Psychogeography was defined in 1955 by Guy Debord as the "the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals." ^[1]. A more straightforward definition is that it is "a slightly stuffy term that's been applied to a whole toy box full of playful, inventive strategies for exploring cities. Psychogeography includes just about anything that takes pedestrians off their predictable paths and jolts them into a new awareness of the urban landscape." ^[2] The most important of these strategies is the dérive. Year 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays the 1955 Gregorian calendar). ... Guy Ernest Debord (December 28, 1931, in Paris – November 30, 1994, in Champot) was a writer, film maker, hypergraphist and founding member of the groups Lettrist International and Situationist International (SI). ... A pedestrian at the intersection of Alinga Street and Northbourne Avenue, Canberra, Australia A pedestrian is a person travelling on foot, whether walking or running. ... In biological psychology, awareness describes a human or animals perception and cognitive reaction to a condition or event. ... Critical praxis developed by the Lettrist International as part of the situationist critique of capitalism and unitary urbanism as a critique of urbanism. ...

Development

Psychogeography was originally developed by the Lettrist International in the journal Potlach. The originator of much of the ideas behind what became known as unitary urbanism, psychogeography and the dérive seems to have been Ivan Chtcheglov, in his highly influential 1953 essay Formulaire pour un urbanisme nouveau (Formulary for a New Urbanism). The Letterists reimagining of the city obviously has some connections to predecessors like Surrealism, while the idea of urban wandering ties in with the longstanding concept of the flâneur. Following Chtcheglov's exclusion from the Letterists in 1954, Debord and others worked to clarify his ideas formulating the concept of unitary urbanism, in a bid to demand a revolutionary approach to architecture. At a conference in Scotland in [1956], the Letterists joined the International Movement For An Imaginist Bauhaus – led by Asger Jorn, Potlatch contributor and, later, Situationist – to set a proper definition to the idea announced by Gil J. Wolman "Unitary Urbanism - the synthesis of art and technology that we call for — must be constructed according to certain new values of life, values which now need to be distinguished and disseminated." ^[3]; it demanded the rejection of functional, Euclidean values in architecture, as well as the separation between art and its surroundings. The combination of these two negations seems paradoxical in that creating abstraction, one creates art, which, in turn, creates a point of distinction that unitary urbanism insists must be nullified. This confusion is also fundamental to the execution of unitary urbanism as it corrupts one’s ability to identify where "function" ends and "play" (the "ludic") begins, resulting in what the LI and SI believed to be a utopia where one was constantly exploring, free of determining factors. The Lettrist International (LI) was the first breakaway group from Isidore Isous Lettrist Movement (LM). ... A potlatch is a ceremony among certain Native American/First Nations peoples on the Pacific Northwest coast of the United States and the Canadian province of British Columbia such as the Haida, Tlingit, Tsimshian, Salish, Nuu-chah-nulth, and Kwakiutl (Kwakwakawakw). ... Unitary Urbanism, or UU, was the critique of status quo urbanism employed by the Lettrist International and then further developed by the Situationist International between approximately 1953 and 1960. ... Ivan Chtcheglov, January 16th 1933-April 21st 1998, is a French political theorist, activist and poet, born in Paris from Russian parents. ... January 7 - President Harry S. Truman announces the United States has developed a hydrogen bomb. ... Max Ernst. ... Look up flaneur in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Unitary Urbanism, or UU, was the critique of status quo urbanism employed by the Lettrist International and then further developed by the Situationist International between approximately 1953 and 1960. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... Asger Jorn (March 3, 1914 - May 1, 1973) was born in Vejrum, Jutland, Denmark under the name Oluf Jørgensen. ... The Situationist International (SI) was a small group of international political and artistic agitators with roots in Marxism, Lettrism and the early 20th century European artistic and political avant-gardes. ... Gil Joseph Wolman was a French poet and writer born in Paris in 1929 and died in Paris in 1995. ... For other uses, see Euclid (disambiguation). ... This article is about building architecture. ... Ludic (adjective) means literally playful, and refers to any philosophy where play is the prime purpose of life. ...

