Digital media shapes my understanding of place and space by giving me a context I can better understand the text that I am viewing. As I have gotten older I have learned that there is great value in contexts or our surroundings. I found the first ten pages to be a nostalgic look back at the view I grew up to. I grew up in the Bay Area and to see the Golden Gate Bridge in many different lightings and weather was a heartwarming visual kiss. We do place a lot of value on our backgrounds, especially when we are meeting people for the first time and I was happy that our reading emphasized this as well.
The painting of the children in the projects I found to be quite reflective. The colors and composition all seem pretty happy, except for the child who is curled up in almost a ball. I know the artist wanted to portray this area as a place of happiness and sorrow. I liked learning about the Watts riot because I had heard about it and not known what it was about.
The article about Chinatown brought to my mind the many times I visited Chinatown in San Francisco. Growing up we were taught about the injustices that the Chinese received when they immigrated to America. I am glad that the Chinatown in San Francisco is still vibrant and a part of the Bay Area’s culture.
Other things that shape my understanding of space and place is the time that the space and place take up. A great illustration of this is Camilo Jose’s pictures of a street corner in Harlem across almost thirty years. The pictures are taken in the same place but the surroundings change across time. The time this photographer has put towards documenting those in poverty is noteworthy.
Why people decide to stay or to move are important issues brought up by both of the essays at the end of our readings. Some people stay because they do not want to flee and they don’t want to fight. Other people are expatriates, exiles, immigrants or repatriates. Their interpretation for being in a certain place is important to me. Not everyone can choose where they live.
-Jeremy Ashworth
Jeremy, I just want you to know how much I value your opinions and insights, I think you have some great thoughts. I thought it was particularly interesting that you've actually been to one of the china towns and could relay your sentiments concerning it as a valuable part of the city and not just its own entity. It's also kind of an interesting dynamic how places affect other places and how we can perceive that relationship.
ReplyDeleteI got a similar feeling of nostalgia from a lot of these passages; not that I've actually been to most of the places featured, but just the idea of "home is where your heart is" was made really clear to me. It helps me to connect to the readings and images on a much deeper level, like tapping into a sort of collective conscience that we all share.
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