Community map

The first project of Oscata inVita was the exploration of paths and trails on which to plan a circular route starting from the main square. Stories intertwine, and this project expanded with the creation of a community map understood in the sense of its English adjective "parish" (from "parish map"), highlighting that the primary goal of this tool is not only to pay attention to a place defined by rigid administrative boundaries — whether municipal or linked to ancient ecclesiastical properties — but rather to prioritize "the smallest arena in which life is lived".

Community maps are not just lines on a paper but custodians of the memory of human stories tied to places. Today, while sophisticated thematic cartographies collect and document research from every corner of the planet, there is a noticeable loss of detailed knowledge of places — expressions of wisdom accumulated over generations. Community maps are tools through which the people who live in a place can tell others, or remind themselves, of the key points of their history, the crucial nodes of their web of meanings and signifiers. The map is not an end in itself but represents a personal and collective journey that involves engagement, research, and commitment — a creative tool capable of strengthening and reconstructing, in contemporary terms, the fundamental bond between people and places.

Oscata inVita formed a working group made up of local children and elderly residents, members or friends of the association, to whom the purpose of the community map was explained. A productive group effort emerged, with the children drawing the most representative places to highlight their characteristics.

Here is where we are: map