walking together…sometimes apart
traces of four beings walking
Although I don’t see myself as ‘teaching walking’ I facilitate walkworks that invite participants to walk together (or, at the moment, apart, via Whatsapp). I sometimes provide an idea or a framework for a walk or I act as a catalyst to provoke discussion on different themes. We walk, talk, gather, find, read, draw, collect, watch and listen….
Perhaps strangely, my walking as research practice started in Detroit, the Motor City. I came across a network of paths that connected homes, stores, churches, basketball courts and schools, which I found out were called desire lines.
Walking in Detroit led to our company’s longest work - the Walking Project, a cultural exchange project between communities, artists, academics and activists in Southeastern Michigan and KwaZulu-Natal. We invited schools, community organisations and anyone interested in walking to workshops, walks, mapping, music and print-making events and conversations over three years, culminating in performances, storytelling, a conference and music jam at the Detroit YMCA
Walkshops emerged as a crucial way of engaging each other in conversations about our neighbourhoods, neighbours and local environment. We worked with participants on turning our attention outwards during group walks which we called A Walk around the Block. This became the basis for my doctoral research involving residents in Bristol and Ann Arbor.
living away from friends in the UK and Europe prompted me to find ways of walking & talking together, so I started text walking - a few of us would set off from our separate homes at a prearranged time and would take it in turns to text each other instructions to carry out. At the end of the walk we sent each other photos and found objects. It was a little clunky to do this in groups of more than 3 or 4 people though…..then came WhatsApp……
WhatsApp enabled easy group virtual walking: instructions and photos can be communicated immediately and clearly. Plus - and this happens especially if we are individuals all walking virtually together - we create all sorts of tangential stories through comments and side conversations, which become as interesting and varied as the walks.
I started using WhatsApp for group walking with USW students: 4 or 5 groups of 5 students all start out from the Atrium campus and head off in different directions. After 10 minutes or so one group gives an instruction: turn right then walk for 100 metres, take a photo of something orange; each group takes it in turn to create an instruction - which might be: after 50 metres do a little dance; look up at the 3rd storey of the building you are closest to and take a photo; stand on the next corner, close you eyes and record what you hear.
We meet back in the Atrium after an hour of walking and improvising and reflect on what we did and what we felt, saw, heard and experienced.
The pandemic has meant that WhatsApp walking has become my main method for walking together…apart. Those of us who cannot go outside walk in a garden or use their fertile imaginations to walk around their home. Since March 2020 I’ve walked virtually with many of my students; we give each other instructions for little games and interventions, sending each other photographs, video and audio recordings that we can post and use for reflecting on not only the walks themselves but on new ways of being, walking, working together.
