My emphasis on place that runs through this weblog is informed by a critical regionalism within a bounded Australia and it is a response to the abstract universalism of the global market that makes every space the same (identical).
The philosophy behind the idea of place as an opposition to the global market is simple though complex. It holds that objects do not go into their concepts without leaving a remainder; the remainder is the non-identical; the remainder is the untruth of identity; and contradiction’ means non-identity. There is so much identity about with the economic categories of the market (they supposedly mirror reality) that we need lots of digging up remainder as excess, negativity and contradiction.
For those interested that's the first few pages of Adorno's Negative Dialectics. (It's a real tough read)
Place emphasizes the particular and the substantive as opposed to the universal and conceptual of the global market. That turns philosophy on its ahead and hits the univeralism of Western culture full on. 'Place' is dimissed as parochical and provincal and so 'place' as a meaningful category is shunned. But the categories of universalism----eg., those of the virtual reality of the internet ---are place blind and obscure the place we inhabit. Virtual reality is everywhere and and a particular somewhere--the inner city of Adelaide---is deemed to be irrelevant. All that matters is the weblog in cyberspace and the links to other weblogs, newspapers, sites etc.
It is in postmodern architecture and ecology that we find an interest and concern for place----eg., the idea of regionalism, both critical and bio. But place is more or less concealed--veiled?---and rarely discussed, even though our bodies have a place we call home. So it is hard to get a grip on it.
Why not go g back to the Greeks? Everybody does it when they are in need of a sign post and some help to unconceal what is veiled.
Where something is constitutes a very basic category since anyway we go we find place waiting for us. Place is primary for us. We are in a place; we live within places. Places----the inner city or beachscape ---surround our bodies just as a glass surrounds water.
The analogy is imperfect:-a glass can be moved or carried around as in a party but a city or beachscape cannot. But it will do as a first cut at coming to grips with what place is. It foregrounds limit as part of place.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at November 11, 2003 10:23 PM | TrackBack