Gardens of Washington Park: Interpreting the symbolic and cultural meaning of place
Introduction
Interpreting cultural values requires a great deal of analysis. At the BLC field school we focus, in part, on the oral histories of the people of Washington Park and conduct extensive interviews in order to gain an understanding of life and social relationships in the neighborhood, sites of cultural importance, and personal biographies. Almost everything about an oral history can reveal things about the speaker; what the speaker emphasizes or passes over, how the speaker talks about a certain topic, and what topics are discussed can be indicators of symbolic meaning. When we analyze the myriad interviews down to their core ideas, we discover that they share common themes. These overlapping concepts are where the root of the culture can be found. The field school interviews identify important thematic terms — change, resilience, values, aspirations, relationships, contact and conflict—that the residents use in order to describe places and life in their neighborhood. Homes, stores, streets and even gardens are imbedded with memories and meanings. And even while the residents may not be aware of it, speaking of these places helps us to identify more conceptual subjects. Talking of place becomes a medium in which they relay history, social relationships, everyday life and self-identity. Folklorists Williams and Young argue that "personal narratives … reveal how people feel about and talk about houses as well as the associational values these buildings have for them." Oral narratives of tangible places, they claim, point us toward intangible meanings, encourage sensory awareness, and show us the importance of personal preferences within larger cultural patterns. Project Objective
This project focuses on the semantic analysis of specific references, in the oral histories, to gardens. In order to identify and interpret major ideas that frame community values and identities in Washington Park, “gardens” may refer to exact sites or specific events, in addition to symbolic and cultural values that are embedded within these places. By discerning the multiple uses and diverse references to this term we are able to identify a nuanced taxonomy of places and meanings associated with the word “garden”. Methodology
Ethnography is an interpretive study and description of individual cultures (Cranz 3) . According to Galen Cranz the purpose of ethnography is to “enter the world of an unfamiliar group”. Oral histories provide us a forum to engage with local residents in order to discern the symbolic meaning of place. My research started by listening to the answer of a “grand tour question”; essentially an open ended and descriptive question that lets the speaker give us a general and overall description of their life (Cranz 13). Based on an analysis of six oral histories I attempted to categorize the residents’ perspectives, experiences and beliefs. Creating and interpreting categories is a useful element in the interpretation of cultural knowledge because categories are used to communicate ideas. According to Spradley et al, classifying objects based on their similarities and differences is how we take a mess of experiences each day and reduce it to terms we can understand (Spradley 60). Naturally, descriptive categories have nested sub-categories that further define the terms. This is why a taxonomy — a logical structure of meaning — is necessary if I wish to get to the base of a cultural concept. Using the taxonomy I watered down key quotes to reveal basic themes that exist in the Washington Park’s specific culture. Garden Summary
Semantic analysis and thick descriptions, a term used by Clifford Geertz to refer to a nuanced and interpretive analysis of culture, produced at the BLC field school generated root ideas such as change, values, resilience and social ties. Our analysis of this year’s oral histories helped us fine tune how these terms are operationalized in the physical landscape in the form of harvesting and tending gardens. When Washington Park residents spoke of gardens they referred to back yards, kitchen gardens, community gardens, and interior plants. It’s true that they are all talking about a cultivated landscape. However, gardens can have different meanings for different people. Gardens can represent many ideas for the community: belonging, pride, tradition, and change are a few of the surface level ones. The derived meaning from these concepts and how they connect are the semantic roots that helps us explain how and why residents of Washington Park interpret gardens. So while a garden may represent tradition for one person and belonging to another, both terms can connect under the umbrella-term resilience, identified in the field school research. Connections of this type are the “base” of the culture that is repeatedly mentioned. While the field school interviewed 16 people, my focus was on 5 of them. Pat Mueller, Yee Yang, Mae Vang, Rosalind Cox, and Martina Patterson all mentioned gardens and there quotes were the subject of my semantic analysis. Yang, Patterson and Vang all spoke of domestic gardens, but Mueller and Cox do not mention community gardens only as a general term. The gardens that they, and others spoke of were the Martin Drive community gardens, Express Yourself pop up gallery, Amaranth Café garden and the Bethune Academy garden. |
The analysis of the architectural and ethnographic data continues after the field school. This year, incoming undergraduate student Mia Krantz joined the BLC field school as a summer research assistant. Krantz was part of an undergraduate research program sponsored by the Office of Undergraduate Research. This program invites a small group of incoming students to campus for four weeks during the summer to engage in research with UWM faculty. Students spend 25-35 hours a week participating in research projects.
