Many philosophers, artists, writers, architects, engineers, and historians, among others, have questioned what makes a place what it is, even what makes a place what it is not: Gertrude Stein famously said of Oakland, California that "there is no there there."
Think about the term place versus the term site. Doesn't a place involve people--their histories, stories, ethnicities, transportation, cuisine, culture, arts, as well as its physical form, whereas a "site" seems to connote only a spot on a map, a physical spot devoid of most or all of these factors?
What did Gertrude Stein mean by her curious statement? Is Corpus Christi a "there"? What is its identity? What makes it different from other places in Texas, or in the U.S.? How do you define it? Do you think others see Corpus Christi differently? Do you think others think Corpus is a "there"?
Take a minute to define this place.
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I think Corpus as a place and as a culture can be summed up in a single word: Miserable.
There are so many things that seem to be wrong with this Place that I can't even think of where or how to being fixing it. Fixing potholes? Clean tap water? A school district that turns out literate graduates? Reduction in poverty, drug use, and crime? Revitalizing our downtown? Fixing our corrupt city government? That's not even really half of what is wrong. I mean, where do we start?
I think this dysfunction and misery is our identity as a city. We're a Place that is both geographically and metaphorically on the way to Nowhere. People are hopeless here and I'm not really sure why they shouldn't be.
The really terrible thing is that the well justified hopelessness people here feel is one of the major things that holds the city back. The level of frustration and anger at higher than national average crime rates, corrupt police, corrupt city government, boredom, failing school system lowers the level of discourse about "what is to be done" to something really unproductive and uncivil. The people who care are just hurling insults and the people who don't care, well, don't care. This is, I think, our identity; we have a culture of hopelessness and misery and anger.
I don't know if our city government is ACTUALLY corrupt or not (probably, though) but I can't think of what else it could be. It's as if no one in charge here has ever been on a vacation or even seen another city before; they seem to have no idea what things could or should be like. I'm not even sure they understand the concept of landscaping and how far a few reasonably maintained shrubs, trees and grass can go to fix an abandoned lot.
I found your blog through the coliseum thread on caller.com and I'm so happy to see it!
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