The academic requirement for the psychogeography module that I teach at Brunel University London is in two parts. First, there’s a fairly straightforward essay question that gives students an opportunity to display their erudition when it comes to the antics of the surrealists and situationists, or the high-flown ramblings of the English Romantics. Then there’s a special project. The idea for this is that the students undertake their own version of a dérive – the aimless drift through the city that is the raison d’être of seriously flippant flâneurs – and document it in any way they please.
They can film themselves, take still images and put them together with words in PowerPoint, or give us words alone. I’ve had students who have conveyed their dérive using immersive installations, others who have painted pictures or drawn cartoons. I tell them: there’s no bar on any mode of expression but the important thing to remember is that I want you to take me by the hand and lead me into this milieu.
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