Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Liminal landscape'

This dissertation investigates the ancient healing tradition of the Maya sweatbath, its landscape, and rituals, which after three millennia is still practiced today among the contemporary Maya. Frequently overlooked because of its size, the ancient Maya sweatbath's location in ancient ceremonial cores, royal courts, and near important ritual structures and sacred water features accentuates its importance and need to understand its role, siting, and connection with the landscape. A three step approach of rooting, projecting, and transcending is applied to the investigation's structure for examining the sweatbaths conception as the womb of Mother Earth, the structure as a replica of the cosmos, the liminal landscape tethering together water, topography, and the celestial domain, and rituals of purification, healing, and transformation. In addition, the ancient Maya site of Yaxchiln and its three sweatbaths serves as the epicenter, the investigation's initial point of beginning, from where projections are made outward to twenty-eight additional sweatbaths augmenting and defining the scope of sweatbath features and site conditions. A combination of archeological drawings, architectural and landscape plans and sections, ethnographic and ethnohistoric texts, and epigraphic interpretations are examined, in combination and juxtaposition, as a means for integrating the symbolic and physical layers, which in union compose a complimentary narrative highlighting liminality as a principal quality encompassing the sweatbath. Liminality, associated with transition and transformation and fundamental to the Maya notion of gestation and creation of the cosmos, is revealed and demonstrated through the cyclical and everchanging nature of the sweatbath landscape of earth, water and sky, and reflected in man's inherent life processes and fundamental to the sweatbath rituals' symbolism of rebirth and renewal.
Ph. D.

In my dissertation, I argue that Marina Carr creates liminal spaces in her plays, exploring the tensions inherent in the issues of landscape, gender, and identity. She uses these liminal spaces to expose her audiences to more complex conceptions of Ireland in the twenty-first century. For example, Carr frequently challenges perceived notions of gender identity, drawing attention to gender as performance and creating female protagonists who resist their roles as wives and mothers. Landscape is also an important element of Carr's plays; most frequently she uses the landscape of the Irish Midlands as a space that is liminal both in terms of its geography in the center of the country and in terms of the bogs, which are neither land nor water. Finally, throughout her plays she combines elements of the Irish dramatic tradition with non-Irish elements as a way of expressing Ireland's complicated post-Celtic Tiger identity. I address Carr's plays chronologically in an attempt to trace her development of her use of liminality, which begins primarily with gender in Low in the Dark and expands to include landscape and identity through the Midlands plays. Most recently, plays like Woman and Scarecrow and The Cordelia Dream are set in the liminal moments between life and death and in the unconscious world of the characters' dreams, illustrating Carr's continuing exploration of new liminal spaces.

