Abstract
Street Talk – material stories
The material qualities of street surfaces facilitate and hinder. They are fast and slow. They include and exclude. They whisper and yell. We have an intimate relationship with them, being both affected, and affecting on a daily basis by the materiality of the street. You are here. Going there. And this in various modalities; on foot, by car, by bike, in bus. Implicit in the surface material of the street is a sensorial mobile relationship, and a social one, too.
The materials of the street speak; a language of the city giving clues to the reading of it. Materials tell stories and histories; of economics, of power, of cultural relationships to time in time, of urban spatialities, and of the inner workings - or not workings - of societies. This contribution will explore the materiality of the street, and through an auto ethnographic approach examining the appearance, disappearance and meetings of materials, imbedded stories and histories of a city will be unfolded.
This presentation takes as its’ base Ajijic, a small Mexican city of American and Canadian expats, and Mexicans of Spanish and indigenous heritage. This is a city in which numerous societies, cultures and economies exist, co-exist, struggle mix and separate, and in which the materiality of the street tells these stories.
Key Words: the street, inclusion/exclusion, relational materiality, mobility and auto ethnography
The material qualities of street surfaces facilitate and hinder. They are fast and slow. They include and exclude. They whisper and yell. We have an intimate relationship with them, being both affected, and affecting on a daily basis by the materiality of the street. You are here. Going there. And this in various modalities; on foot, by car, by bike, in bus. Implicit in the surface material of the street is a sensorial mobile relationship, and a social one, too.
The materials of the street speak; a language of the city giving clues to the reading of it. Materials tell stories and histories; of economics, of power, of cultural relationships to time in time, of urban spatialities, and of the inner workings - or not workings - of societies. This contribution will explore the materiality of the street, and through an auto ethnographic approach examining the appearance, disappearance and meetings of materials, imbedded stories and histories of a city will be unfolded.
This presentation takes as its’ base Ajijic, a small Mexican city of American and Canadian expats, and Mexicans of Spanish and indigenous heritage. This is a city in which numerous societies, cultures and economies exist, co-exist, struggle mix and separate, and in which the materiality of the street tells these stories.
Key Words: the street, inclusion/exclusion, relational materiality, mobility and auto ethnography
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Publication date | Aug 2018 |
| Media of output | Video |
| Size | 15 minutes |
| Publication status | Published - Aug 2018 |
Keywords
- Key Words: the street, inclusion/exclusion, relational materiality, mobility and auto ethnography