TWO HEMISPHERES
Within each person in the centre, there is a subjective map of the objective world (see Figure 4). We usually consider media as mediating between people. However, they can also be considered as mediating, within each person, between this subjective map and the objective world. The subjective map could be considered as composed of a perceptual map and a conceptual map, corresponding roughly to the thing and the word in the objective world and to text- and image-based media (see Figure 5). It is a useful metaphor to consider the perceptual map as a function of the right hemisphere and the conceptual map as a function of the left hemisphere.
Some tasks are best performed by the left hemisphere and some by the right. We academics tend to privilege the left hemi-sphere. For example, it is obvious that recording directions given over the telephone lends itself best to the perceptual map. This has only become obvious to me, however, within the last year (partly as a result of thinking about those things). For example, look at Figure 6. On the left (for the left hemi-sphere), you see my attempt to record the directions to the house of my friend Sally written on 22 March 90; on the right (for the right hemisphere), you see my attempt to record the directions again, drawn on 7 July 90 - just over three months later. (In the interval, I had forgotten how to get there - partly because I had used my left hemisphere inappropriately.) The second strategy was superior - not only because I was able to get there with only one stop to glance at the map but also because I still remember how to get to Sally's place years later - the physical map has been etched in as a mental map. We have to learn to fire on all our cylinders.
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