In Formulary for a New Urbanism[1], Chtcheglov had written “Architecture is the simplest means of articulating time and space, of modulating reality, of engendering dreams”. ^[4] Similarly, the Situationists found contemporary architecture both physically and ideologically restrictive, combining with outside cultural influence, effectively creating an undertow, and forcing oneself into a certain system of interaction with their environment: "[C]ities have a psychogeographical relief, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes which strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones".^[5]

The situationists' response was to create designs of new urbanized space, promising better opportunities for experimenting through mundane expression. Their intentions remained completely as abstractions. Guy Debord’s truest intention was to unify two different factors of “ambiance” that, he felt, determined the values of the urban landscape: the soft ambiance – light, sound, time, the association of ideas – with the hard, the actual physical constructions. Debord’s vision was a combination of the two realms of opposing ambiance, where the play of the soft ambiance was actively considered in the rendering of the hard. The new space creates a possibility for activity not formerly determined by one besides the individual. Guy Ernest Debord (December 28, 1931, in Paris – November 30, 1994, in Champot) was a writer, film maker, hypergraphist and founding member of the groups Lettrist International and Situationist International (SI). ...

However, it is imperative for one to be aware of a certain amount of humor in the SI’s conceptualization of psychogeography. "This apparently serious term ‘psychogeography’", writes Debord biographer Vincent Kaufman, “comprises an art of conversation and drunkenness, and everything leads us to believe that Debord excelled at both” ^[6].

Eventually, Debord and Jorn resigned themselves to the fate of "urban relativity". Debord readily admits in his film A Critique of Separation (1961), "The sectors of a city…are decipherable, but the personal meaning they have for us is incommunicable, as is the secrecy of private life in general, regarding which we possess nothing but pitiful documents". Despite the ambiguity of the theory, Debord committed himself firmly to its practical basis in reality, even as he later confesses, "none of this is very clear. It is a completely typical drunken monologue…with its vain phrases that do not await response and its overbearing explanations. And its silences."

But before succumbing to the truth of the impossibility of true psychogeography, Debord made another film, On the Passage of a Few Persons Through a Rather Brief Unity of Time (1959), the title of which suggests its own subject matter. The film’s narrated content concerns itself with the evolution of a generally passive group of unnamed people into a fully aware, anarchistic assemblage, and might be perceived as a biography of the situationists themselves. Among the rants which construct the film (regarding art, ignorance, consumerism, militarism) is a desperate call for psychogeographic action:

Moments later, Debord elaborates on the important goals of unitary urbanism in contemporary society: Unitary Urbanism, or UU, was the critique of status quo urbanism employed by the Lettrist International and then further developed by the Situationist International between approximately 1953 and 1960. ...

Though the path required to achieve this utopia is difficult and hindered by society and its own constructions, now as living agents that actively enforce restrictions where we may have once considered them arbiters of independence. Quoting from Marx, Debord preaches: Marx is a common German surname. ...

Dérive

By definition, psychogeography combines subjective and objective knowledge and studies. Debord struggled to stipulate the finer points of this theoretical paradox, ultimately producing Theory of the Dérive in 1958, a document which essentially serves as an instruction manual for the psychogeographic procedure, executed through the act of dérive ("drift"). Critical praxis developed by the Lettrist International as part of the situationist critique of capitalism and unitary urbanism as a critique of urbanism. ...

In the SI’s 6th issue, Raoul Vaneigem writes in a manifesto of unitary urbanism, "All space is occupied by the enemy. We are living under a permanent curfew. Not just the cops – the geometry".^[8] Dérive, as a previously conceptualized tactic in the French military, was "a calculated action determined by the absence of a greater locus", and "a maneuver within the enemy’s field of vision".^[9] To the SI, whose interest was inhabiting space, the dérive brought appeal in this sense of taking the “fight” to the streets and truly indulging in a determined operation. The dérive was a course of preparation, reconnaissance, a means of shaping situationist psychology among urban explorers for the eventuality of the situationist city. Critical praxis developed by the Lettrist International as part of the situationist critique of capitalism and unitary urbanism as a critique of urbanism. ... Raoul Vaneigem (born 1934) is a Belgian writer and philosopher. ...

