CONTENTS
Victor COUNTED: Making Sense of Place Attachment: Towards a Holistic Understanding of People-Place Relationships and Experiences
- ABSTRACT: The article is an attempt to make sense of the different interdisciplinary perspectives associated with people’s attachment to places with a view to construct a holistic template for understanding people place relationships and experiences. We took note of the theoretical contributions of Jorgensen & Stedman (2001), Scannell & Gifford (2010), and Seamon (2012, 2014) to construct an integrative framework for understanding emotional links to places and people’s perception and experience of places. This was done with the intention of illuminating on the meaning of place and the different “places” people get attached to. The paper concludes by incorporating different place frameworks with the intention of establishing a holistic model for understanding the different attributes and perceptions of people-place relationships and experiences.
Roger PADEN: Landscapes and Evolutionary Aesthetics
- ABSTRACT: This essay examines the possibility of developing a more complete evolutionary aesthetics that can be used to appraise both natural landscapes and works of landscape architects. For the purpose of this essay, an “evolutionary aesthetics” is an aesthetic theory that is closely connected to Darwin’s theory of evolution. Two types of Darwinian evolutionary aesthetics seem possible; a theory of evolved tastes, such as that developed by Dennis Dutton, and an aesthetics of evolving nature based on Carlson’s positive aesthetics. After, exploring both theories, I argue that, while the two positions approach aesthetics from different directions, they support similar aesthetic judgments concerning landscapes, and this suggests that the two positions might be incorporated into a broader theory of evolutionary aesthetics. That theory is briefly outlined and applied to both natural landscapes and parks.
Jeffrey B. WEBB: Watershed Redesign in the Upper Wabash River Drainage Area, 1870-1970
- ABSTRACT: The Huntington, Salamonie, and Mississinewa reservoirs in northern Indiana control seasonal flooding in the Upper Wabash River drainage area. They appeared in the 1960s after a long period of study and planning in response to large-scale flooding in central and southern Indiana in the first half of the twentieth century. Their construction disrupted the pattern of human ecology along the Wabash and its tributaries for many of the watershed’s inhabitants. Supporters touted the projects’ economic and recreational benefits, while opponents experienced the change as a desecration of sacred space. The projects saved millions in property damage and perhaps many human lives, but at the cost of an enduring sense of place amid the advent of a new regime of scientific watershed management and state control over natural resources in the region.
Winnie L. M. YEE: Fashion, Affect, and Poetry in a Global City
- ABSTRACT: Everyday life is a central theme of Hong Kong poetry. Many Hong Kong poets use the quotidian as a starting point for the exploration of history and alternative imaginings. This mundane focus, unlike the colonial dreamscape of Hong Kong as an economic miracle, allows writers to reflect upon Hong Kong as a post-colonial and global space. The Hong Kong writer Natalia Chan examines the complex nature of everyday life within the space of the global and post-colonial city. Chan’s poems deal with the essence of everydayness and use commodities to conjure up the vivacity of the urbanscape of Hong Kong. Unlike the political and economic discourse that is usually used to define Hong Kong, Chan’s work portrays Hong Kong as a city that offers the possibility of daily re-creation against the background of history. In this article, we will examine Chan’s use of the circulation of commodities in the global world and explore the way fashion becomes a point where high and popular culture, private and public domains, and local and global interests clash, negotiate, and fertilize each other. Chan’s works do not conform to the economic and prosperity discourse that has repressed Hong Kong; rather, she guides her readers to re-experience the everydayness of routines, to celebrate alternate ways of understanding the urbanscape, and to open themselves to the potentialities of art and the everyday.
Emmanuel YEWAH: African Documentaries, Films, Texts, and Environmental Issues
- ABSTRACT: This study draws from theoretical environmental debates as well as a selection of films, documentaries, and texts to discuss Africans’ approaches to environmental and ecological problems. Furthermore, it highlights the various strategies that Africans have developed in their attempts to provide holistic and much more comprehensive responses to environmental challenges. Informed by African indigenous knowledge, those strategies do involve community-based micro-level initiatives, grassroots organizations, ancestral spirits, and use local languages or lingua franca to educate as well as prod the people’s consciousness about environmental and ecological issues.
REVIEWS
- Lorna Lueker ZUKAS: Forgotten World. Directed by Terri Ella
- Derek SHANAHAN: The View from the Train: Cities and Other Landscapes. By Patrick Keiller.
