Proposed:
My idea consists of following around an individual –
having previously received their permission to do so – for at least 4-6 hours
in order to gather images, sounds, and textures of their experience. I want to
see how they respond to the behaviors, structures, and people of Georgetown
University. I will then use these researched descriptions to construct a poem
focused exclusively on their perspective (but that may be told from a perspective
other than theirs). I will repeat this process until I reach a critical mass of
poems (approx. 10-15) which contradict, overlap, and vex each other in such a
way that a larger image of Georgetown in the present moment comes into focus.
The discourse of the Tarot may be used to help gel these poems and offer a
unique lens through which to observe the encounters.[1]
I hope to produce a collection of poems that, taken
together, stitch an image of Georgetown University in the spring of 2017.
Recent scholarship into the history of Georgetown as power center, bastion of
higher education, and plantation has collided with renewed campus planning, the
development of novel academic studies, and seismic shifts in how the university
responds to local and global sociopolitical struggles. Amidst these larger
ideological struggles, I want to situate the experiences of twelve or so
Georgetown students as they interact with the spaces and people of the
institution.
[1] See
Summon Moon for an example of the type of poem I would create. Summon Moon serves as a uniting poem; each other poem would feature one character.
This is really interesting. I'm particularly intrigued by the "plantation" aspect, and how this might tie into the personal lives/ histories/ narratives of current students.
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