Psychogeographic maps

In their memoirs, Jorn and Debord addressed a metaphor of the landscape as a female body, updating it in the form of a paint-splattered collage of pin-up models. The erotic charge of psychogeography was undeniable, the rousing sexual conquest of having fully explored and overcome the exoticism of the city – this was accentuated by a famous piece of situationist graffiti, “I came in the cobblestones.” The SI promised, “We will play upon topophobia and create a topophilia.”

The connection between psychogeography and sexuality may be one of the reasons Jorn and Debord chose to title their famous topographic collage as The Naked City, one of their two famous psychogeographic situationist maps, alongside Guide psychogeographique de Paris. Both maps served as reconstructed guides to Paris, focusing exclusively on areas that Jorn and Debord felt had not yet been spoiled by capitalist-motivated redevelopments, areas still worth visiting; these conclusions were, of course, based on the result of a derive. The arrows drawn on the collaged map were used to demonstrate the psychogeographic “flow” between each locale – true to psychogeographic form, the “flow” could not be objectively deconstructed to common terms, remaining merely as an abstraction. The maps represented Jorn and Debord’s conquering of the urban areas yet undefiled by bureaucracy.

Aside from its erotic undertones, Debord’s use of the name was a direct tribute to the 1947 crime film of the same name, directed by Jules Dassin, itself a direct reference to renowned New York photographer Weegee. Debord and Jorn compared their drifts around Paris to the legwork of the film's detectives. Jules Dassin (born Julius Dassin on December 18, 1911, in Middletown, Connecticut) is an American film director. ... Weegee photograph, The Critic, November 22, 1943, first published in LIFE Magazine, December 6, 1943. ...

More recently psychogeographical maps have been used in political actions, drifts and projections, distributed as flyers and in journals and magazines such as Transgressions: A journal of urban exploration or Mute magazine.

Contemporary psychogeography

During the 1980s and 90s psychogeography has flourished and diverged. While situationist theory became popular in academic circles, avant-garde, neoist and revolutionary groups emerged, developing the praxis in various ways. This interest survives today, manifested in a number of groups practising contemporary Psychogeography. The journal Transgressions: A Journal of Urban Exploration (which appears to have ceased publication sometime in 2000) collated and developed a number of post-avant-garde revolutionary psychogeographical themes. It was, in part, aligned to a magico-Marxist psychogeographical agenda propagated in the prolific work of Stewart Home who continued to cleverly develop and utilise situationist ideas along with many other concepts in his work. Between 1992 and 1996 The Workshop for Non-Linear Architecture undertook an extensive programme of practical research into classic (situationist) psychogeography in both Glasgow and London. The discoveries made during this period, documented in the group's journal Viscosity, expanded the terrain of the psychogeographic into that of urban design and architectural performance. Since 2003 in the United States, Provflux and Psy-Geo-conflux (separate events) are dedicated to action-based participatory experiments, underneath the academic umbrella of Psychogeography. Plato is credited with the inception of academia: the body of knowledge, its development and transmission across generations. ... A work similar to Marcel Duchamps Fountain Avant garde (written avant-garde) is a French phrase, one of many French phrases used by English speakers. ... Street action at the 6th Neoist Apartment Festival in Montreal, 1983 Neoism refers both to a specific subcultural network of artistic performance and media experimentalists and more generally to a practical underground philosophy. ... Revolutionary, when used as a noun, is a person who either advocates or actively engages in some kind of revolution. ... Praxis may refer to: Praxis (process), the process of putting theoretical knowledge into practice Praxis (Eastern Orthodoxy), the practice of faith, especially worship Praxis (band), a Bill Laswell musical project Praxis (moon), a planetary body in the Star Trek universe Praxis Care Group, a Northern Ireland based mental health charity. ... Stewart Home (born 1962) is a writer, subcultural pamphleteer, underground art historian, and activist. ... The Workshop for Non-Linear Architecture (wnla) was the name taken by a group of experimental artists and psychogeographers active in Britain (sections existed in both Glasgow and London) during the early 1990s. ... In June 2003 visual, performance, and new media artists, along with writers, urban adventurers and the general public united to explore the physical and psychological landscape of urban space. ... Psy-Geo-Conflux is an annual event dedicated to current artistic and social investigations in psychogeography. ...

