Comments on: Collage for NOLA: Ruin

By: Matt Thompson

Matt Thompson — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 15:17:50 +0000

Thanks for the bibliography!

By: Bradley L. Garrett

Bradley L. Garrett — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 13:17:35 +0000

Thanks for posting these, the video was a great find, though I suggest a little over-cooked with the Godspeed soundtrack. Kathleen Steward’s work, on the other hand, is unspeakably gorgeous and delicate, we all secretly love her in geography!

Cultural geography has a long history of writing about ruins, including the work of Caitlin DeSilvey, Dydia DeLyser and especially Tim Edensor which compliment these references nicely.

If you would like to see more, may I suggested having a look at:

Dobraszczyk P 2010 Petrified ruin: Chernobyl, Pripyat and the death of the city. City: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action 14: 370-89.

Edensor T 2005 Industrial ruins: space, aesthetics, and materiality. Berg Publishers, Oxford, United Kingdom.

Hell J and Schönle A 2010 Ruins of modernity. Duke University Press, London.

Also, I just published a video article in Geography Compass on urban exploration or place hacking, a cultural movement which seeks to explore and document urban ruins (my work was featured on SM previously by Adam Fish). You can find that video here is you are interested: http://www.placehacking.co.uk/2010/10/05/urban-explorers-video-article/

By: Matt Thompson

Matt Thompson — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 23:56:32 +0000

And the video clip is so cool because of the soundtrack, courtesy of Godspeed You Black Emperor.

By: Matt Thompson

Matt Thompson — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 23:55:33 +0000

Oh, I know it David and I hesitated to do this because I knew I’d be vulnerable to that critique. You make your point well.

I suppose my apologies ring hollow because I made the post anyways…

I really like where Stoller is going with this though. I keep coming back to that question of what people are left with. It is more like the ruination emanates not from disaster, per se, but capitalism itself.

By: David B.

David B. — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 23:25:08 +0000

The Six Flags video is very cool and the whole posting is very thought-provoking…but we really do not want to be defined by disaster here in New Orleans. We know our history and we are shaping our own future. In fact, I would argue that we are in many ways doing better at this point than the rest of the U.S. precisely because we expect things to be tough. This is a resilient and creative city. Look for signs of that while you are here.