Who is authenticity for? I would think that its for nobody and everybody. Authenticity can probably only be unravelled through an objective eye, which would thus mostly exclude the everyday man, and include instead the 'bystanders', academics and tourists. Yet authenticity can only be produced through the everyman's practice of his daily life. I remember LKY (gasp!) once saying that the production of culture is only possible through an unconscious, and relatively isolated process, although in today's context, the relative impossibility of isolation (due to globalization) critical for production of 'culture' means that culture has to evolve through fusion of different influences over time. Perhaps thats why korea and japan have such unique cultures since language itself forms a barrier to provide some form of isolation.
Yes I would agree that authenticity is a western concept and the realisation of such a concept in the east created some form of self-consciousness which an exist at varying levels altho most of the time its the institutions. in a way its also an anxiety to differentiate ourselves from the west. In fact the very concept of 'east' and 'west' is a product of such self-consciousness: are we really that different in today's context? is there really an eastern perception of things? for all you know, our perception has but been homogenized.
History is a selective reconstruction, perhaps only memory is authentic, but then memory is tricky since it is personal, fragmented and may be affected by the present.
Chang Jiat Hwee wrote a dissertation 10,000yrs ago on "The myth of conservation" and noted through a quote from pierre nora that history was established as a device to conquer and reconstruct memory.
Heres my revised dissertation topic statement:
Physical urban fabric, when manipulated (conserved, reconstructed) to propogate strategic cultures, produces 'hyperreal-scapes' and stand as poor means to preserve meanings of site (genius loci). On the other hand, certain everyday experiences (tactics) acts as resistance against the totalising effects of hyperreal-scapes and serve as better agents to sustain meanings of site.
I chose to stress on certain everyday experiences since the everyday exists in various forms, i.e. there are many everydays. In any case, the topic is in constant state of revision...
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
remy's
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4 comments:
wahaha...
everyday thinking of writing everyday about everyday...
On the question of authenticity... I feel it is no longer a question of tracing a kind of origin from which authenticity may stem. There would never be this one objective truth that exists outside of our lived engagement with the world, unless you believe in transcendental truth, one that remains immutable and external to the system.
All this search for authenticity, it is perhaps nothing more than a chase for the IMAGE of authenticity. And the degree of authenticity remains arbitrary, depending on the referent. It is then not a question of how distant/close these 'hyperreal-scapes' are from/to their origin, but more a matter of how they have come to earn a kind of agency of their own. Through the homogenising effect of globalisation, every thing becomes flattened and one thing's value does not come from measuring it against that of another, but rather from the multitude of meanings that it can acquire in its own rights.
Thus, if we were to measure these 'hyperreal-scapes' against an index of degree of preservation of genius loci, they will always remain contrived and staged because it can never satisfy every one's idiosyncratic image of authenticity of a particular place.
The impression I get from remy's description is the State's (the dudes with the power) version of authenticity versus his perceived common people's vision of authenticity.
Also, I think it is also to expose the State's orchrestrated version and resist by continuing our daily life??? Lol, sorry if i made a mess, but that's more my understanding. I.e. the state want to create a 'authenticity' of samsui woman in chinatown but we continue to queue up for bah kwa during cny like true blue sporeans.
Shujun has valid points but out of curiousity..things like beauty, everyone has their own image of it but does that mean we stop discussing it and is there a prevalent mainstream view of it at a point in time? I.e. authenticity to most people has reach a point now where most people will consider it as everyday urbanism. I believe that this can be seen in most people's dissertation topics as they have come to resist the dominant top-down authenticity that has been prevalent for some time.
If we take the position that authenticity is generated from everyday life which exists as a continuation from some point in history(Singaporeans' obsession with wealth is authentic: queueing up for 4D is authentic, even the many condominiums under construction right now, although they constitute a form of hyperreality by themselves), then in order to 'achieve' authenticity, if its ever achievable, everybody just needs to go on with their own lives and not give a damn as i had said b4. the authenticity in question here manifests as the present, but its evolution is traceable to some point of time in the past. therefore i still maintain that the point of origin is relavant.
i do not deny that in many cases, the search for authenticity ends up with an image, but only if it arises from a self-conscious position. so what comes out of a self-conscious search for authenticity? vignettes from history come to mind due to rupture from our past and the insecurities arising from the speed at which everything changes - yes its an image, readily exploited by commercial interests to induce consumption, and the state for propoganda purposes. this version of authenticity is one that is rooted in the past and only evolves as far as the history books can turn, and thus unattainable in present. that is why as shupashups has pointed out, 'the degree of authenticity remains arbitary', but only if authenticity is discussed within this context, and which i think is also shupashups position on authenticity.
as for whether the hyperreal-scapes are close/distant from/to their origin is relevant in today's context, we have to look into the intention behind the production of such hyperreal-scapes. sure, it is true that, objectively speaking, products of hyperreality have to be evaluated by means of utility and merits of their own right, since they were created based on an imagined past. yet much of the hyperreal-scapes in question are created in the name of preservation. or you may dispute that and say, this is only in name, and the real reason lies elsewhere, perhaps commercial viability. yet such hyperreal-scapes would still be haunted by ghosts from the past since they stake a claim to history and the 'authentic' as defined from a historic point of view in the above paragraph.
on the other hand, if we really do it the tabula rasa way, to develop everything from scratch making no historical/cultural references or whatsoever (think:hdb), the issue of preservation would not be present anymore, and such developments can then be judged on its own right, and indeed, can be authentic (if defined according to the 1st definition) as well.
can hyperreal-scapes ever be authentic if authenticity is considered within the 'everyday' context, and by extension, can such places ever sustain the genius locii? i believe that it is possible. here, i would like to clarify what i mean by hyperreal-scapes (sorry i know this came a bit late heheh.) i define hyperreal-scapes as physical urban fabric manipulated (conserved or reconstructed) by strategic forces (or the dominant producers) based on an imagined past. thus although defined by their physicality, their physical connection with the past is not an issue: the meticulously conserved and the completely reconstructed in place of its destroyed past are both seen in the same light.
the answer to the above lies in what kind of everyday is allowed to take hold in the transformed hyperreal-scapes. i specify what kind since everyday is a broad term and manifests as different layers: even tourists form a kind of everyday with the rhythms generated by the daily tour buses. if that layer of everydayness peculiar to the site, that is able to sustain the genius loci, is allowed to take root once again in the hollowed shells of the hyperreal-scapes, we might just get that authenticity that we have been searching for.
no prizes for guessing which area i hv been looking at: bugis area, specifically the stretch above victoria street, is rebuilt in every conceivable way - conserved, reconstructed to simulate, reconstructed on tabula rasa. yet that area possesses an intrinsic liveliness to it, unquestionably part of the people's everyday lives, yet not completely enstranged from the sio poh of the yesteryears - you may call that the genius loci.
ok, before i write out the whole of my dissertation on this blog, i would just like to summarize (sorry if its not apparent in the topic statement i typed earlier) that my dissertation is ultimately an exercise to prove that authenticity and by extension, genius loci of a place, (or, the soft city) has the ability to transcend changes in the physical urban fabric (the hard) through the unwielding resistance of everyday life. in other words, the soft is more precious and important to the city than the hard, on which conservationists and architects have persistently placed much greater emphasis.
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