Field Study's Man in E11 and some confessions of a psychogeography teacher
Lost and Found in E11 tries to review an essay from,
Patrick Keiller, The View from the Train: Cities and Other Landscapes. Verso 2013.
Patrick Keiller occupies a respected place in a field of studies sometimes referred to as 'psychogeography'. The publication cited above represents a body of work admirable for its eloquence, inventiveness and creativity in a variety of media addressing various problems in and of the contemporary landscape. Keiller may have reservations about being cited as a proponent of 'psychogeography' - that as a discipline it broadly lacks the intellectual and academic rigour which underpins his work. Here in, Lost and Found in E11, we are trying to develop our appreciation and understanding of our place (in the world). To do so we have sought out learned texts and other emanations exploring the meaning of place. We find ourselves in a state of doubt about the muddled politics and suspect values of our cultural consumption, that our 'good intentions' lead to nowhere but a conspicuous expression of limited bourgeois material values, and that the finer lessons of such learned texts are entirely lost on us. Our review takes the form of a spurious classroom situation in which 'Julian Beere' attempts to teach 'Field Study's Man in E11' psychogeography, using 'The View from the Train..' as a text book. We concluded that 'Psychogeography for Morons' would be more appropriate for our needs. Here is why..
I was gobsmacked when Field Study's Man in E11 presented me with a collection of centre pages ripped and plucked from various magazines of dubious sexual political correctness. He smiled, idiotically pleased with himself, as he commented on the 'amazing vital statistics' displayed on the tattered and not quite so glossy paper remains of a bygone era of gratification. He had obviously misunderstood my brief.
.
I'd asked the field student to venture out into the field and find me updated facts and figures relating to the phenomenon of dilapidation in contemporary dwelling, as critiqued by Patrick Keiller in his essay, The Dilapidated Dwelling (1998)* included in his recent publication, The View from the Train: Cities and Other Landscapes (2013). I told the field student I wanted the most up to date statistics he could find, e.g. the percentage of urban land in the UK taken up by housing in 2014; or as close to 2014 as he could get. It seems the field student found a derelict house. The website of the Office for National Statistics had crashed in(to) the house and rendered it nearly uninhabitable, except, that is, for a tramp who had also stashed his collection of porno' magazines, circa 1976-1978, in the virtual rubble. Unfortunately, the field student found the naughty material. I told him, the wayward perambulator, a naïve flaneur of vintage ruin porn', to take the centre-folds back forthwith.
.
.
Meanwhile, I despaired at the strange ana-grammatical miscommunication which had put the kybosh on our (or at least, my) hopes of sensible psycho-geographic enquiry. Perhaps it was a slip of the tongue which had fashioned 'centre pages' out of 'percentages'. I sank my head into my hands and moaned, haunted by galleries of the pimpled buttocks of readers wives, and of 'big-uns' for the ladies, their poses replete with the accoutrements of soft core pimpery, an interior topography of tawdry domestic frisson.
The field student returned and was obviously upset about my rejection of his field work. I was not going to allow him to indulge in a sulk.
"Right, (I bellowed) get your psychogeography exercise book out, open it up to a new page, put today's date at the top (on the left hand side) and copy this heading down".
I made sure to bang and press the chalk as hard as I could against the blackboard, creating a sort of sonic attack of squeaks and grinds on the field student's wounded sensibility.
The heading read:
The following facts and figures represent at least a few of the vertebrae in the spine of Keiller's critique of architectural space - and 'the successful operation of a particular economic system in the interests of those who own it'. How have the figures/systems changed in the 16 years since the first publication of Keiller's essay? ***
-
In 2014:-
1 - the real value of housework in the UK is £? billion - ?% more than the current value of the UK's GDP?
2 - On average UK people spend ?% of their total time in paid work?
3 - Most flexible part-time work suited to the child-rearer pays under £? an hour?
4 - In the UK, housing takes up ?% of urban land?
5 - ?% of existing housing stock was built before the end of World War I (? million dwellings)? Has any of that housing stock been demolished since 1998?
6 - In the 1990-2010s c. what is the average number of houses built each year?
7 - What % of the UK national income is spent on house-building (early 21st century) - compared to the 19th century?
8 - How does the DIY sector in the UK compare to that of new house-building?
9 - In the mid to late 90s Labour proposed building 'super-villages' - 5,200 houses near Peterborough, 3,000 near Micheldever, 5,000-10,000 near Stevenage. Have the houses been built?
10. Via the VINEX policy, Holland aimed to build 800,000 dwellings by the year 2000. How many dwellings are there in 2014? What sort of state are they in?
When we have got these facts and figures sorted out, contextualised to 2014, we'll move on to the subjectivities of Heidegger, de Certeau's 'tactics' and the breakdown of 'local stabilities'. I watched the field student complete the list, put his pen down and raise his hand to ask a question. I pretended to ignore him, as if there were other students in the room who needed my intimidating presence to complete the prosaic task. Two hours later I could see the torture of holding his arm up for that long might see me struck off the psycho-teaching register.
"Put your hand down. What is it?"
"Sir, I brought you the naughty pictures as pertinent research into the changing nature of housework in the last 25 years or so. Surely pornography has a very substantial presence in the UK economy, in terms of production and consumption, and various technological innovations in the last 25 years have enabled this presence to grow. I thought of it as historical context and an interrogation of what is meant by 'housework'. I mean we might imagine, might we sir, all those home studios churning out what is a virtually infinite billowing cloud of veritably 'blue movies' - 'the necessities and longings of domestic life'*, if I might quote Patrick Keiller, sir".
