In the extract, De Certeau frequently uses words that connote superiority, power and lust like “rhetorical” and “voyeurs” to relate human as an element in the city, to show the collective drive to “success” defined by the society. To follow the system of the society, the daily path pedestrians unconsciously walk through makes “spaces” “places” and creates “lack of space” by merely walking in the city. Even though their “existence makes up the city”, but the lack of culture makes them a merely local space, which can be compared to the clutters in a room eventually become the elements that gives spacial experiences. The disappearance of the culture hence is related to how spaces in city became places that are anonymously identified, it could be political powers, the city’s value of economic status, as well as selective choose of individuals with power. It is an open-minding experience reading the extract, from De Certeau sensitive observation in a walk in the city to understand the city in a philosophical perspective.
Somia An
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A very well-written reflection on Certeau. Your considerations of the value of culture, as well as, economic status in a space also harken back to our reading on Abbas.