Fieldwork 02-20-07. Kennedy Plaza, "What is Public?"

On February 20, 2007, around 5 or 6 in the afternoon, DPA workers asked everyone that they could "What is public?" or "What do you consider 'Public'?" or "What do you think of when you hear the word 'public'?"


Responses (multiples (x3) represent number of people with same response)
from 57 members of the public:

-"Public Knowledge"
-"For everybody"
-"No time", "We are busy right now", "Sorry, in a rush" (x9)
-Hand wave or head shake dismissal (x4)
-"People" (x2)
-"Everything"
-"This here, restaurant or something..."
-"Without or with common ownership; can't be anyone's"
-"Non-private"
-"Here" (Kennedy Plaza)(x4)
-"Bathrooms, meal sites"
-"Dunno, don't really think"
-"What is public?"
-"Everyone"
-"Crowded place"
-"People of society, culture"
-"I dunno" (x3)
-"The city, everybody"
-"Everybody together"
-"Open to everyone"
-"Available to anybody"
-"Its ok, I guess."
-"I'm not interested"
-"Gotta catch my bus"
-"No thanks"
-"Free"
-"Outside, no privacy"
-"Where anyone can go"
-"Supported and used by the public"
-"Open to all"
-"Everybody, society"
-"Publication, making things available for common presentation and discussion"

Welcome to the Department of Public Address!

Welcome to the Department of Public Address, a multilateral Agency with the designated function of
exploring and redefining the conception and actuality of the PUBLIC, in all of its forms--sphere, realm, domain, space, people, place...