Mapping the forms, characteristics, and processes of landscape narratives in the disciplinary infrastructure of landscape architecture
In contemporary landscape design, narratives have become a common intention for landscape architects. There are always questions of what makes a landscape meaningful and how is meaning found in the landscape. This may then raise confusions about what is the actual role of landscape narratives and how they should be understand and conceived. Although the term landscape narratives “designates the interplay and mutual relationship between story and place, they are not simply considered in terms of literal storytelling that is expressed and controlled by clear references to the histories, biographies, local emblems or other textural forms of a place. Beyond the communication of a local sense of place and the extension of the content of landscape expression, both landscape and narrative have great potentials and much wider significance that need to be studied and further explored.
Stories are the basic tool to convey information among people, and people use stories to shape the worlds that they lived in. The term “narratives” refer to both the story, the aspect of it being told and the means of telling. The very beginning systematic analysis of concepts in relation to narratives was initiated in the 1960s. Coming from Latin and Indo-European words with the meaning of “to know”, narrative “implies a knowledge acquired through action and the contingencies of lived experience”. Since the early 1980s, narratives have become the focus for many design filed including landscape architecture as people started to realise the importance of meaning which may perhaps make design similar to a piece of litera...
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...ur major forms of “tropes” in design approaches including metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and irony. They not only relate things together but also communicate the identified with the unidentified.
• Metaphor is a strategy that commonly find in design practices which can present complex ideas into a more familiar practice without changing the complexity of those ideas. The use of metaphor can create new relation between elements, yet they can also facade one element’s qualities with those of another. “Not only do metaphors covey meanings in a story, but stories also structure the very terms of similarity and substitution that precipitate metaphors.”
• Metonymy create meaning though association, it demonstrates the relationship between cause and effect. One thing can relate to another so that it can be used as a sign of the other through repeated use or memory.
Redmond, James, ed. Drama and Symbolism. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 1982. Vol. 4 of Themes in Drama. 1982-1986. 7-10, 37.
Metaphors, then, are at the heart of understanding the way we view aspects of our culture while we simultaneously build that culture. Umberto Eco stresses that culture is a collective experience. In his view, "there is no such thing as a single mind, un connected to other minds or to their (collective) social cultural constructions" (Cunningham, "MOM" handout). If this is taken as fact, the "social, cultural, historical, and institutional contexts" humans find themselves in contribute to creating their metaphors and in turn, their artifactual worlds. Therefore, the situational context and the metaphors found there are intertwined and must be examined together.
The way Anthony Doerr uses his writing structure of metaphors is to strive complexity, toward questions, and away from stereotype. From the national post says,
Exploring the dialectic relationship between environments –both built and natural—and the figures that occupy those spaces, “Vernacular Environments, Part 1” brings to light the complexities and temporality of the vernacular. Ranging in works from the 1960s through present day, a 32-minute film of Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty (1970) serves as the show’s departure point, illustrating the construction of Smithson’s earthwork as a conditional art relying on time and space for its existence, continually vanishing and resurfacing as the Utah lake’s tide rises and falls.
As you read the text, you come up with hundreds of metaphors. Found almost in every line, they adorn the speech and make it more effective. Most of those metaphors are used to highlight the contrast between t...
Metaphors, according to Professor George Lakoff, are a way to think and reason about life. They are not a unique way to speak about it, but a common way to talk about life experiences since they are a reflection of our thought processes (1986). This became immediately apparent to me when I began looking for metaphors commonly used. It took some time to find any because they were pervasive of my thought system that I did not even notice many phrases around me were metaphors. Those phrases were not “poetic or rhetorical” way of talking, but a normal usage for those around me to express their thoughts (Lakeoff, 1986, p.216). The metaphor that came up several times on my search was history as roots. This metaphor allows us to think about life in a certain way and it holds particular implications for our interpersonal communication.
Breathtaking landscapes are what make up the most beautiful parts of this Earth. The numbers of stories about self discovery and self worth happen all while watching a sunrise, lying by a streaming riverbed, hiking a forest trail, and so on. The point is that
metaphors alone? The use of metaphors in war and everyday life is common and an
On one side of the conflict, Americans have a passionate relationship with nature. Nature acts as a muse for artists of every medium. While studying nature, Jo...
Although Tennyson’s use of landscape indeed creates a strong vivid impression, I feel that it also serves a higher purpose: namely, to express the psychological state and mood depicted in the protagonists of the poems.
Wilderness is a highly idealized concept in today’s society – we simply put it on a pedestal and choose to admire it as we see fit. Nature and wilderness are considered distant and remote concepts, separate from our everyday, civilized lives. By approaching the natural realm in this sense, we simply detach ourselves from our origin, which leaves us to fantasize about the great outdoors as an escape from the artificial creations of our everyday life. This desire to escape our artificial lives has lead to the construction of locations such as national parks, which merely appear to be the natural world, yet in reality they are simply just facets of the modernized world we have created.
How to create an environment suitable for human living when resources are limited is a challenging problem for modern society. My strong interest in photography and art has compelled me to become especially observant toward the relationship between human beings and the environment. I have come to realize that the environment we live in has suffered much damage from pollution and lacks competent planning, making it difficult to find beautiful scenery to photograph or sketch. I began to think that I could make use of my artistic gift, concern about, and interest in the environment by entering the field of landscape design and putting my effort into beautifying our surroundings. Therefore, after graduating from high school, I entered the Department of Landscape Architecture at ABC University.
Throughout the history of mankind, the gardens have been created to feed the spirit. The landscape is a relationship between nature and culture; it expresses who we are and where we from. Furthermore, landscape architecture advances along with society and it adjust to the change of their tastes and way of life. It is at first hand the search for a balance of adapting the environment and the advance society. We can observe the different styles and designs process each culture has, simply by looking at what kind of elements, plants, and regulations it uses. For example in the United States a designer takes into consideration the ADA regulations while in Mexico they don’t, which will result in a different design approach. This means that we might witness a similar design containing a bridge crossing through a pond but one design might incorporate railings and the other one will not. This tells us how one society values the importance of incorporating safety and handicap accessibility just by using different elements. The following essay intends to discuss how culture can contribute to the design of an exterior space and how it’s reflected in the work of a landscape architect. To accomplish this task I am going to look at two landscape architects from different regions and witness how diverse but also how unified they are to each other by looking at the way they incorporate elements from their culture and other societies.
Hirsch, E. 1995. “Introduction, Landscape: between place and space” in Hirsch, E. (ed.) The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space. Oxford : New York: Clarendon Press.
When many people hear about the term “landscape”, they immediately think that it means “nature”. The natural landscape does play an important role in our society but what is more important is the landscape that we make and occupy. So, what exactly is “landscape”? The term can be illiterate in many ways but the definition given by the European Landscape Convention is perhaps the most useful and widely agreed one. It states that a landscape is ‘an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of natural and human factors.’ This definition captures both the idea of landscape being physical like a tract of land, but also something that is mind and social shared, something that is perceived by the people. When it comes to Landscape Architecture, the International Federation of Landscape Architects says that ‘Landscape Architect conduct research and advise on planning, design, and stewardship of the outdoor environment and spaces, both within and beyond the built environment, and its