Invisibility, Seeing and Acknowledging

I feel like I ought to write a bit about my experiences pertaining the Life a User's Manual course, and my struggle with actually finding a feasible idea for our project. I propose two ideas towards the end of the post. 

For me the course has been a very intense experience, it has helped me to realise that my everyday alienation is not my own, that we live in a world which is one giant aggregate of various permutations of everyday banality. The course  has helped me to feel more critical and involved in the world, it has inspired me to actually start putting my everyday thoughts in writing. I have started another blog, in a sense the effect the course is having is actually pulling me  away a bit from my course work, I have spent the last days writing, instead of focusing on our project.

The fact that I am not alone in my everyday does not change however that it is still limiting me, I have patterns, domestic routines, ways of being at home, and somewhere in between there is a mental comfort zone, which separates me from my social, public self. It is so woolly that I even forgot to send the email asking Bernadette about the Eastern European radical group.
I feel like I am alternating between a tension and suspension: once in private, I am suspended like a coat on a hanger.


Everyday experience doesn't have to be 'lofty' to be fulfilling: tidying up, washing, gardening, all can have a meditative quality, but in our mass-produced, rented, temporary experience we actually cannot connect to our environment. We secretly hate the objects that surround us: the ugly furniture provided by the landlord, the shabby fittings, the grey lighting on the tube, the smelly carpet in the library, the idiotic switches in the lecture rooms, that seem to not work for anyone.
We try not to notice this ugliness, we try to pretend that we live alone, that we did not notice the neighbour doing something in their imaginary privacy.
But a trace of our true selves, as having a proper relation to our environment is there: in our relation to children. We notice them, even when we pretend that their parents don't exist.
Old ladies on the street, cashiers in shops will coo, acknowledge the child.

Our project 'brief' is 'invisibility', but I think maybe we should try to turn it on its head: to not focus on the object that is invisible, but to focus on seeing and acknowledging.
I still want to interpret the idea as a social idea, about our interaction with others.

Seeing is not looking, looking objectifies the one looked at.

Invisible does not necessarily imply hidden from sight, it means the ones we don't see, the ones we don't acknowledge, it does not say anything about them in a sense, it says something about us.

Focusing our look on the ones we don't see, might actually not change anything, we will still not acknowledge them.

I propose two ideas:

1) Seeing/acknowledging:

For the duration of the project we acknowledge people that are normally 'invisible', specifically on campus, because as I have said in our meeting I find it that it is where people, especially cleaners are invisible the most.
This might be as simple as a nod, making eye contact, saying "thank you", or just treating them like any other person, not pretending that they are not there, or we could take it a step further and actually have an action that acknowledges their contribution: a party, a talk etc. not sure.

"We call ourselves the Invisibles," say the University of London Cleaners.

2)Acknowledging:

This is an idea inspired by the Non-Violent Communication concept.
(A basic break down of how to do it can be found here)

I have practiced a similar technique once with the person who first told me about NVC,  and it was difficult at first.
It took the following form:
2 people were involved in a conversation and we shifted focus from one to the other in acknowledging what each other said.

So person A would say something, and then person B would respond by acknowledging person A, and repeating back what person A had said.
 It was a kind of therapeutic process, to make  each other feel acknowledged,  listened to, and seen. Normally in 'friendship' when a person has a problem and they talk about it, we try to 'help' them, by giving advice, or our point of view. In this case it was about making sure we actually  acknowledged what the person had said, and mirrored it back to them, so they can try to find a new way of seeing the problem themselves.

We could arrange that in a kind of happening: that we would invite people and provide space for them to talk about what they wanted, or didn't.
We could also limit it to each other and record it through skype for example, so we can have a record for this blog, as with strangers there might be privacy issues.


Hope to see you all tomorrow!