Symbolic Transference: Public Symbols and the Spatiality of Affective Resonance

Keywords: critical race theory, place-making, place, race, landscape
Abstract Type: Virtual Paper Abstract

Abstract

Geographers have demonstrated the importance of public symbols to spatial discourses of place and landscape, showing that these spatial discourses, though fluid, seek to establish normative visions of our society and world. Though use of public symbols has been long-established in the literature, since 2015, we have seen an increase in the visible and blatant (ab)using of public symbols to impact political and cultural discourses. In this article, we outline symbolic transference as a framework to understand how particular communities transfer symbol meanings and affective resonance to another, sometimes even contradictory or antithetical, symbol/object. Using semiology and discourse analysis, we argue that geography, particularly discourses of place and landscape, are foundational to symbolic transference as both subject and underlying motivation. Through an analysis of author-photos and experiences of local cultural landscapes in Northeast Ohio, Kansas, and the US South, we argue that highly visible public symbols and discourses transfer meanings across material and conceptual objects as a way of bolstering normative visions of place and society. Through this study we can better make sense of the use of seemingly antithetical symbols in political and cultural discourses and how these uses impact and are impacted by socio-spatial discourses.