Psychogeography

SOURCE

The following text is taken from 'The most radical gesture: The Situationist International in a postmodern age' by Sadie Plant and published by Routledge. Read it, and live without dead time.

...The situationists' desire to become psychogeographers, with an understanding of the 'precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behaviour of individuals', was intended to cultivate an awareness of the ways in which everyday life is presently conditioned and controlled, the ways in which this manipulation can be exposed and subverted, and the possibilities for chosen forms of constructed situations in the post-spectacular world. Only an awareness of the influences of the existing environment can encourage the critique of the present conditions of daily life, and yet it is precisely this concern with the environment which we live which is ignored.

"The sudden change of ambiance in a street within the space of a few meters; the evident division of a city into zones of distinct psychic atmospheres; the path of least resistance which is automatically followed in aimless strolls (and which has no relation to the physical contour of the ground); the appealing or repelling character of certain places - all this seems to be neglected."

Guy Debord, Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography
DERIVE
One of psychogeography's principle means was the dérive. Long a favorite practice of the dadaists, who organized a variety of expeditions, and the surrealists, for whom the geographical form of automatism was an instructive pleasure, the dérive, or drift, was defined by the situationists as the 'technique of locomotion without a goal', in which 'one or more persons during a certain period drop their usual motives for movement and action, their relations, their work and leisure activities, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there'. The dérive acted as something of a model for the 'playful creation' of all human relationships.
'to dérive was to notice the way in which certain areas, streets, or buildings resonate with states of mind, inclinations, and desires, and to seek out reasons for movement other than those for which an environment was designed.'


From: Drifting with The Situationist International, Author Unknown, from Smile #5
The Situationists use détoumement to demonstrate the scandalous poverty of everyday life despite the plenty of commodities. They attempted to demonstrate the contrast between what life presently is and what it could be. They wanted to rupture the spell of the ideology of our commodified consumer society so that our repressed desires of a more authentic nature could come forward. The situation is based on liberated desires rather than alienated ones. What these desires are cannot be stated a priori. They will emerge in the revolutionary process of situation-creation, of détournment. Presumably, communality, unification, and public urban space will emerge as more desirable than commodification, fragmentation, and privatization.





DEFINITIONS OF PSYCHOGEOGRAPHY Wikipedia
Psychogeography was defined in 1955 by Guy Debord as the "the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals."[1]

n "Formulary for a New Urbanism," Chtcheglov had written "Architecture is the simplest means of articulating time and space, of modulating reality, of engendering dreams".[5] Similarly, the Situationists found contemporary architecture both physically and ideologically restrictive, combining with outside cultural influence, effectively creating an undertow, and forcing oneself into a certain system of interaction with their environment: "[C]ities have a psychogeographical relief, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes which strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones".[6]

In a dérive one or more persons during a certain period drop their usual motives for movement and action, their relations, their work and leisure activities, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there… But the dérive includes both this letting go and its necessary contradiction: the domination of psychogeographical variations by the knowledge and calculation of their possibilities.[8]


I read an exerpt from Psychogeography Today, here are some interesting quotes and ideas I found regarding psychogeography.

Psychogeography is aware of the increasing banality of the urban environment by which we are surrounded. (This idea of banality was the beginnings of the situationalists, to make a difference, to play with, to question.)

JG Ballard wrote about the 'Death of Affect' 'the loss of engagement with our surroundings.'

'Psychogeography is to be understood as the behavioural impact of urban space'.

'A landscape that seemingly offers no escape from the mundane reality of everyday life soon subverts these expectation, provoking us to react against the conformity of our surroundings.' Pg 15


'Ballard describes modern life in advanced industrial societies as characterised by a loss of emotional sensitivity. Admidst the barrage of media imagery to which we are subjected, our emotional responce is blunted and we become unable to engage directly with our surroundings without the mediated images of television and advertising'
Pg 16.

'Walking is the best way to explore and exploit the city, the changes, the shifts, breaks in the cloud helmet, movement of light on water. Drifting purposefully is the reccommended mode, tramping asphalted earth in alert reverie, allowing the fiction of an underlying oattern to reveal itself'
Iain Sinclair, 'Lights Out for the Territory'.


Other people/ideas to research further...
- Iain Sinclair

- Urban wandering

- Flaneur (The term flâneur comes from the French masculine noun flâneur, which has the basic meanings of "stroller", "lounger", "saunterer", "loafer", from the French verb flâner, which means "to stroll".

- Patrick Kellier - Films - 'London' and 'Robinson in Space' (provides a psychogeographical meditation on London.

- Detournement (In détournement, an artist reuses elements of well-known media to create a new work with a different message, often one opposed to the original.)