Klauser, Francisco

2022-02, Magliocco, Célia, Klauser, Francisco

Si les nouvelles technologies occupent une place croissante dans nos existences, elles s’immiscent jusque dans les relations de compagnie avec nos animaux. Il est désormais possible de surveiller son chat depuis son smartphone en observant ses déplacements, en comparant son activité physique à travers le temps et par rapport à d’autres chats « connectés » et de délimiter des zones « sûres » en installant des clôtures virtuelles notamment. Cette recherche questionne les motivations et les impacts de l’utilisation de ces technologies au sein des relations entre les humain∙e∙s et leur(s) chat(s) en mobilisant les contributions des Animal Studies/Geographies et celles des Surveillance Studies. Par une approche conceptuelle qui se développe autour de la notion de « médiation », je propose de penser la domesticité, puis la domesticité surveillante de manière analogue à la territorialité raffestinienne (1982). J’analyse ainsi la domesticité surveillante comme le résultat d’un processus dans lequel s’imbriquent des pratiques spatial(isé)es, des représentations domestiques ainsi que des dispositifs technologiques (les trackers). Cette étude a été menée sur la base d’entretiens réalisés avec des personnes utilisant des trackers pour leur(s) chat(s). New technologies tend to occupy an increasing place in our lives, and they even interfere in the relationships of companionship with our animals. It is now possible to monitor our cat(s) from our smartphone by observing its movements, comparing its physical activity over time and in relation to other "connected" cats and to delimit "safe" areas by installing virtual fences. This research questions the motivations and impacts of the use of these technologies within the relationships between humans and their cat(s) by mobilizing the contributions of Animal Studies/Geographies and those of Surveillance Studies. Through a conceptual approach that develops around the notion of “mediation”, I propose to think about domesticity, then surveillant domesticity in an analogous way to raffestinian territoriality (1982). I thus analyze surveillant domesticity as the result of a process in which spatial(ized) practices, domestic representations and technological devices (trackers) intertwine. This study was conducted based on interviews with people using trackers for their cat(s).

2012, Klauser, Francisco

This introductory paper establishes the grounds for a more sustained discussion of Claude Raffestin’s understanding of human territoriality in its contribution to contemporary geographical debates. The purpose is to highlight the broad, and fundamentally interrelated, philosophical, epistemological, and political ambitions of Raffestin’s work, before elucidating some of the key conceptual pillars of his relational thinking through territoriality. In this, particular emphasis will be placed on the concept of mediation. The proposed engagement with Raffestin’s work offers an opportunity not only for revisiting territoriality in its value for contemporary political geography and sociospatial theory, and for rethinking the positioning and contribution of Raffestin’s oeuvre itself, but also for critically reflecting upon the spaces and power relationships of geographical knowledge production today and in the past.

2007, Klauser, Francisco

In order to emphasize the importance of understanding the experience of the city as one that includes all human senses, this article focuses on the increasing use of CCTV in city centers. As we can see by looking at the array of monitors within control rooms of CCTV systems, surveillance cameras contribute to the development of a "parallel world" created by the assemblage of decontextualized images coming from monitored places throughout the city. Thus, sitting in the indoor space of CCTV control rooms, as if in a capsule, camera operators live an exclusively technologically mediated experience of the city.
However, public space users can neither cognitively know nor sensually approach these hidden spaces, nor can they know or perceive the new urban boundaries between monitored and not monitored places. From the point of view of monitored individuals, this paper shows that the dissociation between hidden spaces of control and fully exposed public space results in an intangible feeling of a new kind of indeterminable superficiality that ultimately leads to the personal withdrawal from this confusing reality.
On an empirical level, the resulting disturbance in the (sensory) relationship between the self and the surrounding territory in connection with video surveillance is studied by the example of CCTV of street prostitution in the Swiss city of Olten. On the basis of thirteen in-depth interviews conducted with street-users this paper points out how the CCTV implied spatial and mental separation between how the world behind and the world below the cameras is lived and experienced.