Materials for Leo's Class

Here are some materials and projects to peruse. I've loosely grouped
them into the themes of my project. I look forward to discussing them
and the DIPGS in class on Monday.

Nature as Cultural Construction:

The Trouble with Wilderness

Revised Public Sphere (Digital Media):

Public Spheres and Network Interfaces

Sustainable Design and Urbanism:

Sustainable Urbanism Chapter 1 part 1

Sustainable Urbanism Chapter 2 part 1

Consider these last two as a pair. Fiber City is a great example of an experimental project that deals with urban design issues brought up by the Shrinking Cities Project.

Shrinking Cities (just read to I 6, before the graphs)

Fiber City: Tokyo 2050

Here are some questions to guide discussion today:

Questions for Cronon:

• What composes a nature narrative?
• What are sublime and frontier nature narratives?
• Are these narratives really pervasive enough to matter? Modern iterations?

Questions for Broekmann:

• Broekmann places emphasis on unlikely juxtaposition, constructive conflict, and instability as ground for democratic potential, what role does digital media play in heightening these positive tensions?

Questions for Sustainable Urbanism:

• Do the contemporary American problems Farr lists correlate with Cronon’s nature narratives? How?
• How can Farr’s five characteristics of Sustainable Urbanism be applied to Cronon’s Trouble with Wilderness and Broekmann’s notion of experimental digital art and revised public sphere?