Seeing Around Corners 👀

“When people left on the Oregon Trail from St. Louis, they knew that only a fraction of them would make it to the West Coast. But they went anyway.” – John M. Grunsfeld

Introduction

Living in Canada, one can often see the obvious differences between us and the USA. For example, travelling from BC to Texas last year gave me more culture shock than I would’ve originally expected. However, travelling from BC to Washington state, or Oregon, or even California doesn’t have that same effect. On the West Coast there is a kind of collective identity that crosses boarders, and is felt amongst every resident from Vancouver to Los Angeles. That’s why, in this project, we delved deeper into said collective identity, and we linked that idea to people who see around corners, who seem to be in an abundance on the Coast.

Why are some people able to see around corners in ways others are not, and by doing so shape how we see ourselves in this changing world?

The project

Reading that driving question for the first time was confusing, to say the least, but it gets easier to understand if we break down what it means into a few sections.

1. People who see around corners

To begin this project, we looked at people who could see opportunities and trends that other people could not see. We wrote several paragraphs and such to demonstrate our understanding of the traits of these people. Craft Document- Seeing Around Corners

2. Changing World

This changing world truly refers to the future we are actively building for ourselves. It could be more accurate to say that those who see around corners aren’t actually predicting the trends that form the foundation of the modern world, but instead are making decisions that set those trends and change the future on their own.

3. Collective identity and the West Coast 

The collective identity on the West Coast is something that is pretty easy to visualize. It includes many main features such as: The great outdoors, the entertainment industry, art and architecture, a cultural mosaic, and lastly, places that make reality seem distant (unreal). The collective identity on the Coast is actually highly discussed, and you’ve probably heard parts of it through art forms, such as music. In a Skill Sprint we did before this project, we discussed music and its importance in history. A common place and topic discussed was the West, specifically California, where, at the time, the hippie movement was a huge part of the collective identity and culture. An example of this is from the song California Dreamin’ by Mamas and Papas, which describes the yearning for California, showcasing its reputation of being a hotspot for art and culture.

The Docuseries

In order to showcase our understanding of this question and this multi faceted topic, our final goal was to create a 10-15 minute docuseries episode about said collective identity, people who see around corners, and one of the main features of the West Coast culture. My group included myself, Dries, and Jakub, and our characteristic to focus on was “The Great Outdoors.”

The trip

However, before diving into the docuseries episode, I first need to connect the field study we went on to California to this final product. We travelled to Los Angeles in order to gain a fuller perspective of The West Coast as a whole, not just Vancouver. On this trip, we were mainly collecting footage, learning about the southern part of the Coast, and making our episode come to life. Below are some pictures.

The episode

The episode we made took lots of time, effort, and collaboration to finish, and it was certainly a challenging task. My group definitely had some bumps in the road, but by the end of the project we had successfully created a final product. Our issues mainly stemmed from collaboration and communication, with each of us having a different idea of what the product would look like, with many different versions of our script being drafted before agreeing on a final one.

Evidence

The biggest contributions I made to my group were things like: 

• Much of the first few drafts of the script:  Script,Script v3
• Footage from the trip and from copyright free sources: Footage
• The storyboard: Storyboard

Here is the entire docuseries episode below ⬇️ 

 

Back to the beginning

To connect back to the beginning and the first quote I used, The West Coast is a hub for people who see around corners, with our collective identity being shifted year after year. As I mentioned earlier, the hippie movement was a huge part of the collective identity in the 1960’s, when California Dreamin’ came out. Although being relaxed and hippie adjacent is a common characteristic of your average West Coast resident, it is not as integral to the culture as it once was. The people who can see the trends can decide what to do with them, in order to shape what comes next. It’s less that they can magically see the future of society, but that they can see hints of something better and bring them to life with a skill and understanding that most people don’t have. 

Conclusion 

This project had a different learning curve for me than most, as it took me a while to fully grasp the meaning of the project, the connections between all of the aspects, and the teamwork that was needed to create a conclusive video, but I believe that through researching examples and learning in the field, my understanding and perspective of what it means to live and grow on the West Coast has been expanded.

Thanks for reading!