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Local Networks: Toward a Decolonial Map of Pullman

1881 Plat Map of Pullman

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Curated: Mapping Pullman This section is a limited curation of maps which help to illustrate the legacy of colonial discourses of measurement--as well as some alternative approaches to mapping certain communities--within the Palouse region, and Pullman specifically.

This is a portion of the map of the Indian nations and tribes of the Territory of Washington and of the Territory of Nebraska west of the mouth of the Yellowstone, made in 1857. Courtesy of the Early Washington Maps project.

Here is a view of that full map.

When Cintron writes about discourses of measurement, he is working from city maps much like this one: plat maps are meant to divide the land into easily identifiable sections. This plat map of Pullman from 1881 (courtesy of WSU MASC) was originally made in order to expand the city out and to accommodate future settlers. At the time this map was created, however, there were far fewer people than its zoning would suggest. Here we can see discourses of measurement--specific plans for a population which would expand, grow, and build here--working to colonize a swath of land which already belonged to native communities. Divorced from the reality of how many people were actually living in Pullman at the time, or how many were certain to come West and settle in Pullman, this map remains a stark reminder of the ideological work of colonizing space. This map and all that it represents must be accepted as a heritage of Washington State University. And it is this map--its zoning and infrastructure--which has become a persisting view of this area.

The discourse of the plat map has given birth to new discourses of measurement: in perhaps the closest thing that humanity has ever had to a universal map, only the discourse of the plat map and its heritage find representation. In the process, other discourses about the land have been erased.
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I have suggested that one method by which we might begin to counter discourses of measurement in a decolonial approach would be to map community networks. The next several examples show that Pullman has been mapped in terms of experience before, though these maps all rely upon the discourse of the plat map. These resources were obtained through WSU's own collection in Manuscripts and Special Collections (MASC).

An early, humorous map, the "Hysterical Map of W.S.C. Campus" made by students.
In the same vein, this map acts as a commentary on campus life.
Part of a joint project between the City of Pullman and the WSU Center for Civic Engagement, this more recent document maps out a walking tour of pullman, complete with landmarks which were referenced and explained elsewhere in text.

Notably, every one of these maps draws upon the colonial discourses in mid-19th century mapping of the Palouse area.
Place Such postcolonial approaches to mapping apply to the experiences of American Indians, as well. Indeed, Byrd asserts the close ties between the goals of American Indian studies and Postcolonial studies, stating that "if anything, bringing indigenous and tribal voices to the fore within postcolonial theory may help us elucidate how liberal colonialist discourses depend upon sublimating indigenous cultures and histories into fictive hybridities and social constructions as they simultaneously trap indigenous peoples within the dialectics of genocide, where the only conditions of possibility imagined are either that indigenous peoples will die through genocidal policies of colonial settler states (thus making room for more open and liberatory societies) or that they will commit heinous genocides in defense of lands and nations" (xxxiv).

Of course, as this 1881 plat map of Pullman shows, such an approach has been used in order to delegitimatize Native claims to land in the United States, on the very lands used by Washington State University. According to WSU Historian Mark O'English, the 1881 map planned for hundreds of settlers who had yet to arrive, yet the land was divided in anticipation of potential growth, taken from Native inhabitants by the colonial imaginary long before the plat map's plan for the area was to be fully carried out. Thus the very act of mapping Pullman in such a way was a colonial act, one upon which we continue to build as we engage with and utilize colonial discourses of measurement.

In the light of the plat map of Pullman and its legacy, it is crucial that those working and living at WSU continue to recognize that their university was built on the traditional homelands of the Palouse and Nez Perce tribes. Keith Basso has written extensively on a Native understanding of land, place, and shared wisdom, specifically with regard to the Apache tribe, but he surmises that it is at least in part a shared philosophy among many, if not most tribes of American Indians (63). According to Basso, the Apache view the land as a "repository of shared wisdom," and places are even the "possessions of particular individuals," as well as resources for storytelling (63, xvi). Basso outlines the place-making of the Apache people as a type of history which is place-based first, and only secondarily time-based (31). Because of this, the names of places are stories in themselves, which persist but are also remade each moment, for each person, as sources of shared wisdom and even morality, foundational to Apache culture (60-70). One of Basso's Apache guides directly states the comparison between this logic and the colonial logics of the plat map: "white men need paper maps...we have maps in our minds" (43). Though Basso's experience with one tribe cannot obviously be extrapolated to all, his notes on the general trend of ties between American Indians and land, which run so counter to western colonial logics, challenges any digital map of Pullman which might be based on discourses of measurement.

How, then, to fashion a useful decolonial map in response? One answer already lies with those tribes which continue to maintain their connection to the land and water of the Palouse region: the best and most obvious decolonial maps may not reflect Western logics of mapping at all. But when it comes to digital tools, the question then becomes one of whether or not they can contribute anything in such a context. I think they can.