More prominently Psychogeography become a standard device used in performance art and literature. In Britain in particular psychogeography has become a recognised descriptive term used in discussion of successful writers such as Iain Sinclair and Peter Ackroyd and the documentaries of filmmaker Patrick Keiller. The popularity of Sinclair drew the term into greater public use in the United Kingdom. Though Sinclair makes infrequent use of the jargon associated with the Situationists he has certainly popularized the term by producing a large body of work based on pedestrian exploration of the urban and suburban landscape. Sinclair and similar thinkers draw on a longstanding British literary tradition of the exploration of urban landscapes, predating Situationism, found in the work of writers like William Blake, Arthur Machen, and Thomas de Quincy. The nature and history of London were a central focus of these writers, utilising romantic, gothic, and occult ideas to describe and transform the city. Iain Sinclair drew on this tradition combined with his own explorations as a way of criticising modern developments of urban space in such key texts as Lights Out for the Territory. Peter Ackroyd's bestselling London: A Biography was partially based on similar sources. Merlin Coverly gives equal promience to this literary tradition alongside Situationism in his book Psychogeography (2006), not only recognising that in the public eye in Britain at least the situationist origins of psychogeography are sometimes forgotten, but that via certain writers like Edgar Allan Poe, Daniel Defoe and Charles Baudelaire they had a shared tradition. The ongoing development of psychogeography as a fashionable brand resulted in such developments as the British journalist Will Self who has a column called Psychogeography which started out in the British Airways in-flight magazine and now appears weekly in the Saturday magazine of The Independent newspaper. This article is about Performance art. ... Old book bindings at the Merton College library. ... For the Australian politician, see Ian Sinclair Iain Sinclair is a British writer and film maker. ... Peter Ackroyd (born October 5, 1949, London) is an English author. ... Patrick Keiller (born 1950) is a British film-maker, writer and lecturer. ... William Blake (November 28, 1757 – August 12, 1827) was an English poet, visionary, painter, and printmaker. ... Arthur Machen (March 3, 1863 – December 15th, 1947) was a leading Welsh-born author of the 1890s. ... Thomas de Quincey (August 15, 1785 - December 8, 1859) was an English author and intellectual. ... This article is about the capital of England and the United Kingdom. ... Romantics redirects here. ... Strawberry Hill, an English villa in the Gothic revival style, built by seminal Gothic writer Horace Walpole The gothic novel was a literary genre that belonged to Romanticism and began in the United Kingdom with The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole. ... For other uses, see Occult (disambiguation). ... For the Australian politician, see Ian Sinclair Iain Sinclair is a British writer and film maker. ... Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American poet, short story writer, playwright, editor, literary critic, essayist and one of the leaders of the American Romantic Movement. ... Daniel Defoe (1659/1661 [?] â€“ April 24 [?], 1731)[1] was a British writer, journalist, and spy, who gained enduring fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. ... “Baudelaire” redirects here. ... For other uses, see Brand (disambiguation). ... Will Self William Self (born September 26, 1961) is an English novelist, reviewer and columnist. ... For the 1930s airline of similar name, see British Airways Ltd. ... For other uses, see The Independent (disambiguation). ...

