Promenadology

The promenadology (also walk Science and English Strollology ) is one of Lucius Burckhardt developed cultural studies and aesthetic method that aims the terms of the perception of the environment to raise awareness and to broaden the perception of the environment. It is based both on a cultural-historical analysis of forms of environmental perception and on experimental practices for environmental perception such as reflexive walks and aesthetic interventions. Insofar as it includes not only cultural studies but also practical elements and aesthetic interventions in order to determine the perception of the environment and behavior in open spaces, restricting walking science to science would be just as insufficient as it would be to designate it as an artistic method. It has been picked up by planners and artists and partially redesigned.

history

In 1976, Lucius Burckhardt undertook his “ original walk ” in the Riede Palace Park with students from the University of Kassel . The sociologist Lucius Burckhardt founded walking science together with his wife Annemarie Burckhardt in the 1980s as part of his teaching activities at the Kassel University . Burckhardt developed it from parts of sociology and urbanism . Originally anchored in discourses on urban and landscape planning, walking science projects have repeatedly been received in the context of contemporary art exhibitions. The walk The drive to Tahiti , performed in a former military training area on the outskirts of Kassel, became famous. Likewise, the stroll along the zebra (1993). In September 2008, the city of Frankfurt am Main organized the two-day, international congress “Gut zu Fuß. The science of walking ”.

Walk science

As a critical planning scientist, Burckhardt contradicted the technocratic approach in planning science, which was widespread in the 1960s to 1980s, and developed an alternative method for dealing with problems in planning from the contradiction. He conceived the science of walking, although the cultural-historical research was clearly in the field of science, not in the sense of a strictly academic science with a paradigmatic core and fixed methodology. In his opinion, a purely scientific methodology would not be appropriate for a planning discipline that also includes design aspects. For the analysis of cultural phenomena, he used a hermeneutic method, as is common in the humanities and art studies , in order to interpret the meaning of cultural phenomena.

In terms of planning, he combined this research with practical parts, e.g. B. Explorations in the city or in the country (ethnologists speak of going into the field ). These explorations formed reflexive walks by means of which an attempt was made to clarify planning questions using the example of typical and everyday situations. In addition, the reflexive walks were connected with the questions of what you see and why you see it or how you behave and why you behave that way. From a historical perspective, the perception of the environment presents itself as changeable and has become historical. For this reason, Burckhardt's training for planners was about making them aware that present-day things are not always taken for granted and that current perception of the environment is subject to historical conditions.

In addition to knowledge of cultural studies and planning policy, Burckhardt also used aesthetic means and actions. For example, a parking lot was used as a seminar room on a walk in order to determine the reactions of drivers and passers-by to this use of open space in the field test. His aim was to ask future planners to have personal experience that is relevant to planning, such as B. slowly crossing a busy street. Aesthetic interventions in everyday situations were therefore not only to be understood in an artistic sense, but were also aimed at making the participants aware of certain perceptual and behavioral habits and making known situations perceptible in other ways, because many planning problems are ultimately aesthetic problems that arise from entrenched perception patterns result.

Teaching

Until 1997, the science of walking was taught by Lucius Burckhardt at the then University of Kassel in the department of architecture, urban and landscape planning. Contrary to what is often claimed, the walk science in Kassel was never a chair or a course of study (corresponding media reports are a classic duck ), rather a sociological method. Since then, some lecturers in Kassel have referred to walking science or have made it a methodological component of seminars. From 2006 to 2007 Martin Schmitz had a teaching position in the Department of Architecture, Urban and Landscape Planning, in the context of which he applied the science of walking.

The science of walking is also taught in seminars at other universities: In the 2006/2007 winter semester, Bertram Weisshaar taught walking science as part of the urban perception seminar at the University of Leipzig , Institute for Urban Development and Construction. In 2007, Klaus Schäfer, Chair of Urban Development, University of Bremen , conducted the seminar on foot , which also dealt with topics related to promenadology. In 2011 Hannah Stippl submitted the dissertation Only where humans have disturbed nature, the landscape becomes really beautiful to the landscape-theoretical watercolors by Lucius Burckhardt in the class of landscape design at the University of Applied Arts Vienna .

