Sam Cartwright: "Astrotopophilia: A Love of Place with Maps of Space”

Sponsored in partnership with California, Chicago, New York, Philip Lee Phillips, Rocky Mountain, and Texas Map Societies.

Location: Zoom

Time:  7:00 PM ET/ 6:00 PM CT/ 5:00 PM MT/ 4:00 PM PT

Title: “Astrotopophilia: A Love of Place with Maps of Space”

Speaker: Sam Cartwright, PhD candidate, Department of Geological Sciences, University of Colorado Boulder

Summary: Whether a trail map of a serene forest or a plot of historical markers in a bustling city, maps help us understand and connect to the spaces we inhabit, creating a feeling of topophilia, or “love of place”. But what if a map shows a place that no human has ever been to? Can we ever truly know or love a distant, alien landscape with the help of a mere map? In this talk, we’ll trace the history of planetary cartography from the earliest telescope sketches to today’s high-resolution imagery and explore the indelible link between maps and humanity’s fascination with space.

Bio: Sam Cartwright is a PhD candidate with the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder. For his dissertation, he is developing novel mapping techniques to explore the composition of Mars’s crust and ice deposits, which are key to understanding the planet’s early formation and climate history. Sam was born and raised in Ogden, UT and previously earned degrees from Middlebury College (BA, 2018) and the University of Nevada Reno (MS, 2021). In 2024, he co-curated an exhibit on topophilia at CU’s Earth Sciences and Map Library. He enjoys film photography and collecting vintage maps and ephemera.

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