, place corresponds to Dardels geographical space. It is

considered as recognizable, symbolic, mythical, and religious. It islocal and regional; it is the landscape too, it is the concrete set-

ting for local culture, and concerns the process of sense-making. In

this respect I would like to strongly highlight that the connection

between place and local is not a matter of scale: we can, on the con-

trary, characterize the term localas something regional, multiscalar,

by providing an idea of local that avoids the peril of closure, tribal

identity and localism. I think that this clarication is quite importantto prevent possible misunderstandings especially in reference to

some concepts such as heimat (Menatti, 2011, 2012).Space, instead, is something global; it refers to measurement, calcu-

lation, innite extension, and homogeneity. It is a term belonging to

Modern Western philosophy, expression of Cartesianism and to aspecic idea of nature in the history of ideas. E. Casey argues, in fact,that for many centuries, in philosophical thought and in the history

of ideas, persists what he has called disdain for the specialness of

place (Casey, 2007), implying that the place with its own qualitative,perceived, relational, and historical features has been substituted by

the concept of Cartesian space, characterized as empty, calculable,

innite, and homologated.Nevertheless the core of this paper is the idea of landscape con-

sidered as the visible and invisible shape of a place. It is well known

that landscape is a cultural product of a society; it is not something

universal and did not exist in every age. In the last thirty years many

philosophers, sociologists and anthropologists have spoken about

the denition of landscape: for example A. Berque (1995), com-paring Western and Chinese landscape, afrms that some societieswere not landscape-aware. Berque, quoting the famous assertion

by Czanne that the peasants of Provence had never seen (from anaesthetical and artistic point of view) the Montaigne Sainte Victoire,argues that many societies have worked with the environment, but

never wondered about landscape. For many authors, landscape has

been invented by city-dwellers and artists during the Modern Age,while ancient civilizations (e.g. Ancient Greece) did not have in itslanguage a world for landscape. An aesthetic conception of land-scape emerged both in China, about two thousand years ago, and in

Europe during the XV century, within Flemish art.

As we know, an innovative concept of landscape, which over-comes the aesthetic reductionism, has been introduced thanks to

the European Convention of Landscape (2000). I argue that one


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of the most interesting ideas of this document is its new concep-

tion of landscape: in the Florence Convention we read, in fact, that

landscape does not merely mean a beautiful landscape (a postcardlandscape). Indeed, the convention acknowledges that landscape isnot only a view (landskaap), but also a place (lanshaft), with its ownculture (Howard, 2004). The postcard model has distinguished formany centuries interesting and beautiful places (e.g. panoramas)

from ugly ones. As a consequence, urban planning and environmen-tal national laws have often safeguarded only postcard places, leav-ing an insane property speculation free to destroy places that were

considered as ordinary or ugly. On the contrary, according to the

Convention: the landscape is an important part of the quality of

life for people everywhere: in urban areas and in the countryside,

in degraded areas as well as in areas of high quality (Preamble).This is quite interesting for the analysis of globalized contemporarylandscape and, as I will explain, in the clarication between placeand non-places.

I want also to emphasize the aspect of landscape related to prac-

tices, and not just its symbolic and spiritual characteristics. I think

that practices are an important element which needs to be taken

into consideration. On the one hand it allows us to avoid the riskof making place something metaphysical. On the other hand it en-

ables the understanding of the connection between landscape and

territory. I argue that landscape can be considered as a territory of

practices (De Certeau, 1980), and I use the concept of territory asa valid instrument for describing the complex nature of a landscape.

I quote De Certeau, not with regards to his controversial distinc-

tion between space and place, but in reference to the fact that the

concept of practice can entail the idea of an experienced landscape

(lived and composed of paths and continual reconstructions). Byspeaking of practice, I point out the sensible characteristic of a

landscape and its evolution.

Thus the notion of landscape is composed by a wide range of ele-ments, all entailing the relation between cultural and natural as-

pects. Therefore the term refers to a wide spectrum of concepts,and, as I said before, since landscape is everywhere and it is not

merely a view, it can contain in itself the notions of place, space,

territory and milieu. We can consider all these terms as severalmeanings of the concept: for this reason I will show later how the

term environment is a fundamental part of the landscape too and

how I absolutely reject the idea that the environment is simply a

name for a biologistic description of place according to the mod-

ernist approach.

