Everyday experience and community development practice

This article explores the potential to apply what is generally known as ‘theories of everyday life’ and psychogeography to understanding how the experience of place affects individuals concept of self and their position within the world. We suggest that community development practice can become over focused on the practicalities of organizing, at the expense of understanding the daily life experience of individuals and communities. If community development practitioners applied an analysis based on the theories and experiences of everyday life they could better facilitate individuals to work collectively for personal and social change. The article explores the basic ideas of everyday life and psychogeography. We then identify a methodology for using these ideas in community development practice and provide an experimental example of such an analysis set in Las Vegas. Finally we discuss the potential for community development workers of linking such an analysis to the work of Freire and the ideas of Gramsci to increase the effectiveness of their practice

Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990

‘Postmodernism’ was the final instalment of a 12-year series of V&A exhibitions exploring 20th-century design. It examined a diverse collection of creative practices in art, architecture, design, fashion, graphics, film, performance and pop music/video, which the curators, Pavitt and Adamson (V&A/RCA), identified under the common theme of ‘postmodernism’. The exhibition assessed the rise and decline of postmodern strategies in art and style cultures of the period, exploring their radical impact as well as their inextricable links with the economics and effects of late-capitalist culture. The exhibition comprised over 250 objects, including large-scale reconstructions and archive film/video footage, drawn from across Europe, Japan and the USA. It was the first exhibition to bring together this range of material and to foreground the significance of pop music and performance in the development of postmodernism. Pavitt originated and co-curated the exhibition with Adamson. They shared intellectual ownership of the project and equal responsibility for writing and editing the accompanying 320-page book (including a 40,000-word jointly written introduction), but divided research responsibilities according to geography and subject. The research was conducted over four years, with Pavitt leading on European and British material. This involved interviewing artists, designers and architects active in the period and working with collections and archives across Europe. The research led to the acquisition of c.80 objects for the V&A’s permanent collections, making it one of the most significant public collections of late-20th-century design in the world. The exhibition was critically reviewed worldwide. For the Independent, ‘bright ideas abound at the V&A’s lucid show’ (2011). It attracted 115,000 visitors at the V&A (15% over the Museum’s target) and travelled in 2012 to MART Rovereto, Italy (50,000 visitors) and Landesmuseum Zürich, Switzerland (70,000 visitors). Pavitt was invited to speak about the exhibition in the UK, USA, Poland, Portugal, Ireland and Italy (2010-12)

How to build a community : New Urbanism and its critics

The focus of the following article will be New Urbanism, an urbanistic movement which originated in the United States and advocated the establishment and reinforcing of communities through planning activities. Its proponents claim that the proper design of space leads to the development of a local community. The article will discuss the main principles of the New Urbanism approach, such as its social doctrine and the concept of neighbourhood. Possible benefits of New Urbanism and critical arguments regarding it will also be analysed

New Hollywood in the rust belt: urban decline and downtown renaissance in 'The King of Marvin Gardens' and 'Rocky'

This article reviews the geographical dynamics of New Hollywood, arguing that the industrial crisis of 1969-1971 catalyzed further decentralization of location shooting beyond Los Angeles, bringing new types of urban space into view. It examines the parallel crisis and restructuring of the film industry and the inner city via two films, The King of Marvin Gardens (1972) and Rocky (1976), which are emblematic of distinct phases in the development of New Hollywood. Through their aesthetic strategies, narrative structure and mapping of cinematic space, these films produce allegories of urban decline and renewal that closely engaged with the transformation of the American city, from the urban crisis of the late 1960s to neoliberal programs of renewal in the late 1970s

In Pursuit of Sustainable Strategic Long-term Planning Throughout Meta-postmodernism as New Perspective of Stylistic Design

