Spatial turn is a phrase/term that is used within the GIS and neogeography disciplines. It aids in making GIS mapping relatively easy for many students. "Turn" offers insight as to why travelers from different places became "fixated on the landscape."
Upon beginning the reading by Guldi. J, I was introduced to several new terms under the GIS discipline. Terms like palimpsest and panopticism were considered to be older than GIS, however, they are still rooted in the GIS discipline today and explain land use and agency.
Historical perspective provided insight into the different contributions from scholars of history, religion, and psychology to the GIS and neogeography discipline known as the 'spatial moment'. The spatial moment was a discovery that nature is situated in space. It also represents a period of time when scholars addressed the struggle over utilizing the space around them. In the 1970s and 80s spatial turn, literature shifted from old concerns like abstract and symbolic space and was interpreted through metaphors like panopticism.
In the Geography department, these terms were transformed into theories that described the relationship between power and space. “Territoriality, space-time compression and Power geometry” are examples of the theories that elaborated that relationship. A map that depicts land use created by Saul Griffith helped us to determine whether or not in the future we would be able to fully depend on renewable energy or whether or not we would have to take a look at nuclear options. These maps truly paved a way for geographers to determine the use of energy in many regions of the world.