3. Territorialisation and deterritorialization: a model

to understand globalized landscape

Contemporary landscape is a very problematic issue: one of the

reasons is clearly that it is globalized. As I showed elsewhere, a par-allelism can be identied between the space-place difference andthe opposition between place and non-place by the French anthro-

pologist Marc Aug. Even though I consider it important to takeinto consideration the distinction between places and non-places

in order to understand the aspects and the dynamics of contempo-

rary globalization, I advocate that contemporary landscape can be

better described by using the concept of rhizome and by dening it

through a continual dialectic between deterritorialization and ter-ritorialisation acts.

Deleuze introduces these terms in order to describe the processes

of creation and dismantling of a territory, as two movements of a

continuous dialectic characterizing the dwelling on the Earth. In

particular, as he stated, inAnti-Oedipus (1972), in the Post-Modernworld deterritorialization is related to madness and it implies the

disconnection of the sick body without organs of the schizo-

phrenic from the nature of his own body and of the Earth. In the

same way Deleuze uses the word territorialities to describe theneurotic (with his Oedipus territorialities). The schizoid, instead,for him is someone who is continually wandering about, migrating

here, there, and everywhere as best he can, he plunges further and

further into the realm of deterritorialization, reaching the furthest

limits of the decomposition of the socius (Deleuze 1972, 35).Thus schizophrenia becomes an interesting model to describecontemporary migrants and deterritorialization (Buchanan 2005).According to Deleuze ancient states and city states carry out adeterritorialization by adapting the territory to a geometrical ex-

tensiveness; the imperial spatium of the State and the political ex-

tension of the City are deterritorializing principles of an originally

nomadic place, that once was connected with the Earth (Deleuze

1991, 85). But it is with capitalism and the despotic State that de -territorialization reaches its climax. For Deleuze modern societies

are characterized by continuous processes of deterritorialization:

what they deterritorialize with one hand, they reterritorialize with

the other. These neoterritorialities are often articial, residual, andarchaic. Thus every territory in history is subject to both theseactivities.

The concepts of deterritorialization and re-territorialization can beapplied to the explanation of the dialectic between local and global

landscape: local is something connected with place, whichever its

extension, and with the creation of territory; global, on the other

hand, is connected with deterritorialization.

Nevertheless the issue is not so easy. I sustain that every cultureentails local (earth as a place) and global (earth as a globe) ac-tions. Every culture is characterized by both deterritorializing and

reterritorializing movements. This kind of relation is never static,sedentary, but implies a continuous movement in connection to

global uxes. However, it is also true that globalization itself is adeterritorializing process because, as Deleuze points out, capitalism

applies extensive measurements to the Earth that, on the contrary,

needs intensive and qualitative modalities of approach. On the oth-

er hand, globalization does not just erase the differences and the

specic characteristics of places (I think we have to consider alsothe different historical phases of globalization, not just the last one,

dominated by the capitalism of trades). Rather, globalized worldmeans a continuous dialectic movement between local place and

global space. The poles of this dialectic are not in radical opposition,but are complementary. Global becomes the relation and the con-

nection between different places. According to Deleuzes theory,in fact, territory is unpredictable in what concerns its shape (land-scape) and the uxes that pass through it: especially in the Post-modern age there is neither temporal stability nor spatial xity. Wecannot simply and nostalgically speak about a place whose qualities

are erased by globalization; on the contrary, the uxes that crossa territory can now erase its qualities and congure a new anddeeper kind of landscape. Whether this shape is in harmony with aplace (considered as historical, symbolical) or not, depends on the

complexity of elements that need to be analyzed. Hence, the crucialpoint is to understand which kinds of deterritorializations and re-


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Laura Menatti -A Rhizome of Landscapes

territorializations, which kinds of places and spaces have emerged

in the Post-modern age. Non-places are surely a distinctive aspect

of Post-modern deterritorialization, yet in this short paper I want

to point out that the simple dichotomies between place/non-place

and space/place as something contrastive are not enough to un-

derstand the contemporary landscape. Moreover, from the ethicalpoint of view, I suggest, they are not enough to take care of all kinds

of landscapes in the world. I argue that when a space is markedas no-place/junk space or a similar denition, an aesthetical and,consequently an ethical (meaning by this the action of taking care)judgment is implied. As I said above, landscape is everywhere, isglobal and local, with each landscape entailing a specic kind ofrelationship with the human beings. The task of the philosopher isto understand the relationship between people and contemporary

landscape, and to encourage the development of educational prac-

tices aimed at dwelling in a landscape, and feeling that landscape.

