Maps of Material Desires
Sletto defines places as “existing only in someone’s imagination also are constitutive of landscapes and contribute to forming personal biographies (444).” The people who inhabit this space perform the identity of this space – they become the space itself. “Performers become the rightful ‘owners’ of the landscape (Rose 2000, 289) based in part on their embodiment of the landscape and on their relationship with the histories that are embedded within it and thus define it (444).”
(Manovich) I liked the idea of cellspace not only being important or visible to the individual user or holder of the device, but also to the passerby. This then makes the use of devices in public spaces a shared experience that connects two or more people together on the same playing field (if you will). It removes the idea of isolationist technology. This idea takes the physicality out of interaction, meaning, there is no need to acknowledge someone’s existence because they can experience your technology without you – although this is kind of invasive, but the more we start Googling in public on iPhones, tablets, laptops, the more we unwillingly share with those around us.
Sassen makes a direct statement about my issues with Requiem for Detroit and gentrification as a whole – the displacement of lower income residents. These upper class residents are moving into these areas and literally displacing individuals of lower income families. As I mentioned the gentrification in Brooklyn (and even Detroit with the emergence of these white people who have places to fall back to if all crops fail in Detroit) has become a major point of contention for me. This is also emphasized in the ways in which cities are mapped out and described. By the migration of the upper classes into areas and the dislocation of the lower income families and then the subsequent borders that develop.