conundrum the first

As I write the first (very rough) draft of my prospectus, I bump up against my first major conundrum. It's a mind bender:

I argue that "space" is the undelimited, undefined territory in and against which "place"--as shelter, definition--is established. But at the same time, and especially in terms of the West, I claim that part of what gives shape to particular places and the process of placing them are the perceptions and expectations that emigrants carry with them into these new spaces. For instance, I am told and believe that the Great Plains are the "garden of the world," that the land is bountiful and easily cultivated. So, I hitch up the wagon and move there, only to find the vast, dry open spaces with which I must now contend. My disappointment and struggle shape the place I make there.

So, the problem: If landscape is previously mythologized (and when is it not?) to the point that we have a preconception--real or not--of what that landscape is and means, then can there ever really be any pure "space"? Can there ever really be a truly undefined, undelimited territory?