Introduction

Clearly we are dealing with something complicated, and we cannot even say that it is a complicated object because, as many theorists have pointed out, landscape is something which is mental as well as physical, subjective as well as objective. One of the most significant moments in the study of landscapes was the ‘cultural turn’ in geography of the 1970s and 1980s, which highlighted the roles of language, meaning and representation in the construction of social

realities. Central to this was the idea, advanced by Denis Cosgrove and Stephen Daniels, that landscape, when considered from a humanist Marxist position, is not a neutral term but is an ideologically charged ‘way of seeing’. In a sense, this was the moment at which landscape, as an object of study, lost its innocence, and this was to have a strong influence upon cognate disciplines such as art history, landscape archaeology and landscape architecture. Translations of the word ‘landscape’ into different languages carry different baggage, but

there are even significant variations in usage within the Anglophone nations. The slipperiness of the landscape concept, the multiplicity of disciplinary interpretations, and the sometimes jarring lexicons employed in different fields, might prompt us to abandon any attempt at trans-disciplinary work or understanding. As editors we believe that this would be a profound mistake. We are all board members of the Landscape Research Group, a non-profit organisation set up in the 1960s to encourage precisely this sort of cooperation across academic frontiers, as well as to enhance the dialogue between researchers and practitioners, the latter being a group which includes landscape architects, artists, curators, field archaeologists and indeed anyone who has any interest in or involvement with landscapes. LRG also owns and produces the peerreviewed journal Landscape Research which is published by Routledge. Our own backgrounds exemplify the diversity of the group as a whole. Peter is a geographer who for many years taught in an art school, before becoming an authority on matters of heritage. Ian read philosophy as an undergraduate and then became a landscape architect. Emma read anthropology, became interested in cultural landscapes and now works in the areas of heritage studies, heritage tourism and cultural policy. When it was put to us by an anonymous referee that we might structure this book in sections

related to the principal disciplines with a stake in landscape, we immediately agreed that this ran completely against the ethos of LRG, and counter to our own strong inclinations. Of course, it is risky to assemble a book which melds so many different perspectives, but the journal Landscape Research has been putting together papers from disparate sources for more than thirty years and all the indicators – growth in submissions, rejection rate, citation indexes, readership figures and so on – indicate that there is a diverse and growing community of landscape scholars who appreciate this eclecticism. If we may slip into a landscape metaphor for a moment, the terrain this book covers may be complicated and even difficult in places, but our book is intended to be the sort of companion who will not only help you find your way, but also explain and enthuse, while assisting you to make your own discoveries and connections.