Motel Movement

Posted on Posted in Photo Essays No Comments Tagged with , , , , ,
Motel Movement
artifacts to stories not yet lost, but falling away piece by piece, stand in the midst of people living their daily lives

Somehow the decaying neon motel sign, seen from the road while traveling across the United States, bears the weight of decades of expectations bound up in glimpsed histories of hope and hurt- with some debauchery thrown in. The signs are not only icons of past age, they are shared artifacts of people who have passed through, some for a night and some who have made these places their homes for a week, a month, a year. Today, so many of the motels are homes to families who have made their way from the other side of the world to the very center of the US to buy and manage them. Conversations with these families at the front desk- about Hinduism vs. Buddhism or the representation of Ganesh hanging behind the counter or how their son has gone to India and will return with his wife to manage another motel down the street- add a rich layer to the human story encapsulated in the aging signs. They serve as a reminder that people, and our studies of people, are not static- and capturing moments in their movement to build a whole is much of what anthropology is all about. These photos, taken with a cellphone camera from the car after a quick application of the brakes, intend to capture and celebrate this movement- of space, of time and, most importantly, of people.

both a fixture of and a sanctuary from the open road, the motel provides a way to simultaneously connect and disconnect from the world
seeking out the motel with the sign with the broken neon is engaging with the past- with the people that have stopped there before you
the reminders of the present make sure that we don’t lose ourselves in nostalgia- but engage in the way the past is created in the present
artifacts to stories not yet lost, but falling away piece by piece, stand in the midst of people living their daily lives
home for many- outside in a room in the back, there are a pair of polished boots, a makeshift closet with pressed shirts hanging from the rod and a welcome sign decorated with flowers
the mystique of Route 66 tells just part of the story- the rest is created by the choice of when to apply the breaks
with a horizon peppered with motel signs, most are only a glimpse and a imagined moment
as night falls, a decision about where to sleep might soon be on the (glorious, pink) horizon
when and where you end up depends on who you might meet in the lobby or at the window- which conversations are to be had there or in the parking lot- how you might reinvent the past through the lens of the present

Kristina Baines is our resident cool anthropologist. She’s been formally trained in applied, sociocultural, ecological and medical anthropology at Florida Atlantic University (BA, MA), the University of Oxford (MSc) and the University of South Florida (PhD). She has a strong interest in corn, how what we do in our environment makes us well, and using innovative methods to make anthropology relevant and accessible to a wide audience. You can find out more about how these interests translate into projects and pursuits by perusing the rest of our site, or you can contact her directly at kristina@coolanthropology.com

What do you think?