The return of public space: For an understanding of the affective atmosphere when walking amidst fear

Resumen

Studying the human feeling in and through space is something that makes us better understand this ancient relationship, after all, places and spaces were established through this contact (Tuan, 2012). Affection, emotion and feeling are part of being in society. The ability to feel and spatialize affections is inherent to the social being, shaping living spaces in which common interests predominate; the so-called affective atmospheres are built to encompass a little of each one, shaping the ‘climate’ of the places (Pallasmaa, 2014; Anderson, 2009). To clarify the concept about this ‘climate of the places’, we choose the definition created by Pallasmaa (2014), the author says that affective “atmosphere is similarly an exchange between material or existent properties of the place and the immaterial realm of human perception and imagination. Yet, they are not physical ‘things’ or facts, as they are human experiential ‘creations’ (p. 232)”.

The present research, through the perspective of the geography of emotions, aims to observe and understand the phenomenon of conformation of affective atmospheres in the public space through the conflicts generated by the appropriations and expropriations in these spaces, focusing its perspective on spatialized fear through landscape markers of repression, this markers can be understood as a generic concept to designate material elements in landscape that represent an embodied fear or other feelings that affect people when they walk around a city such as railings, security cameras, spiked benches, etc. (Caldeira, 2003; Faria, 2020).

The fear, this antagonistic feeling was chosen due to its potency in human actions in the space. As part of human experience in the world, the fear can drive some of our actions when we are walking by some places. Thinking in a bodily perception, the fear can trigger some biological or cultural responses that can sharp our perception about places, like wich path to follow or a ‘dangerous mood’ in some places (Tuan, 2006). The role of fear in this research is central to discuss this bodily perception of landscape in public spaces of the city through our senses.

The choice of objects is justified from the search for a geography of the lived (BUTTIMER, 1985) starting from the observation of the resumption of coexistence amid the fear of dwelling and walking in public space (Besse, 2013).

It is understood that this perception of the phenomenon (Merleau-Ponty, 1999) provides us with an explanation of the geographic-social behavior that is formed as a result of the affective atmospheres conceived through the aforementioned markers. In this research, a sociocultural understanding of the exposure and influence of feelings in geographic knowledge is also sought (Silva, 2019), taking advantage of a scenario common to the world for the conformation of this study – the insecurity generated through undermanagement in the public spaces of cities (Carmona, 2010).

From this scenario, we seek, as a main objective: to understand how fear is impacting the forms of appropriation of public spaces in the center of the city of Curitiba through the bodily perception of the affective atmospheres produced by landscape markers.

The phenomenological approach (Relph, 1979) was chosen as the epistemological line for the study, conforming an exploratory and qualitative approach to the research object/subjects. This approach is centered in the Merleau-Ponty (1999) phenomenological perception, that is, to understand the perception of the fear in landscape as a phenomenon perceived through the body and its senses. As a tool, affective cartography was adopted (Flatney, 2003; Rolnik, 2007).

The methodological tool is centered in a process of translation of people’s relationship with space through the ‘materialization’ of feelings/affects. This translation will occur in two distinct moments, making use of field and visual notes (photographic record): 1º Deriva – when the author will use his senses and own body perception to trace a sensible path when walking around the city, identifying the landscape markers along the way; 2º Meeting – the author will select random people in the streets requesting a brief verbal narrative about their perception of the place/landscape, in addition, it will be request that people take a photography of the place/markers to compare with the registers of the first moment (Santos, 2020).

The methodology will allow the author to identify the affective atmosphere through the comparation of people’s perception of the landscape markers in the public space of the city and if these markers really influence in the people’s perception about the lived space. The expected result of the research is the in-depth understanding of the concept of affective atmosphere in geographic studies and the influence of the feeling of fear in the forms of housing and use of public spaces. The results will be interpreted and materialized through an affective map of the research subjects’ perceptions.

Key words: geography; public space; affective-atmosphere; appropriation; fear.

References:

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Besse, J-M. (2013). Estar na paisagem, habitar, caminhar. Em: Cardoso, I. L. (Eds.). Paisagem Patrimônio. (pp. 33-53). Dafne Editora.

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