Map Making Game
Cartographic Perspectives February 22, 2026 Mark Denil
A familiar postmodern technique for gaining fresh insight is 'making strange'—stripping away familiar assumptions to force new discovery. This paper argues that other documented avenues for such strange-making exist, particularly a body of interpersonal psychobiology studies that describe human society in game-structure terms, which remain largely unexplored in cartographic literature. It introduces this psychedelic analysis and proposes its application to contemporary explorations of maps and cartographic practice. The strategy offers a toolbox of tactics that can take any existing conceptualization of maps, mapmaking, map use, or cartographic practice and 'make them strange' for dispassionate examination and evaluation.