offbeat, sure, and provocative, always!
Daniel, and all,
yes, I hoped it just needed elaboration, you are right. Thank you for this. I think yours just got caught up in my interest in public geographies and being offbeat, provocative, and in writing about generosity and `lay` [sic] geographies. There is much on that does push a `we know better` in the guise of being `creative` [sic], thinking of an awful digital city "take over the city" [!] event I was involved with this year; little connections the two parts of that title; and it often sounds as capitalistically closed minded and exploitative as the great enemy it seeks, apparently, to dislodge.
enough sermon; and I hope your event goes really well.
best, David
________________________________________
From: Daniel Raven-Ellison [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 16 September 2009 14:16
To: [log in to unmask]; David Crouch
Cc: Daniel Raven-Ellison
Subject: Re: URBAN EARTH EVENT: CANTERBURY
Many thanks the thoughts on the Canterbury event that I am organising. I can
entirely see what you are getting at, but this may be because the original post
didn’t do what it could/should have to situate the URBAN EARTH event in the
context of the URBAN EARTH project as a whole – apologies for not providing
a little more history with the initial posting.
URBAN EARTH is a project to (re)present urban areas. This is done by walking
across cities - capturing them through photographs, sound recordings, notes or
however participants choose. The photographs/media are then 'exposed' and
shared online or otherwise for free and under an open creative commons
license. The walks attempt to reveal the distribution of multiple deprivation
within the cities - where 10% of land is occupied by the most deprived fifth of
the city around 10% of the walk will go through these types of area.
Anyone can use them as well as the many films either as they are or to edit
into other things they are doing.
Take a look at
- over 6,000 images of Mexico City here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/urbanearth/sets/72157618632696725/ (other
cities to follow)
- and download six (creative commons) films here: http://urbanearth.blip.tv/,
these have been watched over 15,000 times online alone.
The images and films has been used at no cost at a range of events and for a
number of publications. Feel free to request some high res images if they will
help with your work. At two extremes:
- The new book 'Ecological Urbanism'
http://www.springer.com/birkhauser/architecture+&+design/book/978-3-
03778-189-0 uses over 200 URBAN EARTH images at no cost
- VJ Freedom uses the films at festivals including Glastonbury and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rFuxcXENPo&feature=player_embedded
Once more the project attempts to be as democratic as is reasonably possible.
Anyone can join URBAN EARTH's social network athttp://urbanearth.ning.com
where all walks and events are posted. There is also a facebook group. Over
200 people are parts of this network from countries around the world. Any of
these people can ask for help in setting up their walk and then launch it from
the Ning. When organising a walk through a city local media are contacted and
encouraged to invite local residents along - we are doing this with the current
walks planned across Leeds and London. In the UK this has not been to
successful as of yet, but in Guadalajara over 100 people took part aged
between 10 and 90.
More recently we introduced a new type of URBAN EARTH walk called an URBAN
STORY walk. The idea of this walk is to follow a specific theme and will
hopefully be easier for participants to plan their walks and make the project
even more accessible.
It is a playful event that attempts to engage people in an alternative way –
deliberatively a little offbeat (less intentionally provocative) … in my and many
colleagues’ experiences, most academic paper-based conferences are neither
inclusive or democratic, or at times critical. The 'secret' is fun (are you curious?
) and schedule intentionally under-structured in order to enable participants
there at the time to take ownership and influence, through consensus, what
occurs. While it’s not explicitly advertised as an event to 'make friends' and
'explain ourselves', these, and understanding each other, are at the heart of
what the weekend is about. URBAN EARTH EVENTS are open to anyone and the
price is intentionally as low as possible (£40-50 is quite good for two nights
bed, breakfast and dinner).
It would be great if anyone on crit-geog could make it (and indeed any of your
students, friends or others who may be interested), the greater the range of
perspectives, knowledge and understanding we have at the event the better.
Hopefully, you will enjoy it.
Dan
URBAN EARTH
http://urbanearthcanterbury.eventbrite.com/
http://urbanearth.ning.com
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