Problem statement: In contemporary environmental sciences literature in Iran, the word “Manzar,” as an equivalent for the Western concept of “Landscape,” is often understood as a concept equal to “external objectivity.” This reductionist usage is not merely a lexical error but stems from ignoring the semantic and historical structure of the word and, consequently, neglecting the ontological foundations that render “Manzar” a distinct concept for understanding the human-environment relationship. The persistence of this misunderstanding has led to the dominance of a formalist approach in explaining this concept and has undermined the possibility of an independent theoretical formulation of it.
Research objective: The aim of this research is a genealogical re-reading of the word “Manzar” within the context of language to extract its multi-layered meanings and semantic capacities, to elucidate the preeminence of this word over cognate terms in a determinate understanding of the environment.
Research method: The present research is conducted within the interpretive paradigm using a qualitative approach. For data collection, documentary and library methods (including lexicographical sources and literary-mystical texts) were utilized, and data analysis was performed based on a combined method of “Historical Etymology” and “Semantic Field Analysis.”
Conclusion: The findings indicate that “Manzar,” unlike “Sima” (which denotes the visual surface) and “Mazhar” (which is inherent to the phenomenon itself), is a “process-oriented” concept dependent on the “observer.” The research findings delineate five ontological features for “Manzar” that distinguish it from cognate concepts: 1. Simultaneity of being both Origin and Destination, 2. Quasi-objectivity (Object-likeness), 3. Processual nature, 4. Blendedness (Hybridity), and 5. “Created” nature. These components demonstrate that the reduction of “Manzar” to words with similar concepts in professional literature stems from an oversight regarding the ontological components of the word.