The concepts and themes seen in popular comics writers like and Grant Morrison and Alan Moore in works like From Hell are also now seen as significant works of psychogeography. Other key figures in this modern version of psychogeography are Walter Benjamin, J. G. Ballard, and Nicholas Hawksmoor. Part of this development saw increasing use of ideas and terminology by some psychogeographers from Fortean and occult areas like earth mysteries, ley lines and chaos magic, a course pioneered by Sinclair and Home. A core element in virtually all these developments remains a dissatisfaction with the nature and design of the modern environment and a desire to make the everyday world more interesting. Grant Morrison (born January 31, 1960) is a Scottish comic book writer and artist. ... For other persons named Alan Moore, see Alan Moore (disambiguation). ... From Hell is a graphic novel by writer Alan Moore and artist Eddie Campbell speculating upon the identity and motives of Jack the Ripper. ... Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin (July 15, 1892 – September 27, 1940) was a German Marxist literary critic, essayist, translator, and philosopher. ... James Graham Ballard (born 15 November 1930 in Shanghai) is a British writer. ... The career of Nicholas Hawksmoor (probably 1661 - 25 March 1736) formed the brilliant middle link in Britains trio of great baroque architects. ... Charles Fort, 1920 Charles Hoy Fort (August 6, 1874 - May 3, 1932), writer and researcher into anomalous phenomena, was the son of an Albany grocer of Dutch ancestry. ... The term Earth Mysteries describes a multi-disciplined (holistic) approach to the study of ancient sites and landscapes (including archaeology, archaeoastronomy, and ley lines), unusual natural objects, bizarre events and phenomena, anomalous archaeological artifacts known as anachronisms (e. ... Ley lines are alignments of a number of places of geographical interest, such as ancient megaliths. ... The chaos star (called a chaosphere, or black hole sun,[citations needed] by some practitioners) is the most popular symbol of chaos magic. ...

In a practical sense the many flourishing groups of urban explorers often are practising psychogeography, perhaps unknowingly, they certainly often draw on modern pyschogeographic writers as an inspiration. An urban explorer stands near the outfall of a muffin shaped brick and concrete storm drain, under Saint Paul, Minnesota. ...

Urban Squares Project through their practice came up with their own definition of psychogeography: The subjective analysis – mental reaction, to the neighbourhood behaviours related to geographic location. A chronological process based on the order of appearance of observed topics, with the time delayed inclusion of other relevant instances.

Groups involved in psychogeography

Psychogeography is practiced both experimentally and formally in groups or associations, which sometimes consist of just one member. Known groups, some of whom are still operating, include:

• Neighbourhood Design Unit - Seneca College, Toronto, Canada
• evoLhypergrapHyCx
• London Psychogeographical Association
• Manchester Area Psychogeographic
• New York Psychogeographical Association
• Psy-Geo-Conflux
• Toronto Psychogeography Society
• Virtual Psychogeographical Association
• The Workshop for Non-Linear Architecture
• Providence Initiative for Psychogeographic Studies
• Ta! Da!
• Bay Area Rapid Transit Psychogeographical Association / SF0 Groups

The London Psychogeographical Association (LPA) is a largely fictitious organisation devoted to psychogeography. ... Manchester Area Psychogeographic (MAP) is a psychogeographical group that published 9 newsletters between 1996 and 1998, as well as undertaking a number of derives and other activities. ... Psy-Geo-Conflux is an annual event dedicated to current artistic and social investigations in psychogeography. ... The Workshop for Non-Linear Architecture (wnla) was the name taken by a group of experimental artists and psychogeographers active in Britain (sections existed in both Glasgow and London) during the early 1990s. ... About PIPS grew out of a small group looking to investigate the urban environment in detail. ... SFZero is web-based community game based in San Francisco. ...

Noted psychogeographers

• Aleksandar Janicijevic Urban Squares Project]]
• Luther Blissett
• Stewart Home
• Members of the Situationist International
• Wilfried Hou Je Bek
• Rohit Gupta
• Iain Sinclair
• Will Self
• David Doig
• Charles Hurst, author of 'The Book of the English Oak' a psychogeographical journey undertaken before the concept was so named
• Vladan Jeremic, Rena Raedle

Likeness of Luther Blissett, from wumingfoundation. ... Stewart Home (born 1962) is a writer, subcultural pamphleteer, underground art historian, and activist. ... The members of the Situationist International were: Algerian Section (2) Mohamed Dahou Abdelhafid Khatib American Section (4) Robert Chasse Bruce Elwell Jan Horelick Tony Verlaan Belgian Section (6) Walter Korun Attila Kotanyi Rudi Renson Jan Stijbosch Raoul Vaneigem Maurice Wyckaert Dutch Section (5) Anton Alberts Armando Constant Jacqueline de Jong... Rohit Gupta (born April 9, 1976) is an author and thinker based in Bombay, India. ... For the Australian politician, see Ian Sinclair Iain Sinclair is a British writer and film maker. ... Will Self William Self (born September 26, 1961) is an English novelist, reviewer and columnist. ...

