Hybrid mapping methodology – a manifest

For the empirical research of the refiguration of spaces innovative methods are needed to investigate the relationality and materiality of spaces and thus explore societal processes of change from multiple perspectives. We founded the working group “Hybrid Mapping Methods”, with the objective to develop a new hybrid mapping methodology at this interface of social science and spatial design, drawing together the analytical and projective modes within the respective disciplines and combining both visual and textual means of inquiry. The central characteristic of our reflexive methodology is its hybridity which unfolds across four interconnected yet analytically discrete dimensions. The first dimension, Inter- and Transdisciplinarity, explicitly refers to the combination of epistemic and ontological approaches from social sciences with spatial design disciplines; the second dimension, Space, empirically addresses the different co-existing conceptualisations of space (container space and relational space); the third dimension, Data, considers the integration of diverse data into a multi-layered visual-analytical protocol; the fourth dimension, Modus Operandi of mapping production brings together both designerly and sociological ways of thinking and making.