Archinect - UC Berkeley Geography

'When will landscape get its Pritzker?' and other landscape urbanism worries.

2006-10-23T01:54:29-04:00

Long time, no see, huh? PhD life is, mmm..., "alienating" sometimes (see my last post). Anyway, I wanted to quickly share a little of what I have been thinking of. Let me back up... As a first year PhD in the Geography department, we take a seminar course with Michael Johns, maybe some of you into urbanism know his work (The Retro City, for example). This is a fun class with lots to read on diverse subjects related to epistemology and history of science, this semester. This week: Darwin. Need I say more? Basically, I turn in a paper at the end that responds to the themes of the course. I'll be working loosely under the subjects of disciplinary cultures and ideas that shaped landscape architecture. It should help me define by the end of next semester, and after a new paper, a series of reading subjects for dissertation work...and I think we turn in a proposal at the end of the Spring. Well, anyway, I started to whack out some ideas here... This will touch upon issues of all this city...

The exercise of intellect

2006-10-02T15:00:53-04:00

Some Pierre Bourdieu from last week.

Being at home today, correcting some undergrad exams, I get to thinking about the discipline and work of ideas. How to do this? Treat it as a "normal" job? Get to reading by a certain time everyday. Devote a fixed number of hours? Break some time out to think about capitalism and alienation? I am reading some Bertell Ollman and Foucault this week, thinking about whether or not landscape architecture can go anywhere to alleviate people's sense of divorce from nature, given that so many post-Marxist critics allege that this is not possible no matter what under capitalism (and given that capitalism commodifies all land). Anyway, back to the question at hand... Can the production of ideas be more efficiently done by being disciplined and sticking to a schedule, or can I slip into an ascetic mindset of desks, books and typing that defies schedules, so that my ideas can be as second nature as the bowel movements of my landlord's dogs.

9:56AM

1...

thanks for not tearing down Rand Hall

2006-09-23T12:23:53-04:00

so far, those plans for the Cornell Arch school don't call for the demo of Rand Hall. Not fancy nor pretty, just a big fucking chunker for working...and partying. Here is Dragon Day 1995 (or 96?). Marlin Watson and I are in there somewhere. (thanks to Zano for the pic).

How I roll.

2006-09-22T14:16:05-04:00

current. L to R: Bourdieu Practical Reason; Marx & Engels The German Ideology; Marx and Engels The Holy Family; Ollman Alienation: Marx's Conception of Man in Capitalist Society; Foster Marx's Ecology; Mills The Power Elite; Monthly Review (includes "Why Hipsters Aren't All That Hip" and "The Empire of Oil & the Scramble for Africa")

way far above Cayuga's waters..fair oh fair Millstein Hall

2006-09-22T13:39:08-04:00

Let me remind you that Cornell has been attempting to build this studio building by one architect or another for a good ten years now, if not more. Justin says that Rem Koolhaas was kind of surprised that the undergrads wanted nappy nests. (Great reportage, btw...) Careful what you wish for. You might just get chains and shackles and you will never see your own private pillow ever, Justin. My inbox yielded a few snapshots of the model...(flickr)

Apparently the alumni in NYC also got a preview with shiny light and someone on flickr has a few cool cameraphone spyshots...

And some encores of Remulous...

Casa Capece Venanzi a Giulianova

2006-09-17T23:42:30-04:00

so goooood. via

Baaad Kuulluuu...

2006-09-17T11:22:15-04:00

The challenge of academia

Predator tries all its moves, but the fucking construction trailer won't even acknowledge it.

More arrest news in Cali, this time for coming to America...

2006-09-10T01:38:15-04:00

more west coast news... U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested 107 people for immigration violations Thursday and Friday in Santa Cruz, Watsonville and Hollister, officials said. If you had any doubts that immigrants are held to be some sort of subhuman entity in this here town, check out their objectification through the naming of this sting operation... Operation Return to Sender. Not kidding.

News from Berkeley. (I wasn't arrested; thank you)

2006-09-09T14:53:16-04:00

Three arrests made following incident involving apparent marijuana-laced cookies

"The UC Police Department learned of the incident following an 8 p.m. call from a student who said she was feeling ill and very anxious. Police soon learned that approximately 15 others at the co-op were experiencing similar symptoms including numbness to feet and hands, shortness of breath and minor hallucinations. Of those 15, a dozen were sent to local hospitals where they were treated and released by this morning. Four were treated on the scene by fire department paramedics."

drunkass bear

2006-09-08T12:01:04-04:00

(flickr)

drunkassbear wants to remind all you school bloggers: remember to submit your student loan deferments!

Mo'Jave's To-Do List

2006-09-07T17:51:02-04:00

a snippet from the life of a PhD (still in his diapers)...
1. make appointment for UCSF biology and mood study (300 bucks for half day!). PhD's need food (and nice jeans) too, and I admit I have a weird fascination with medicine, blood-drawing and getting into an MRI machine. See below about this week's readings also.
2. Make Fellowship deadline calendar. (see item 1...)
3. Prep for Monday's sections (I teach as part of the Southern Border staff. I like to call it "the So-bo" but no one gets it except the architect, me.)
4. Doctor Dija (aka Dr. Z, the Dija, ZabanDija...) is coming over to spend the weekend at my place.

Hopefull dogsitting won't be too much fun. I need to get some reading done...
5. Finish corrections on article for Mark.

and so... readings for next week? The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn and The Great Transformation by Karl Polanyi. Coming up, I'll do justice to the discussions and content of the classes in a new post, but for now I'l...

Living and dying in the water.

2006-09-05T03:18:34-04:00

Steve Irwin died earlier today, his chest punctured by the fatal stab of a stingray while he snorkeled along Australia's Great Barrier Reef. Many know Irwin as the camera-happy croc-wrestler seen on TV. The incident will probably serve to cloak broad notions about nature behind statements, perhaps even judgmental ones, on Irwin's frequent encounters with wild beasts. Beyond those simplifications, this singular moment caught on film--as Irwin apparently would have wanted it--is powerful and full of contradiction. Irwin on the screen seemed to apprehend cultural tendencies to interpret human nature as a condition of vulnerability and innocence. In the end, he was defenseless, like any weaker animal that falls prey to a predator. This is an abstraction about the human being that he worked with, and one of the reasons we watched the show at one time or another. Maybe it makes us think of our supposed innocence, that imaginary pre-human or pre-modern place we were once at. Many others wi...

The setup. (W/ footnotes)

2006-09-03T17:35:56-04:00

Hi. Some of you knew me in the Archinect news and discussions. I just started a doctoral program, yes, in geography. What? Yeah. It's a broad discipline.* I'll get into it more as the blog rolls along. I study landscapes, principally. No...well, I actually study culture. Well...sort of...At the farthest depth of my research is the problem of society trying to define nature.
For now, take a look at my desk. I do most of my work from my cave in the Mission neighborhood of San Francisco. I take the Bart to go to Berkli four or five times a week while I listen to dublab sounds and read.

That's flickr on the screen. I am currectly reading The Sociological Imagination by Charles Wright Mills, and some Raymond Williams and David Harvey on the side. Rad, as Izzy would say.

* My Standard Disclaimer: Even though my research has moved somewhat away from the object-building of my professional background as an architect, I am still a fan of the entertainment value found in the complex forces ...