Muybridge, The Horse in Motion
ESRC
Methods
Festival
2014
What is Rhythmanalysis?
Dr Dawn Lyon, University of Kent - d.m.lyon@kent.ac.uk
kent.ac.uk/sspssr/staff/lyon.htm & nowaytomakealiving.net
Introduction: What is rhythmanalyis?
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Concept introduced by Henri Lefebvre
(1901-91) in short book of same name
originally published in 1992 as Éléments
de rythmanalyse: introduction à la
connaissance des rythmes
Translated into English in 2004 as
Rhythmanalysis: space, time and everyday
life
Opening line: ‘This little book does not
conceal its ambition. It proposes
nothing less than to found a new
science, a new field of knowledge: the
analysis of rhythms.’ (Lefebvre 2004: 3)
What is rhythm?
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‘Everybody thinks they know what this word means. In fact,
everybody senses it in a manner that falls a long way short of
knowledge: rhythm enters into the lived; though that does not
mean it enters into the known.’ (Lefebvre, 2004: 77)
Rhythm requires more than repetition
There must be marked temporal elements, e.g. strong and
weak, and an overall movement
‘… the rhythmanalyst concerns himself [in original] with
temporalities and their relations within wholes.’ (Lefebvre,
2004: 24)
Tuning into rhythm
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The rhythmanalyst ‘will be attentive, but not only to the words
or pieces of information, the confessions of confidences of a
partner or a client. He will listen to the world, and above all to
what are disdainfully called noises, which are said without
meaning, and to murmurs [rumeurs], full of meaning – and finally
he will listen to silences.’ (Lefebvre 2004: 19)
‘The rhythmanalyst calls on all his senses. […] He thinks with
his body, not in the abstract, but in lived temporality. […] He
must simultaneously catch a rhythm and perceive it within the
whole’ (Lefebvre 2004: 21)
‘… to grasp a rhythm it is necessary to have been grasped by
it; one must let oneself go, give oneself over, abandon oneself
to its duration.’ (Lefebvre 2004: 27)
Doing rhythmanalysis
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Lefebvre’s work on rhythm has been influential in geography in
particular since publication of the book in English 10 years ago
Discussed (amongst others) by Mike Crang, Tim Edensor,
Owain Jones, and Paul Simpson
Stimulated new attention to processes, patterns and
interactions in natural and social worlds – see
http://rhythmofcapitalism.wordpress.com/ for documented
examples of everyday life
Some critique that Lefebvre did not instruct readers how to
do rhythmanalysis
Practical elaborations include mobile methods, notably walking,
and time-lapse photography
Example: The everyday rhythms of
Billingsgate fish market
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How to document rhythm in a market space?
Time-lapse photography (speeded up) allows us to perceive
interconnected activities and temporalities in the cycle of the
market through the night
Loss of some detail leads to greater clarity in patterns
The use of sound connects the viewer to the felt-experiential
aspects of moving through space-time, to hear the space in the
sound
Time-lapse photography is both a medium of ethnographic
inquiry and makes it possible to create a representation of the
rhythms of market life
Conclusions
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Rhythmanalysis is more than an orientation to research; it
offers a way of thinking and doing research that makes us
aware of time and space in new ways
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It is in this book that Lefebvre demonstrates how space and
time need to be brought and thought together to better
understand everyday life
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This involves the recognition of time-space as produced in
practice