A space to struggle with the concept of flanerie. Definition: a new technology of vision and cognitive understanding.

Some posts marked “Diss. Rework” are attempts to update sections from my dissertation entitled, “Women and the Walk: Female Flanerie and the Aesthetics of Public Space in 19th-century Europe.” It has lain fallow since 1996, when the Harvard Dept. of Comparative Literature accepted it and conferred the Ph.D. I’m no longer interesting in publishing it as an academic work, so this blog is a lab where I try to take the historical research and deprogram it into reading that’s a little more palatable. I’m not sure if this is at all possible.

This blog is open to researchers of these and related topics. Boundaries are fluid and just about any area related to flanerie, urban cultural history, and/or cognitive science would fit in. Please send submissions to cparsons@umd.edu or join my Facebook page, the Nomadic Optic Research Group https://www.facebook.com/pages/Nomadic-Optic-Research-Group/420466364665894?skip_nax_wizard=true#!/pages/Nomadic-Optic-Research-Group/420466364665894. All civil discourse and observations welcomed.  I also strenuously invite submissions by readers, especially creative or autobiographical writings that reflect a transformative experience as a solitary stroller. We have a lot of gadgets at our disposal, but none as powerful as our brain and senses.