Vieques, Puerto Rico : from devastation to conservation, and back again
Name
56770221-MIT.pdf
Description
Full printable version
Size
14.51 MB
Format
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Checksum (MD5)
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Author(s)
Arbona, Javier, 1976-
Advisor(s)
Anne Whiston Spirn.
Date Issued
2004
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
The donning of camouflage gear by military forces is uniformly understood to be an attempt to dissolve into a background matrix in order to deceive an enemy in combat, or in a combat simulation. This thesis examines the landscape of Vieques, Puerto Rico, to disprove such notion and move towards proving the opposite: that the military assembled the background matrix according to its own set of interests. Through different communication channels and agents, the military arranges the retrospective gaze into the landscape, recasting the past in the service of its future stratagems. The military communicates to visitors that they gaze at original, primeval nature, when in fact it is a successional vegetation misrepresented as primordial. This scenography proves nearly unquestionable when it is adopted by corporate tourism marketing at the end of the 20th century, but does not appeal to the leisure audience only. It also seduces all those that opposed the military, perpetuating an idea of Vieques without people in the process.
Description
Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 2004.
"June 2004."
Includes bibliographical references (p. 117-121).
Subjects
Architecture.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Architecture
Terms of Use
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