Field Study's Man in E11 is late (again) with his psycho-geography homework


What is our excuse this time? Previously on this blog, we expressed anxieties about exploring and reporting on the sensitive territories of home, particularly if there are dilemmas and disputes concerning the privacy of the territories. Proceed with caution, a voice whispered into our left ear before exiting via the emergency right ear. The urgency of escape expressed by the voice of hopelessness nee caution may have been due to an alarming hollowness of the shell between our ears. Within our limited capacity to imagine, we think we heard a voice echo, 'abandon all hope, ye who enter here'. No, he said, 'there'. No, she said, 'here'. 

One of the problems about the voice of caution/hopelessness saying "there" is that we cannot, with any authority, go on to pretend we are clever and/or cultured by sharing the Latin translation of that iconic cliche. We would like to bandy about choice bits of Dante in the way of a pseudo-literary pyromaniac. Well here is the 'here' translation - 'Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate' - courtesy of wikipedia.

We have done some homework to bring you the 'there' translation - 'Relinquo totus spes ye quisnam penetro illic' or 'Omni spe, qui intrant'. The latter has such brevity as to lack the flowery pyrotechnics of the former, which emanates high over the unlit bonfire of our vanity. Yes we will opt for the former but don't take our pretentious Latin words for it. 

Might our pretence be an illustration of why we should heed 'the voice' and reside in limbo, to explore this domestic sphere and habitus with, at most, just one foot? Keep 'stumm' (you berk) until you have got something to say worth saying!

Our excuse concerning the overdue emanation of our homework about our lifetime collection of home addresses, is that we have all too easily been distracted and we have been trying to work out how to make the distractions appear purposeful, meaningful, valuable and productive. How very bourgeois of us! 

Below, there is a video animation which forms a partial preview of the field student's report for the Journal of Field Study International, Field Report 2013.

 homework

What sort of '-scape' does our account represent? E-scape? Home-scape? HMO-scape? Nowhere-scape? Ghost-scape? Mind-scape? Limbo-scape? 

As a wannabee 'psycho-geographer' of some 'poitential'* merit, I have, perversely, temporarily abandoned the 'psycho-' part and immersed myself in the '-geographer' part, in order to bring you this introductory insight into the subject of home as, 'a spatial imaginary: a set of intersecting and variable ideas and feelings, which are related to context, and which construct places, extend across spaces and scales, and connect places'. (Blunt and Dowling 2006).

The field student is concerned about my concern about being considered a 'fly by night' and he is disgusted by my desire to be 'a fully paid up member of the current tendency' (Self 2013, quoting Patrick Keiller writing about 'Robinson'). "Apart from the fact it is highly unlikely you could be, why would you wannabee?" the field student implored. "I just don't want to be a ghost all the time, man!" I cried. Will Self has pummeled my flabby intellect, my lazy mind, with 'a bourgeois calculus of the arty factual.' Damn, that hurt! In this, my interior monologue, I replied with a quick, but definitively un-received, one two - integral or differential, mate? I wonder if the 'spatial imaginary' (cited above) might be analogous to Mr Self's 'calculus'?

A knockout blow came when I was distracted by the field student negotiating the feasibility of being a low paid, minimum waged (but definitely not card carrying union) member of 'the current tendency'. I couldn't believe 'he' was trying to sell me out like that. If you cannot trust your self, who can you trust? I have to snap out of this Robinsonian/Patrick Keiller appropriation or else I'm just deluding myself.


John Rodgers and The Lost Byway, brings a more gentle appreciation of the politics and contexts of dilapidated domestic dwelling, via the essential reading of UK Port Statistics (amongst many other tomes as I recall the Robinson Institute installation at Tate Britain), derived and investigated by Patrick Keiller's, Robinson.  I think I will have to get the Keiller BFI box set out again however the politics of watching London, and, Robinson in Space/Ruins, was not, I recall, so gentle at our most recent viewing as it brought on a flashback. We think the flashback was caused by the unexpected over-excitement and plot twist of a train crossing a bridge at high speed. The flashback itself consisted of being rudely awoken by a geography teacher's blackboard rubber docking with our head, as he bellowed, 'Wake up, Beere! The lesson is not over yet'. Where was I, where was I? Quite.

I think that was a lesson in psycho-geography.





Home, Alison Blunt and Robyn Dowling, Routledge, 2006


* - I like this spelling mistake very much.







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