Find a place in your selected neighborhood and stay there in silence for a minimum of 5 minutes. There is nothing to do here but let your thoughts wander. You might pay attention to the variety of sights, sounds, smells, sensations on your flesh, or emotions that arise. But do not fixate on them for long. Notice them and let them pass so that other thoughts may enter.

After some time has passed, turn your attention intentionally back on to the experience of staying in wonder.  What thoughts came up for you that linger?  What did you notice? What sensory feelings emerged? Take a photograph of something in this place that represents your wonderings.

Jot down some notes, sketch an image, or video or audio record your thoughts prompted by the following questions. Submit this reflection as part of your Scene Library.

Conduct a sensory inventory at two spots within your neighborhood spaces, as we did in class on Tuesday (indoors and outdoors).

After completing this in at least two spots, create a map of your site based on these sensory inventories. Submit the map as part of your scene library. 

Pay attention to words, letters, signs, symbols, and language in your space. Look for examples of these and consider the different meanings of each given how you imagine or define the audience and/or context.

Document your wonderings in the form of sketches, photographs and/or video.  Submit this to your scene library.

Deepen your sensory inventory, by not just paying attention to sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures; but also note how your sensory inquiry affects your experience or understanding of a space. Go for a walk or find a location to sit in the neighborhood you selected for your final project. Use the questions below (or make up your own!) to tune into one sense,  your body, and your thoughts. Keep track of your sensory experiences in a variety of ways to contribute to your scene library.

Smells, scents, aromas

Debrief Questions

Use these questions to reflect on your sensory inquiry:

Look like a ... (historian, vandal, futurist, bad guest, improv performer, child), pp.  48-57)

These activities provide instruction to help us slow down, activate the imagination, and find alternate questions and meanings in the spaces within which we find ourselves.  Choose at least two of these activities for your scene library, however, feel fee to keep playing and do them all to support your neighborhood inquiry. 

This prompt asks that you write about your space in a form that is evocative of feeling, senses, and embodiment, but in a way that brings the reader into the scene with an openness that is "not rooted in fixed conditions" but in "a something coming together" (Stewart, p. 2). Reread Stewart's introduction to understand the kind of writing about the ordinary that is "at once abstract and concrete" (p. 3) and what possibilities that might open.

If you need a starting place, you might consider E.B. White's Here is New York, Malcom X's description of Harlem from The Autobiography of Malcolm X, Harryette Mullen's Urban Tangleweed, Natalie Diaz’s Manhattan is a Lenape Word or Kathleen Stewart's selections in Ordinary Affects (see Canvas).  

Option B

Do you have a favorite poet or author? Share a poem or scene they wrote that is based in the senses and stories of a particular place. Compose a short poem or scene for your place, based on their style. 

Create an artistic representation of your neighborhood that reflects some aspect of your ongoing analysis. Integrate a text, material, or found object associated with your neighborhood into the piece. We will provide art materials in session 7 to help you get started. You might choose one of these prompts from 'How to be an explorer of the world' to help you get started.  Reference:  Smith, K. (2008). How to be an explorer of the world: Portable Life Museum. New York: Penguin Books.

"Using your imagination, create a portrait of your [space] in which everything you encounter is magical, exaggerated, or slightly altered from reality" (Smith, p. 99). 

What ghostly pasts, haunted presents, or speculative futures can you imagine? Choose whatever documentation method you prefer to present a speculative portrait of an imagined past, an altered present, or a hypothetical future of your space.  This might be an annotated image, a comic book sequence, a painting or visual rendering, or other method of presentation.

Reference: Smith, K. (2008). How to be an explorer of the world: Portable Life Museum. New York: Penguin Books.

Create a map that reflects your neighborhood investigation this semester. This may be hand drawn or computer generated (ex. from google maps or some online source). You may use any type of materials or conceptualization to create your map. The main criteria is that your map demonstrate understanding or grappling with ideas from course readings and/or discussed in class.

Your map might include any of the following elements (these are optional): 

1. A map of locations visited or routes taken

2. Indicate moments or particular places that demonstrate some intentional curation of experience

3. Address the senses (sight, sound, touch, taste, smell) in response to one or more of your sensory inventories

4. Integrate other writing, text or imagery, such as fiction, poetry, journalism, photos, video, music, and/or sound 

5. Map or trace assemblages and flows of materials and other forces through this space (see Bennett and Nxumalo).