ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how 3D technologies create “model environments” that dislocate sites from culture and context in favor of accuracy and archives. It explains how 3D technologies are linked to colonial practices of collection and dislocation. The chapter discusses the concept of stereoscopic rhetorics to examine how 3D scans rewrite cultural heritage sites and engender similar ways of seeing that dislocate local landscapes in the name of global heritage preservation. Many 3D scanning methods privilege mathematical accuracy over humanistic inquiry, creating a surface-level, one-dimensional picture of cultural heritage and environments. Digital 3D technologies survey an object or landscape and record precise, reproducible measurements, translating math into a three-dimensional model. 3D scans are considered some of the most accurate methods for reproducing objects or scenes because of the sheer amount of data collected. 3D models are data visualizations—a way of assembling measurements and images to create an accurate digital render.
