Stasia Skonberg
Geography 101: Dr. Richard Simpsonm
January 19, 2021
Response Paper 1
Landscape Defines Itself
In J.B. Jackson’s “The Word Itself,” he pulls apart the word landscape and investigates what the true original meanings and uses were as well as the ways it has changed in modern times. Throughout the essay he takes us through the past uses of the word landscape and how that pertained to a certain group of people back in the day as opposed to now where it is more “public domain”. His argument throughout this piece stays that we need a new definition for landscape, although he may not be able to come up with one.
“Landscape” is the main term in the essay used and talked about and has a vast history not many people know about or look into. The fact that it had so many meanings and uses before it became a mainstream English word used among English speakers is in itself a very interesting part of the entire word. The word has ties to German roots, Saxons, Jutes, and Danes and Dutch and at the root of the word can mean both a natural scenery or a space defined by people.
A space defined by people as well as something that shows natural scenery in the eyes of the people that live on it is what landscape means at its core. With that said I have a hard time agreeing with Jackson on his argument that we need a new definition for the word landscape because I think it has transformed into the word it was truly meant to be and into the meaning it was truly meant to be understood in and that the meaning is up to yourself or in the eye of the beholder.
Space has become a very important thing in society today and more specifically personal space. We have been cooped up in our homes for months at this point trying to maintain our personal space, and I do think the word landscape is changing because of that. Because of our inability to meet together in one space created for learning, in our case, we are forced to create our own definition of the space and of the idea of a “learning space” a learning-scape if you will. Some may see that as a hindrance or a set back to the leaps and bounds made from the original “painterly” meaning of landscape, showcasing picturesque landscapes, but I see it as a sort of Renaissance. This weird time in all of our lives has changed every aspect of it and we have to change with it.
Stasia, those changing times you mention does indeed mean that "learning-spaces" are changing, and this indeed, is why Jackson suggests we need to understand the change in the word landscape. As people and culture change so does the environment. Jackson is advocating for an understanding of that change, and proposes a different definition of landscape as a result. One that includes an understanding of the processes that effect that change. What is that definition of landscape for Jackson?
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