See also

• Social mapping
• Desire lines
• Situationist International
• Lettrists
• Psychohistory

A desire line is the abstract line that represents the shortest route between an origin and destination, and shows where people want to travel. ... The Situationist International (SI) was a small group of international political and artistic agitators with roots in Marxism, Lettrism and the early 20th century European artistic and political avant-gardes. ... The Lettrist International (LI) was the first breakaway group from Isidore Isous Lettrist Movement (LM). ... Psychohistory is the study of the psychological motivations of historical events. ...

Bibliography

• Coverley, Merlin. Psychogeography. (London: Pocket Essentials, 2006).
• Debord, Guy (editor). Guy Debord presente Potlatch (Paris: Folio, 1996).
• Ford, Simon. The Situationist International: A User's Guide. (London: Black Dog Publishing, 2005).
• Home, Stewart. Mind Invaders: A Reader in Psychic Warfare, Cultural Sabotage and Semiotic Terrorism (Serpent's Tail London, 1997).
• Kaufman, Vincent. Guy Debord: Revolution in the Service of Poetry. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006).
• Knabb, Ken (editor) Situationist International Anthology. (Berkley: Bureau of Public Secrets, 1995).
• Law, Larry, and Chris Gray (editors) Leaving the 20th Century: the Incomplete Work of the Situationist International. (London: Rebel P, 1998).
• McDonough, Tom (editor) Guy Debord and the Situationist International: Texts and Documents. (Boston: October P, 2004).
• Sadler, Simon. The Situationist City. (Cambridge: MIT P, 1998).

References

1. ^ Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography, 1955
2. ^ http://www.utne.com/pub/2004_124/promo/11262-1.html Joseph Hart, A New Way of Walking, Utne magazine July / August 2004 Issue
3. ^ Sadler, Simon. The Situationist City, pg 15. Cambridge: MIT P, 1998.
4. ^ Ivan Chtcheglov, Formulary for a New Urbanism, 1953
5. ^ Knabb, Ken, ed. Situationist International Anthology, pg 50. Berkley: Bureau of Public Secrets, 1995.
6. ^ Kaufman, Vincent, Guy Debord: Revolution in the Service of Poetry, 114, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006.
7. ^ Knabb, Ken, ed. Situationist International Anthology, pg 50. Berkley: Bureau of Public Secrets, 1995.
8. ^ Larry Law and Chris Gray, eds. Leaving the 20th Century: the Incomplete Work of the Situationist International, p26. London: Rebel P, 1998.
9. ^ McDonough, Tom, ed. Guy Debord and the Situationist International: Texts and Documents, pg 259. Boston: October P, 2004.

Video Presentations

• Psychogeography - Will Self (Authors@Google)

External links

• Urban Squares Project
• Manchester Area Psychogeographic
• The Materialist Psychogeographic Affiliation
• People Interested in Participatory Societies
• Psychogeographic Guides to Paris and New Orleans
• Toronto Psychogeography Society Blog
• Baltimore/Washington Psychogeography Association
• Bodmin Moor Explorer
• Glowlab
• Conflux
• AlgoMantra
• iKatun
• Tim Devin
• John Rogers
• The Institute for Infinitely Small Things
• Interview with Merlin Coverley
• The Psychogeography of Prague
• Regula Pragensis
• Methinks Presents
• Urban Paradoxes
• The Urban Repair Project (Cleveland)
• Pittsburgh Psychogeographical Society
• INVIGILATOR : DERBY (Paul Conneally, Nikki Pugh, Kev Ryan)