A cosmogram is a two-dimensional geometric figure that represents a cosmology, or an understanding of the universe. The practice of cosmography has a deep and widespread human history, as a means of inscribing and encoding memories by drawing connections between people and places through space and time. Cosmograms can position people in relation to a broader configuration of things, marked by a series of convergences and events between people and places.

The cosmogram presented below, for example, is an artistic rendering inspired by the practice of African ritual ground markings. It is on permanent exhibition in Harlem, New York at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. The Center’s Self Guided Tour gives the following narrative of the installation, which connects two major figures of the Harlem Renaissance:

Brass etchings in the Rivers cosmogram cut bearing-lines that converge in Harlem. Also etched in brass are seven fragmented stanzas from Langston Hughes 's poem The Negro Speaks of Rivers. The final verse is embodied in the symbol of a fish at the confluence of four rivers. Beneath the terrazzo fish rests the ashes of Langston Hughes himself. It is notable that the cosmogram is also intended to serve as a dance floor that wields its own centripetal force.

“Two significant components of the cosmogram – the life lines- are drawn homage to ancestors Schomburg and Hughes. The lines symbolically pass through the places of their births – Puerto Rico, whose geographic location determines the outer circle of the cosmogram, and Joplin, Missouri – intersecting at the crossroads in Harlem where they lived, achieved and died” (2015).