4. A Rhizome of landscapes

The rhizome (from the ancient Greek rizo-, root) is a biologicalterm that denotes the modication of the underground stem of aplant. If a rhizome is separated into pieces, each piece may give rise

to a new plant. In Thousand Plateaus (Deleuze, 1987) the conceptof rhizome is used to denote a network in which, unlike in the

tree-like organizations, any node can immediately connect with any

other node. Networks replace hierarchies, but it is too trivial to as-

sociate the rhizome with the net: rhizome also involves the idea of

process and it is aimed at explaining the relation between different

concepts, which are only apparently in opposition. In fact, the no-

tion of rhizome can express the relation between global and local,

between space and place, as a conceptual model of the complexity

of spatial systems and of the new congurations of globalized space.Carl Gustav Jung used the metaphor of rhizome to speak about the

deep and invisible nature of life; Deleuze uses it to introduce a new

model of science, language and space (Deleuze, 1987, 21). Deleuzesidea of space constitutes a pragmatics of the transit, of the dissemi-

nation of the sense (as Derrida would say) and it never closes thegure of space, that is, it is never completely dened and enclosed.Thus rhizome can be used to denote a processual network of land-scapes. Applying this concept to the question of landscape has thetwo following consequences: (1) inside the rhizome we have differ-ent processual landscapes. I call processual landscapes every mutual

relationship belonging and constituting a landscape and involving

the couple nature and culture, human being and environment, ecol-

ogy and history of ideas; (2) the identities of landscapes are notsomething xed, pre-given, unchanging and decided a-priori, butlandscape is always in evolution. Thus I can assert that the contem-porary conguration of places implies a collection of rhizomaticlandscapes mutually dened. The rhizome is important because itallows us to say that nowadays its still possible to speak about

identities of places, but at the same time we need to characterize

identity as something not static, and that cannot be reconstructed

merely through the concepts of heimat and genius loci (elementswhich belong to places, that are distinguished for their beauty or

memory). In the Post-modern age, identity is something not clear,changeable. Above all, it is built on the relationship between us and

the place, and between different places all over the world.Furthermore, I suggest that rhizome is an open system: it involves

the idea of a global space formed by multiple landscapes. Each land-

scape can be connected with others without necessarily following a

unique and xed trajectory. The production of places and landscapeshappens according to different scales and relational modalities. Therhizome is a source of diversity: from the cartographic point of

view it opens to innite possibilities. The rhizome has never an endbut, rather, a milieu from which it grows and which it overspills. It

constitutes linear multiplicities with n dimensions having neithersubject nor object, which can be laid out on a plane of consistency,

and from which the one is always subtracted (Deleuze, 1987, p.21). Thus the rhizome refers to the multiplicity of places, as well asto the important concept of milieu: Deleuze, in fact, uses the latter

to denote the core of such a place-space, which is related to sym-

bolic elements that are not always in evidence. I think that one of

the challenges of thinking about the identity of place is constituted

by elaborating a new concept of space made of a multiplicity of mi-

lieux. The concept of milieu is as crucial as the rhizome. The term isused in contemporary geography to denote places, landscapes and

territories lled with cultural and social elements. We were notborn in a milieu, but we create a milieu by an elective and emotional

relationship. The concept of milieu allows us to go beyond the ideaof place as something original, sedentary, and given by birth. With -out the need to recur to a deterministic approach, we can say that

the environment affords us to build a milieu. I think that the milieu

is the historical, memorial, and at the same time potential, core of a

landscape, according to a non-deterministic interpretative grammar

that focuses on the relation between culture and nature. For this

reason I think that the rhizomatic global space can be considered

as made of milieux, multiple contexts, which constitute different

places that we have to take care of.

