The politics of movement

The American Guide Book Series was meant to encourage Americans to engage in more tourism within the United States. Writers from each state went to great lengths to create guides in minute detail so as to be extremely easy to follow, but created these books absent of nuance. The routes that people where being encouraged to take where divorced from the realities of racism and segregation that where deeply ingrained in society and informed who could navigate the world safely. These books can only be fully engaged with by white or white passing men and their families and creates conversation about who has the freedom of movement and who was being considered as an American during the authorship of these guides. These maps, and others tools like it help to "visualize both historical and present racism and highlight racial issues" (Bond, Sarah E., 2017) were being overlooked.