1.Traditional arts and social science have long focused on “representation,” that is, the ways in which language, symbols, and images are used to represent and interpret the world. Thrift argues that this over-reliance on representation obscures a more fundamental and expansive dimension of social life. The core of the world’s reality, he suggests, is constituted by those experiences and practices that occur prior to language and thought—those that are directly participated in by the body, and which are fluid and difficult to articulate.
Non-Representational Theory shifts the focus of research from static texts and symbols to dynamic bodies and practices. It is concerned with the unthinking habits of everyday life, the tacit knowledge contained within the skilled body, and the affects and atmospheres that permeate space and function prior to individual consciousness. These elements are understood as environmental forces that shape conduct and influence perception, rather than as internal psychological states.
The theory seeks to capture not the fixed state of the world, but the process of its continual becoming. It emphasizes the primacy of relations and effects, focusing on how different elements—including humans, technologies, objects, and the environment—mutually shape each other and co-evolve through their interactions. This is a philosophical position that understands the world as a ceaseless flow of innumerable practices and events.
Thrift’s work pulls scholarly attention away from the interpretation of meaning and toward the observation of effect; it turns from the decoding of signs to a focus on practices. It reveals that the substance of life resides more in the realm of embodied, pre-reflective experience than within a clearly represented symbolic order.
2. My lens should capture those moments when language fails. At Philadelphia’s subway station, leaning against a gently vibrating pillar while waiting for the train, the rumble transmitted through my bones recorded the city’s pulse more vividly than any image. I began focusing on collecting these sensory fragments that defy complete translation: How the diamond-shaped sunbeams on the fire escape warped over time, how the aroma wafting from bakeries in different neighborhoods subtly mingled with exhaust fumes at street corners… These fragments collectively form my memory map of Philadelphia—not about how it looks, but about how my body truly existed here. It’s a “backup” of genuine memories, preserving these fleeting sensory dialogues, even though they can never be fully archived or explained.
Refenrance
Thrift, N. (2008). Non-Representational Theory: Space, Politics, Affect. Routledge.