Illumination # 3 - Derive and Psycho-Geography

Putting aside topics relating to specifically Orientalism for a minute, I have been thinking a lot about what is the motivation for my "Flaneurism" and in my research came upon the concept of the "Derive" (English: 'The Drift"):

The dérive (French: [de.ʁiv], "drift") is a revolutionary strategy originally put forward in the "Theory of the Dérive" (1956) by Guy Debord, a member at the time of the Letterist International.^[1] Debord defines the dérive as "a mode of experimental behavior linked to the conditions of urban society: a technique of rapid passage through varied ambiances."^[2] It is an unplanned journey through a landscape, usually urban, in which participants drop their everyday relations and "let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there"

The central purpose of the derive is that it is unplanned; in the smartphone era we are constantly looking at Google maps and hyper aware of where we are situated at almost all times. The derive is akin to my wanderings as an almost therapeutic antithesis to this. Getting lost  and disoriented is the whole point. Flaneurism and the derive motivation were something apparently known to a variety of art movements - not coincidentally all influential to me. 

'Baudelaire established a tradition that moved through the early modernists, to the Surrealists and on to the Situationists.  As part of the latter movement, Guy Debord developed the notions of the dérive and the ‘spectacle’.  A dérive (in English ‘drift’) is the means by which ‘psycho-geographies’ are achieved.  A drift is an unplanned walk, usually through a city or marginal area, and a psycho-geography involves the walker creating a mental map of the city.'


I am really curious about this word "Psycho-geography":

'Psychogeography, as the term suggests, is the intersection of psychology and geography. It focuses on our psychological experiences of the city, and reveals or illuminates forgotten, discarded, or marginalised aspects of the urban environment.'

http://theconversation.com/psychogeography-a-way-to-delve-into-the-soul-of-a-city-78032

 Yesterday I spent the better part of the morning and afternoon wandering from Edirnekapi all the way down to Eminonu. Having bought better boots to support my constantly spraining ankles, I was eager to get out after too many days spent at home. There is something that happens when I find myself alone on a street I haven't explored before; a sense of familiarity and all too often a bizarre dejavu. I cannot logically explain this phenomena but maybe in the act of being dislocated, some transcending feeling of placelessness takes over and creates a familiarity or map or psychogeographical imprint of past derives? Maybe it is this feeling i am addicted to, this state which allows me to notice the oddities and interesting forgotten tidbits within the streetscape; the cat on a roof, a mans shirt matching a wall, a sheet billowing in the wind like a flag, a pink staircase to nowhere. This map I create in my head supersedes the one on any smartphone. Psychogeography is a way of diving into the soul of a city, in a way that is playful and allows for intuitive exploration and creativity.

"Because purposeful walking has an agenda, we do not adequately absorb certain aspects of the urban world. This is why the drift is essential to psychogeography; it better connects walkers to the city."