Tim Waters2001-2002 MSc GIS

tim@geothings.net

http://geothings.net

Psychogeography

Psychogeography

What's it all about?

From Coverley / Debord“the study of the specific effects of the geographical environment,

consciously organised or notOn the emotions and behaviour of individuals.”

Its how place effects the brain!

History

Main theories

Main practices

Applied outside

Applied on the Internet

Theory

PeoplePoliticalArchitectureUrban PlanningCapitalismCultureOccultSensesEnvironmentHistory

Local History

Experienced - it's an activity.

Debord / Situationism

the Situationists found contemporary architecture both physicallyand ideologically restrictive, combining with outside cultural influence, effectively creating an undertow, and forcing oneself into a certain system of interaction with their environment.

Gawd knows!

Coverley says that the SI / Debord's view of Psychogeography is not valid anymore

The Term is vague!

Tortoise

Debord

The Theory of the Derive

One of the basic situationist practices is the dérive [literally: “drifting”],a technique of rapid passage through varied ambiances. Dérives involve playful-constructive behavior and awareness of psychogeographical effects, and are thus quite different from the classic notions of journey or stroll.

In a dérive one or more persons during a certain period drop their relations, their work and leisure activities, and all their other usual motives for movement and action, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there. Chance is a less important factor in this activity than one might think: from a dérive point of view cities have psychogeographical contours, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes that strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones.

"participants to drift from their usual activities and to become more aware of their surroundings while simultaneously seeking out ways of changing them."

David Pinder (1996)

Literary Efforts & rest of history we'll skip

Walter Benjamin

Defoe

London and Paris

Will SelfWalk airportsDubai

Alan MooreBedford

Capitalism & Politics Theory we'll skip as well.

Practices Modern

Resurgence of interest

o remap the area of High Wycombe earmarked for town centre re-development. The remapping is to be undertaken in collaboration with community groups in High Wycombe by staging a psychogeograpical event, a walk, a ‘derive‘ within the boundary of the re-development area, the results of which will be used to animate the town centre with a temporary art installation.

The aim of the LunchTime Dérive was to study how, by following a simple instruction, a group of workers could re-experience the town during their Lunch Break. The daily hunt for a prawn sandwich or Chicken Tikka Marsala Ready Meal will be replaced with a drift motivated by following a basic algorithmLeft left right

http://mappingweirdstuff.wordpress.com/Mapping Weird Stuff is a course offered as part of the OWjL summer camp at Ohio Wesleyan.

BiomappingChristian Nold

Unconscious & reflection

Urban exploration?

Parkour?

Make Playce – Leeds

http://my.parkingday.org Parking Day

Leeds psychogeography groupParticulations.blogspot.com

fin5tr@leeds.ac.uk

Regular meetings and guest talks & walks!

RulesDice – 1-100 and university campus map. Visit number on map that corresponds with number rolled on die

Take a downloaded piece of Situationist text ('The Theory of the Dérive' by Guy Debord). Using a piece of tracing paper, draw a dot over the first word on each line that beginswith a 'p' (for 'psychogeography'). Make a separate note of all these words. Lay the tracing paper over a map of the University of Leeds campus. Draw a line, moving from right to left which connects those dots that lay on top of the map.Ignore the dots that are outside of the map. The end result is a zigzag line on the tracing paper that is superimposed over the map. The line becomes the route (as much as possible that it can be followed), the dots become the stopping places. Each point of stopping would then have the relevant word attached to it. Also, the photographs attached to the map, would be a picture looking towards the next point that would be visited.

Leeds Derives

Leeds Derives

Beating the bounds

Bring booze!

On the Internets!

Platial

Story telling

Crap towns, chav towns, slagging off towns, place forums, etc

We feel fine

We Feel FineLiveJournal, MSN Spaces, MySpace,Blogger, Flickr,Technorati,Feedster, Ice Rocket,

Smell map http://www.nioibu.com/smell/map

The scents listed range from "a toasty odour of cow dung" to "used socks in the summer" Soundmaps too!

Thats it.

It might be worth getting outside.

Theory

PeoplePoliticalArchitectureUrban PlanningCapitalismCultureOccultSensesEnvironmentHistory

Local History

SituationismDerive

ModernArt Landscape

Urban changeCitizen geographyCheap tools

Outdoor space reclamation

Leeds derives

InternetStories,Real time feelings about placeOrganising and documentingVolunteered psychogeographical informaion

Tim Waterstim@geothings.net

http://geothings.net