Other goals and variants

Burckhardt first spoke of the science of walking, but later also referred to it as promenadology. Under this name it has been taken up by others and partially developed independently with different goals. The aim of promenadology is the concentrated and conscious perception of our environment and thereby the continuation of mere sight to cognition. According to Schmitz, technical progress has also led to an alienation and change in people's perception of their environment. The way people see things has changed rapidly. The railroad contributed to this change, followed by automobiles and airplanes. Even GPS mixes it with, more and better navigate - and, if you look at the is not aware of these technical innovation can lead to see less and less. According to Weisshaar, GPS navigation is also establishing itself as a new medium that - if used artistically - can specifically sensitize people to perception.

Promenadology is about bringing the environment back into people's minds. The walk serves both as an “instrument” for exploring our everyday living environment and for conveying content and knowledge. The walk is particularly suitable for conveying spatial impressions and spatial references directly, since space can ultimately only be experienced through one's own physical movement and cannot be grasped only through "purely scientific description".

See also

• Strollers
• walk

literature

• Lucius Burckhardt: The children are eating their revolution: living - planning - building - green . Edited by Bazon Brock , DuMont, Cologne 1985.
• Lucius Burckhardt: Who is planning the planning? Edited by Jesko Fezer and Martin Schmitz , Martin Schmitz Verlag, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-927795-39-9 .
• Lucius Burckhardt: Why is landscape beautiful? The walk science. Martin Schmitz Verlag, Berlin 2006, ISBN 3-927795-42-9 .
• Lucius Burckhardt: Design is invisible: Design, Society & Pedagogy Ed. By Silvan Blumenthal and Martin Schmitz, Martin Schmitz Verlag, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-927795-61-7 .
• Silvan Blumenthal: The teaching canapé. Lucius Burckhardt and the architectural image at the ETH Zurich 1970–1973. Viewpoints Documents No. 2, Basel 2010. ISBN 978-3-9523540-5-6 .
• Gudrun M. König: A cultural history of the walk. Traces of a civil practice 1780–1850. Kulturstudien, special volume 20. Böhlau, Vienna 1996, ISBN 3-205-98532-X (also dissertation, University of Tübingen 1994).
• Ueli Mäder: City and Power - The City between Vision and Reality. Life and work of Lucius and Annemarie Burckhardt . Rotpunktverlag, Zurich 2014, ISBN 978-3-85869-591-8
• Bertram Weisshaar: Walk through the open pit. With photos by Bärbel Bamberger. Bauhaus Dessau Foundation , Dessau 1995.
• Bertram Weisshaar (Ed.): Walk Science in Practice. - Formats of locomotion . JOVIS Verlag, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-86859-242-9 .

Web links

• Weblog on promenadology
• Introduction page on Lucius Burckhardt's publisher's website
• Walk science in motion
• Interview with the artist and walk scientist Gerhard Lang
• Projects on walking research by Bertram Weisshaar

Individual evidence

1. ^ Lucius Burckhardt: Walk Science. In: ders. Why is landscape beautiful? Edited by Ritter and Schmitz. Martin Schmitz Verlag, Berlin 2011: 257-300.
2. ↑ Lucius Burckhardt et al .: The trip to Tahiti. Kassel University Press, Kassel 1988. Lucius Burckhardt (1996): Walk Science. In: Why is the landscape beautiful? Ed. Schmitz, Ritter, Berlin 2006, pp. 257-300.
3. ↑ http://idw-online.de/de/news201682 "When the duck goes for a walk". Press release of the University of Kassel from March 23, 2007
4. ^ Report in the Saarbrücker Zeitung of March 6, 2007 about Martin Schmitz
5. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from September 23, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.