During the different period of architectural design, designers attempt to achieve high level of life quality for all users. Architecture and urban planner want to provide a style of design which not only achieves different function for different users with respect to their ethnicity, ability, age, sex, capability, position, and life style but also improve friendly environment throughout responsive legislation based on long-term planning. Although, the styles are considered some indicators, it is ignored the other important characteristics. Therefore, the existing styles never achieve standard level of satisfaction of different people. The goal of the research is to introduce meta-postmodern style as supplement stylistic approach. The style tries to consider all important indicators that create a strategic long-term planning for different generations. Various characteristics of new style can be applied to improve the quality of human life and provide a health, livable and sustainable planning for all users

In Pursuit of Sustainable Strategic Long-term Planning Throughout Meta-postmodernism as New Perspective of Stylistic Design

During the different period of architectural design, designers attempt to achieve a high level of life quality for all users. Architecture and urban planner want to provide a style of design which not only achieves different function for different users with respect to their ethnicity, ability, age, sex, capability, position, and lifestyle but also improve the friendly environment throughout responsive legislation based on long-term planning. Although the styles are considered some indicators, it is ignored the other important characteristics. Therefore, the existing styles never achieve the standard level of satisfaction of different people. The goal of the research is to introduce meta-postmodern style as supplement stylistic approach. The style tries to consider all important indicators that create strategic long-term planning for different generations. Various characteristics of a new style can be applied to improve the quality of human life and provide healthy, livable and sustainable planning for all users

Repetition and difference: Lefebvre, Le Corbusier and modernity's (im)moral landscape: a commentary

This article engages with the relationship between social theory, architectural theory and material culture. The article is a reply to an article in a previous volume of the journal in question (Smith, M. (2001) ‘Repetition and difference: Lefebvre, Le Corbusier and modernity’s (im)moral landscape’, Ethics, Place and Environment, 4(1), 31-34) and, consequently, is also a direct engagement with another academic's scholarship. It represents a critique of their work as well as a recasting of their ideas, arguing that the matter in question went beyond interpretative issues to a direct critique of another author's scholarship on both Le Corbusier and Lefebvre. A reply to my article from the author of the original article was carried in a later issue of the journal (Smith, M. (2002) ‘Ethical Difference(s): a Response to Maycroft on Le Corbusier and Lefebvre’, Ethics, Place and Environment, 5(3), 260-269)

From intersubjectivity to interculturalism in digital learning environments

The paper presents the work of the research program “Studies on\ud Intermediality as Intercultural Mediation” a joint international venture that seeks\ud to provide blended-learning -both online and in-classroom- methodologies for the\ud development of interculturalism and associated emotional empathic responses\ud through the study of art and literary fiction.1\ud Technological development is consistent with human desire to draw on\ud previous information and experiences in order to apply acquired knowledge to\ud present life conditions and, furthermore, make improvements for the future.\ud Therefore, it is logical that human agentive consciousness has been directed\ud towards encouraging action at a distance by all possible means. The evolution in\ud media technologies bears witness to this fact.\ud This paper explores the paradoxes behind the growing emphasis on spatial\ud metaphors during the 20th-century and a dynamic concept of space as the site of\ud relational constructions where forms and structural patterns become formations\ud constructed in interaction, and where the limit or border becomes a constitutive\ud feature, immanently connected with the possibility of its transgression. The paper\ud contends that the development of mass media communication, and particularly the\ud digital turn, has dramatically impacted on topographical spaces, both sociocultural and individual, and that the emphasis on „inter‟ perspectives, hybridism,\ud ambiguities, differences and meta-cognitive articulations of awareness of limits\ud and their symbolic representations, and the desire either to transgress limits or to\ud articulate „in-between‟, intercultural „third spaces‟, etc. are symptomatic of\ud structural problems at the spatial-temporal interface of culture and its\ud representations. Finally, the paper brings into attention research on the\ud neuroscientific basis of intersubjectivity in order to point out the material basis of\ud human knowledge and cognition and its relationship to the archiving of historical\ud memory and information transfer through education. It also offers and brief\ud introduction to the dynamics of SIIM