deCerteau Post

Understand the middle two paragraphs on p. 93 starting with “The ordinary practicioners…” How is a city or any other landscape a text? Get an understanding of what might be meant by the term, operations, and how it relates to the aspect of the city that is not represented as “geometric” or “geographical.”

There is the city and the concept of the city. Please define each and describe their relationship to each other.

I think the most obvious answer is when you find elements of a city or landscape that resemble letterforms for words. I think aerial views lend themselves to this kind of thing. It's easy to see some shapes forming with so many objects clustered together. Forms like this are certainly not limited to aerial views;

A city or landscape can also be defined by text in terms of language. For example, a city in Spain is perhaps defined by all of the Spanish text advocating bull-fighting, a city in Japan is perhaps defined by all of the hand-painted text written on wood planks advertising fish at a local fish stand, an American city is perhaps defined by its indefinite texts as a merging of cultures and languages can be found.

As for the second part of the question, to me, the city includes the physical location, the people, creatures, buildings, politics, ideals, customs, etc. The concept of the city is more of a "what does all of this stuff defined as a city do to things within it (as well as outside of it)," basically, what is the city for and how does it affect things? The two are very related to each other in that they talk back and forth. A location (part of the city) is certainly going to affect the people, the buildings, the customs, and so on (concept of the city). An industrial city is definitely going to do different things to its surroundings than a rural area. An island city is going to focus on a navy rather than a land-based defense.




Why does deCerteau claim that the concept city is dying? Make sure you have a clear ideas what is meant by concept city before you try and answer this question.

It seems to me that he blames the concept dying because of those who have become aware of the concept and are thus able to control and contort it. The city is controlled by few rather than by all, and therefore, the effect that is created by everyone moving together and averaging out, the effect is being swayed heavily under the influence of the powerful (usually rich, corrupt, of out touch with the everyman).


How can focusing on the negative privilege a discourse?

Both sides should always be reviewed and understood to make an informed decision. By studying the positives, one knows what worked, how well it worked, and if it should be done again; with the negatives, one knows what didn't work, how to improve, and what not to do.


How does deCerteau relate the decisions we make when walking to speech acts? You may first have to understand what constitutes a speech act. See bottom of p97.

These sentences seem to describe it very well: "…it is true that a spatial order organizes an ensemble of possibilities…and interdictions (e.g., by a wall that prevents one from going further), then the walker actualizes some of these possibilities. In that way, he makes them exist as well as emerge." Through the act of realizing something, we think about something; while thinking, we come up with uncountable circumstances that become real, become thought-speech, through our imagination. Merely by suggesting they exist, they come into existence.


How does deCerteau define myth in the context of this chapter?

It seems to be related to tradition and how things work, or at least, how they've worked in the past.


Understand the notion of “local authority”. Examples of local authority?

This can mean many different things. First you must define local. Is local limited to the city, the household, the school, the workplace, the individual moral, the country, the universe, etc.? Going in order, examples of such could be: police force, parents, teachers, bosses, moral codes, national laws, the laws of physics, etc.


What purpose/s could be served by eradicating stories and legends that inhabit places? What are the consequences of this? How is this related to walking?

Instead of looking at things the same way they've been looked at for ages and ages, a completely new view could be found due to no previous notions or bias or clues. These views could be good or bad, right or wrong, some better than others. I think a good example to relate this to walking can come from my time in Tokyo. It would always amaze and surprise me by how many people took the escalator at different places rather than the stairs (particularly the train stations). While the stairs are much faster, more people take the escalator, causing it to become crowded and even slower. Most of these people are business men and women who are constantly in a hurry to get places, yet they continue to take the slower path. I think at least some of the reasoning behind this is because it's engraved in many of their minds. In such a technological society, I imagine it would become easy to fall prey to letting machines do work for you.


Think of place that you where you have spent a lot of time. “Walk” that place. Pretend that you are describing the landscape to a person you know quite well. As you “walk” and talk differentiate between the parts of the conversation that describe what is currently there now and the parts of the conversation that detail what is not longer present.

*Please refer to my post about my old house.


Is it possible to see memory as negative space?

I think it's more accurate to see memory as positive space. Just because it's negative space in the physical world does not at all mean that it's negative space in the mental world of my mind. For example, every time I go past where my old house used to be, I don't see a metaphorical hole in the property, what I see is my old house simply overlaying the one that is there now, not because it was bigger (it wasn't) but because I remember it so vividly.


In your own words, what does the practice of space mean?

Perhaps it has to do with the continual return to and movement through an area in space, whether it be a physical space that , say, you travel through everyday to get to school or work, or be it a mental space that you travel to to relax and get away. I think the repetition and acknowledgment of traversing this space is the "practice of space."