How Our Journey Began

Doug Healy and Alison Safford worked as colleagues at the Cambridge School of Weston outside of Boston. After many breakfast conversations about maps, and constant "did you see this?" emails, they created the curriculum for Mapping Meaning.

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Doug is a teacher of humanities, an avid cyclist, and dad to three. Doug’s interest comes from an interest in borders creating inequalities and injustices, as well as city planning, and how American car culture affects the livability of a city.

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Alison is a teacher of visual arts, a practicing artist, and Amsterdam afficianado. She is interested in maps that show things that aren’t mappable, as well as the psychogeography of a space, and also how the performative act of walking can change how one experiences a space, with specific interests in Debord’s derivé and the concept of the flanuer.

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  We think of maps as a visual representation of human decisions and desires, memories and histories, nations’ conquests, and the dreams of those in power.