I shuffled uneasily, irritated by the smart-arse and thought unprintable things about him. "Yes, yes Field Study's Man in E11, that's all very well but..."
He interrupted me....
"I mean, sir, you want me to help you develop a critical understanding of dilapidation, and it says here that 'experience of dilapidation is tempered by the promise of immediate virtual or imminent actual presence elsewhere,' ...." **
"Yes, yes (cough cough) that's all very well, you snivelling little brat however what I need to make you realise - even though you are a totally fictitious character - is that you are only a 7-year-old-blogger and this really isn't an appropriate field of research for you. I suggest you redirect your enquiries to DIY and the performance of various leading companies in this field".
"Ohhhh ... siiiiirrrrrr! That's not fair".
To avert a classroom revolt I resorted to the tried and tested ploy of a very funny movie:
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/icp/multi-factor-productivity--experimental-/indicative-estimates-to-2012/videomfp.html
Field Study's Man in E11 drifted off into a field of multi factor unproductivity while I completed our report/review.
*** / Keiller, Patrick: 'The Dilapidated Dwelling' in Sarah Wigglesworth and Jeremy Till (eds): The Everyday and Architecture, Architectural Design 68: 7-8 1998, pp22-27.
* / ** / Patrick Keiller - The View from the Train: Cities and Other Landscapes. Verso 2013.
The field student returned and was obviously upset about my rejection of his field work. I was not going to allow him to indulge in a sulk.
"Right, (I bellowed) get your psychogeography exercise book out, open it up to a new page, put today's date at the top (on the left hand side) and copy this heading down".
I made sure to bang and press the chalk as hard as I could against the blackboard, creating a sort of sonic attack of squeaks and grinds on the field student's wounded sensibility.
The heading read:
PATRICK KEILLER, THE DILAPIDATED DWELLING, 1998 - FACTS AND FIGURES TO UPDATE
The following facts and figures represent at least a few of the vertebrae in the spine of Keiller's critique of architectural space - and 'the successful operation of a particular economic system in the interests of those who own it'. How have the figures/systems changed in the 16 years since the first publication of Keiller's essay? ***
-
In 2014:-
1 - the real value of housework in the UK is £? billion - ?% more than the current value of the UK's GDP?
2 - On average UK people spend ?% of their total time in paid work?
3 - Most flexible part-time work suited to the child-rearer pays under £? an hour?
4 - In the UK, housing takes up ?% of urban land?
5 - ?% of existing housing stock was built before the end of World War I (? million dwellings)? Has any of that housing stock been demolished since 1998?
6 - In the 1990-2010s c. what is the average number of houses built each year?
7 - What % of the UK national income is spent on house-building (early 21st century) - compared to the 19th century?
8 - How does the DIY sector in the UK compare to that of new house-building?
9 - In the mid to late 90s Labour proposed building 'super-villages' - 5,200 houses near Peterborough, 3,000 near Micheldever, 5,000-10,000 near Stevenage. Have the houses been built?
10. Via the VINEX policy, Holland aimed to build 800,000 dwellings by the year 2000. How many dwellings are there in 2014? What sort of state are they in?
When we have got these facts and figures sorted out, contextualised to 2014, we'll move on to the subjectivities of Heidegger, de Certeau's 'tactics' and the breakdown of 'local stabilities'. I watched the field student complete the list, put his pen down and raise his hand to ask a question. I pretended to ignore him, as if there were other students in the room who needed my intimidating presence to complete the prosaic task. Two hours later I could see the torture of holding his arm up for that long might see me struck off the psycho-teaching register.
"Put your hand down. What is it?"
"Sir, I brought you the naughty pictures as pertinent research into the changing nature of housework in the last 25 years or so. Surely pornography has a very substantial presence in the UK economy, in terms of production and consumption, and various technological innovations in the last 25 years have enabled this presence to grow. I thought of it as historical context and an interrogation of what is meant by 'housework'. I mean we might imagine, might we sir, all those home studios churning out what is a virtually infinite billowing cloud of veritably 'blue movies' - 'the necessities and longings of domestic life'*, if I might quote Patrick Keiller, sir".
I shuffled uneasily, irritated by the smart-arse and thought unprintable things about him. "Yes, yes Field Study's Man in E11, that's all very well but..."
He interrupted me....
"I mean, sir, you want me to help you develop a critical understanding of dilapidation, and it says here that 'experience of dilapidation is tempered by the promise of immediate virtual or imminent actual presence elsewhere,' ...." **
"Yes, yes (cough cough) that's all very well, you snivelling little brat however what I need to make you realise - even though you are a totally fictitious character - is that you are only a 7-year-old-blogger and this really isn't an appropriate field of research for you. I suggest you redirect your enquiries to DIY and the performance of various leading companies in this field".
"Ohhhh ... siiiiirrrrrr! That's not fair".
To avert a classroom revolt I resorted to the tried and tested ploy of a very funny movie:
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/icp/multi-factor-productivity--experimental-/indicative-estimates-to-2012/videomfp.html
Field Study's Man in E11 drifted off into a field of multi factor unproductivity while I completed our report/review.
*** / Keiller, Patrick: 'The Dilapidated Dwelling' in Sarah Wigglesworth and Jeremy Till (eds): The Everyday and Architecture, Architectural Design 68: 7-8 1998, pp22-27.
* / ** / Patrick Keiller - The View from the Train: Cities and Other Landscapes. Verso 2013.
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