5. Ecology of perception: the affordance

Such a complex topic as the notion of landscape requires an inter-

disciplinary approach. As a geophilosopher I study the genealogyof concepts such as place, space, landscape, milieu and territory,

trying to embed them in the contemporary global horizon. Yet as

a researcher of cultural studies and history of ideas I could miss

an important point in analyzing the landscape: that is the ecologi-

cal question connected to the term environment. The concept ofenvironment is often criticized for being used in a reductionist and

realist way to describe the physico-biological (objective) elementsof nature. The problem is that the environment also belongs tolandscape, and has a role in dening the latter, especially if we con -sider the environment from an ecological perspective.

Hence, I suggest using the bridge concept of affordance to con-nect the cultural study on landscape to the biological and ecologi-

cal ones. Landscape is not only inhabited, but also perceived. Eventhough landscape is often considered only a cultural issue, belong-

ing to humanities, or at least to human geography, I argue, that the

study of landscape should comprehend also the ecology of percep-

tion (Gibson, 1979). In 1979 J. Gibson introduced the concept ofaffordance, that is what the environment offers the animal, what it

provides or furnishes, either for good or ill [] I mean by it some-

thing that refers to both environment and the animal in a way that

no existing term does. It implies the complementarity of the animal

and the environment (Gibson 1979, 127). The affordance is thepropriety of the natural environment, offered to the animal and the


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Landscape and Imagination - Epistemology

human being. Two specications are required: rst of all, affordanceis not a property, neither an a-priori, nor a universal measure. It is

something unique for every animal and it belongs to (and within)the relationship between the environment and the perceiver. Theperceiver (a human being) is not a Cartesian subject (character-ized by the hardware/software dichotomy): I suggest that naturalvision depends on the eyes in the head on a body supported by the

ground, the brain being only the central organ of a complete visualsystem (Gibson 1979, p. 1).Therefore a human being is someone emplaced in the place, inthe nature and in the landscape, and the affordances are revealed

as perceptional characteristics during the interaction between the

environment and the perceiver. The human being and landscape(constituted by affordances) are in a mutual and dynamical relation:as a consequence we need to introduce the concept of processual

landscape. Affordances does not imply a realistic approach to thenature/culture problem, neither do they exist without interaction.

Hence the processual landscape is the product of the dialectic be-tween the culture and the affordances of a place. This relationshipis neither realist, nor conceptually determined, but it is a process

in continuous evolution, happening in the interaction between envi-ronment (and the complexity of the affordances and invariants) andthe perceiver (a body in moving) in the place, who uses his natureand culture to create a relationship/boundary with the environ-

ment. This relation is what I called processual landscape. What con-tinuously results from this kind of ongoing process can be places,

spaces and landscapes.

6. Conclusion

In this paper I tried to make a short genealogy of the concept of

landscape. The distinction between space and place, so importantfor geophilosophy, anthropology and human geography has been

widened in relation to terms such as rhizome and processual land-

scape. The contemporary globalized world forces us (as an ethicalimperative) to take into consideration several kinds of landscapes(e.g. the idea of the third landscape proposed by G. Clment). Fur-thermore I think that cultural studies should take into consider-

ation the perceptive aspect of landscape: that is, introducing the

concept of affordance, belonging to ecological psychology, in order

to widen the range of study and to be able to deal with what nowa-

days is a higher and higher number of factors concurring to the

creation of a landscape. In conclusion, this paper is aimed at pre-

venting the risk of a simplistic cultural determination of landscape,

but at the same time, preventing the risk of a realist approach to

the issue of landscape.

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Aug M, 1997. Limpossible voyage. Le tourisme et ses image. Payot &Rivages, Paris.

Berque A, 1995. Les raisons du paysage : de la Chine antique aux environ-nements de synthse. ditions Hazan, Paris.

Buchanan I, Lambert G (ed.), 2005. Deleuze and space, Edinburgh Univer-sity Press, Edinburgh.

Dardel E, 1952. Lhomme et la Terre. Nature de la ralit gographique,Presses Universitaire de France , Paris.

De Certeau M, 1980. LInvention du quotidien, Vol. 1, Arts de Faire. Uniongnrale dditions, Paris.

Deleuze G, Guattari F, 1972. Capitalisme et schizophrnie. LAnti-Oedipus.Les ditions de Minuit, Paris. [Anti-oedipus. Capitalisme and schizo-phrenia. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis 1983].

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