Ways to Wander
A Footwork[1] compendium of suggestions, instructions, rules and activities for walking.
We would like to collate and edit (for possible future publication) an interdisciplinary catalogue of ways to engage with walking. From simple ideas to complex instructions, philosophical musings to playful encounters, do you have a walking task, idea, practice or methodology that you would like to write up and share?
Inspired by the multi-disciplinary approaches and experiences of the Footwork research group, and by Professor Carl Lavery’s ’25 Instructions for Performance in Cities’[2], this compendium aims to assemble a series of short texts that can be used to construct, interact with, or be encountered on a walk. The text may be for any location: urban, suburban or rural, or it could be site and/or route specific. Your contribution may offer an improvised experience, or a more structured task. The context may be geological, environmental, historical, autobiographical, pedagogical, political, playful, spiritual, critical, or any combination of these, and you may want to work in a visual aspect to your text that coincides with your idea.
The word count is a maximum of 350 to suit page size A5 and we are currently looking for textual examples, though the text can take on a visual form in relation to how the writing or mark making is laid out on the page.
Send your 350 words with a short 50 word biography to Claire Hind c.hind@yorksj.ac.uk
The deadline for the submission is Monday 10th March 2014. We actively invite contributions globally, although they should be in English. If this is not possible please contact us and we will try to find ways to accept work in other languages.
The Footwork group will meet in the spring to compile the contributions and work on ways in which the compendium may be published. The plan is to disseminate it as widely as possible including looking for print and online publishing possibilities.
Warm wishes
Claire Hind and Clare Qualmann
Footwork/Walking Artists Network.
[1] Footwork is a research group attached to the Walking Artists Network, http://footworkwalk.wordpress.com/
[1] Lavery, C., 2005, ‘Teaching Performance Studies: 25 instructions for performance in cities.’ Studies in Theatre and Performance, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 229-238.
Dr Claire Hind
Course Leader MA Theatre and Performance
York St John University
Lord Mayors Walk
York
YO317EX
http://garyandclaire.com
http://clairehind.com
http://writingencounters.squarespace.com
http://yorknewyork.blogspot.com
I have just bought a copy of this book on Kindle. A perfect collection of ideas for dérives, writing ateliers and to develop your own practice. I am going to enjoy using it on my Travel Writing Masters down here at Plymouth University. Thank you to all the contributors.
Charlie Mansfield