Reading Landscapes

Cultural Landscapes: Reading Eau Claire GEOG 111 Exercise #3	Instructor: P. Kaldjian

1) Carefully read this assignment to understand the expectations and to know its different parts. This will help you see the big picture and complete it successfully. For this assignment, you will need a digital camera. I suspect that most of you have access to one -- your family, a roommate, a friend, a neighbor, somebody. Learning and Technology Services has cameras that you may check out for a day or two on a first come, first served basis. They are in the Old Library Building, OL 1144.
2) Read Peirce Lewis’ “Axioms for Reading the Landscape”. (Click on the title to open a pdf of the article.)
3) Click on the link to open the blank table that you will fill in for this assignment. You may want to print a off copy onto which to take notes.
4) For this assignment, you are to compare the Eau Claire you know and in which you circulate , to a part of town you do not, based on the cultural landscapes you observe. As objectively as you can, think of the cultural landscape of the Eau Claire you know (campus, water street, etc). What do you see? What specific human landscape features charecterize "your" Eau Claire. Consider everything – from the striking to the mundane, the unique to the plain. Think of such things as buildings , monuments, symbols, signs, indications of activities, material goods and their architecture, condition, etc.)– all evidence of human activity. Pick a vantage point from which you can observe what you believe are representative landscapes of your Eau Claire. With the digital camera, take a picture of them landscape. In fact, take a few from different angles or zooms. When you get back home, download the picture onto your computer or into your H: drive folder.
5) Next, do the same thing with a part of Eau Claire with which you are unfamiliar or to which you have never been. You are to go there by city bus (click here for Eau Claire Transit) -- with your student ID, you can ride for free. Take a bus from campus to the transfer center and then, from there, hop on any bus that goes to the North, East or West (click here for schedules and routes). Because you are not driving, you can observe what the landscape looks like. Take notes, open the window and take pictures. What are you seeing? What is the landscape telling you. What kind of changes are you seeing as you travel along. Since most bus routes in Eau Claire are 1/2 hour routes, you will be back at the transfer center in 30 minutes. Then, take the trip again and see if you notice anything new or different the second time around, and this time get off, walk around and take pictures of landscapes you find interesting.
6) In the first column of the table, identify and describe features from the landscape. Pick ones that you feel tell you something about the city, its history, its population, its issues, its ethnicity, its attitude, its level of prosperity, its beliefs and so on and so on. Go through Lewis' chapter to help you think about the things you should be looking for and how to read (interpret) them. These features on the landscape are clues to who the people in this place are and what this place (Eau Claire) is. You will find that many of the features that you identify can mean any number of things. That’s OK, think about what these landscape features mean to you – you are the one reading the landscape. Identify 4 meaningful landscape featuresfrom "your" Eau Claire, and 4 from the "other" Eau Claire, and be sure to use a mix of cultural, historical, ecological, and other clues that represent a variety of axioms.
7) Before printing off your digital pictures, you need to label them. Learn how to do it on your computer with something like MS Powerpoint, MS Word or Adobe Illustrator. For labels, give it a title in which you identify it by place and with some sort of creative subtitle that captures your sense of what the place is like. Then, maybe in small type below that, type in the details of the location, the date, and your name as photographer. Some of you will know how to do this. For those of you that do not, I will try to arrange a computer session before the homework is due. 8) Make a clean and informative map of Eau Claire that identifies what you did, where your observations are made, and the bus route you took. Your map should have a title, an explanatory subtitle, and a legend. It should be clear to the viewer what the map represents and shows.
9) Now, interpret the landscape. What does the observor think about what he or she sees? What does the human landscape you have described above seem to tell you about Eau Claire? Is it wealthy, poor, patriotic, eccentric, ethnic, elderly, sports-minded, community-oriented, kid-friendly, environmentally-concerned, and so on and so on? Use the evidence on the landscape to support your contention. Try not to get side-tracked by what you already know about Eau Claire, but concentrate on what a newcomer observes. For each landscape feature you present and describe in column one, consider its meaning. Interpret this feature, its meaning, what it says (and about whom) and write it down in the second column. This should be based on what you see, and not what you already know.
10) Then, on a separate piece of paper, type a clear and thoughtful, paragraph in which you reflect on what you oberved, interpreted and learned. What do all of the landscape features portray when taken together? Think about how there may be multiple Eau Claires. Think also about things like whether or not what the outsider observes about Eau Claire matches what you know about it (and why such a discrepancy might exist). Is Eau Claire -- based solely on what is seen by a first-time visitor -- a place that they would want to move to? Visit? Avoid? Why or why not? You might want to address the issue of scale, and how landscape readings of your town may tell you one thing about your local/regional culture that may or may not be consistent with our national culture. Or, how the chosen landscape reflects your city. Or, reflect on this assignment and write something of the significance of recognizing that landscape is like a text, using your experience with your hometown as an example.
11) Hand in your completed table, photographs, map and your reflection. Make sure the formatting is neat, acceptable and appropriate before printing off your table. Staple the two sheets together. Remember – I cannot give you a grade if your name isn’t on it. Your assignment will be graded on completeness, thoughtfulness, effort, clarity, comprehension and obvious incorporation of Peirce Lewis's ideas into your assignment.