View Washington Park Gardens in a full screen map Selected Bibliography
Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays. New York: Basic, 1973. George Marcus, & James Clifford, Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. Eleftherios Pavlides and Galen Cranz, "Ethnographic Methods in Support of Architectural Practice, Shauna Mallory-Hill, Wolfgang Preiser, Chris Watson (Ed.) Enhancing Building and Environmental Performance. p. 299-312, (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley, 2011). Michael H. Frisch, A Shared Authority: Essays on the Craft and Meaning of Oral and Public History, (New York: State University of New York Press, 1990) Luke Eric Lassiter, The Chicago Guide to Collaborative Ethnography, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). Michael Ann Williams and M. Jane Young, “Grammar, Codes, and Performance: Linguistic and Sociolinguistic Models in the Study of Vernacular Architecture,” Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture 5 Gender, Class, and Shelter (1995), 40-51. |
Conclusion
This research suggests that the term garden holds multiple meanings and spatial references for the residents of this neighborhood. Gardens include vegetable gardens in domestic backyards and homes, produce beds in community owned lots and privately owned empty lots, publicly accessible social and leisure spaces, pop up art gallery locations, historical landmarks, property boundaries and markers, playgrounds and in-between spaces separating different properties. Activities and everyday use of these locations vary with users, time of the day, season, and uses. It is necessary to be mindful of this nuanced definition of this term when we talk of gardens in this neighborhood because the values and symbolisms associated with these sites vary. However, after we have identified these various meanings, we can see how they relate to overarching terms that are being talked about in this area.
What then, is the purpose of all this collected knowledge? We believe that our everyday engagement with our built environment —buildings, landscapes, roads, and public spaces—ultimately frames our actions and identities, determines our future, and gives us the power to become committed citizens. Therefore, to talk about our world, to act in this world and to build our world requires us to first understand, examine, and interpret this world. I will leave you with a quote that explains why this type of research is so important. Davey Kesey argues that “One of my fundamental flaws as a human is my tendency to value my perspective above others perspective. I think everyone should see things the way I do and if they don’t I sometimes look down on them for it.” How can we move forward in any field of knowledge if we don’t recognize that there is something to be learned from every perspective.
This research suggests that the term garden holds multiple meanings and spatial references for the residents of this neighborhood. Gardens include vegetable gardens in domestic backyards and homes, produce beds in community owned lots and privately owned empty lots, publicly accessible social and leisure spaces, pop up art gallery locations, historical landmarks, property boundaries and markers, playgrounds and in-between spaces separating different properties. Activities and everyday use of these locations vary with users, time of the day, season, and uses. It is necessary to be mindful of this nuanced definition of this term when we talk of gardens in this neighborhood because the values and symbolisms associated with these sites vary. However, after we have identified these various meanings, we can see how they relate to overarching terms that are being talked about in this area.
What then, is the purpose of all this collected knowledge? We believe that our everyday engagement with our built environment —buildings, landscapes, roads, and public spaces—ultimately frames our actions and identities, determines our future, and gives us the power to become committed citizens. Therefore, to talk about our world, to act in this world and to build our world requires us to first understand, examine, and interpret this world. I will leave you with a quote that explains why this type of research is so important. Davey Kesey argues that “One of my fundamental flaws as a human is my tendency to value my perspective above others perspective. I think everyone should see things the way I do and if they don’t I sometimes look down on them for it.” How can we move forward in any field of knowledge if we don’t recognize that there is something to be learned from every perspective.
Rosalind Cox explains the importance of relationships and social ties that connect individuals and communities.
Yee talks about farming in the Hmong culture.
Martina speaks about greed in her community.
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Mae speaks about the importance of plants to the Hmong culture.
Mae talks about her mothers garden.
Martina talks about Amaranth Bakery.
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