El portfolio Traumland (1922) de Alfred Kubin es el más personal y complejo, aunque olvidado, de los trabajos del artista. Tras un exhaustivo análisis de la vida, obra, contexto y escritos íntimos de Kubin, esta tesis presenta el portfolio como un proyecto para cartografiar sus paisajes interiores, que beben de sus experiencias oníricas y del vínculo con su entorno. El marco contextual abarca desde el origen del Expresionismo hasta 1920, señalando la importancia de la obra kubiniana dentro del mismo. Se analiza la imagen de la ciudad en el Expresionismo mediante tipologías compartidas por Arte y Literatura de las que Kubin participó. A través de conceptos como Stimmung, heterotopía y “memoria colectiva”, se explica la permuta de ciudad por naturaleza, aspecto que une a Kubin con otros artistas de entreguerras. La síntesis de nuestros hallazgos culmina en un análisis técnico y simbólico del Traumland y del modelo de paisaje kubiniano.
Alfred Kubin’s Traumland portfolio (1922) is the most personal and complex, yet understudied, work of the artist’s career. By comprehensively analysing his life and works, context and personal writings, this thesis explains Kubin’s portfolio as a project for mapping his inner landscapes, which draw directly from his oneiric experiences and from the bond with his environment. The study is framed within the context that embraced the beginning of Expressionism until 1920, and assesses the importance of the Kubinian works within that period. The image of the city in Expressionism is analysed through different typologies exhibited in Art and Literature, to which Kubin contributed. Concepts of Stimmung, heterotopia, and ‘collective memory’ are applied to explore his artistic shift from city to nature, something shared with other artists of the interwar period. The synthesis of findings culminate in the technical and symbolic analysis of Traumland and the prototype of the Kubinian landscape.
Alfred Kubins Traumland Mappe (1922) ist das persönlichste und komplexeste, denoch das am selten berücksichtigste Werk des Künstlers. Nach einer ausführlichen Analyse von Kubins Leben, Werk, Zeitrahmen und privaten Schriften, präsentiert diese Doktorarbeit die Mappe als Projekt zur Abbildung seiner Innenlandschaften, die sich aus seinem Traumerleben und der Verbindung mit seiner Umgebung schöpfen. Diese Untersuchung wird zwischen dem Ursprung des Expressionismus bis 1920 eingerahmt, unter besonderer Hervorhebung des kubinischen Werkes. Das Bild der Stadt im Expressionismus wird durch verschiedene Typologien analysiert, die Kunst und Literatur betreffen, an denen Kubin beteiligt war. Durch Konzepte wie Stimmung, Heterotopie und „kollektives Gedächtnis“ wird der Wandel vom Stadtbild zur Natur untergesucht, der Kubin mit anderen Künstlern aus der Zwischenkriegszeit teilte. Die Synthese unserer Ergebnisse gipfelt in einer technischen und symbolischen Analyse des Traumlandes und des Modells der kubinischen Landschaft.

Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
This exegesis, which is essentially an auto-ethnographic account, examines the particularities of my photographic practice, which has been forged and elaborated over a period of years, and which coalesced into an exhibition titled Margin Walker - A Theatre of Disembodied Poetics. The questions and concepts that are inevitably and tangentially raised by its singular style are interrogated. Margin Walker invites investigations into the nature of photographic truth, which are approached through applying pataphysical and surrealistic constructions in the directorial mode, using analogue large-format photography. Time and space are distorted and elevated to unfamiliar dimensions by what I call the process-exposure, an ever-evolving method whereby a dense temporal layering on the negative occurs. This enables me to create an unfamiliar, or even recondite, vision of the liminal landscape. It is one which, given that I do not apply post-production manipulations to the images, I argue is a literal recording of time and light, and thus, even impossible photographs are available for the interpretation of being truthful. An overview of the nature and style of Margin Walker is given in the first chapter, A Theatre of Disembodied Poetics. Here, the notion of a fundamental paradox upon which my photographs hinge, which structures and enables the work, is introduced. In the following chapter, Estrangement, Displacement, Belonging, I explore the primary motivations of the work, which derive from personal psychology. That very private realm is not just motivation, but it shapes the work in conceptual and practical terms as well. The chapters Nothing and Beingness, and then Periphery and Centre, ponder, respectively, the qualitative temperament of the photograph, and of the landscape, especially as they exist in the peculiar milieu of Margin Walker. I then, in Thinking Sideways, Building Backwards, use a number of ‘case studies’ of individual photographs as a matrix in which to explore not only their particular idiosyncrasies, but also the ways in which they serve more generally to illustrate and illuminate themes and motifs which occur throughout the larger body of work. Lastly, I consider the work of some contemporary photographic artists whose work I find of special interest; and I then review how my work has, over the years, been received in the wider world, and how it is shown in a culminating exhibition, in December, 2013.

The fairy figure has had a long association with Ireland in popular cultural discourse. While often the source of children's fairy tales, their history in Ireland is far from kitsch. Their enduring association with the Irish has been one of adaptation in the face of colonialism and is linked to the land itself as well as Irish identity. The Gaelic Revival and emerging field of archaeology in the nineteenth century pulled from a strong tradition of myth and storytelling to craft a narrative of authentic Irishness that could resist the English culturally and spiritually. This paper explores the relationship between nationalism, landscape, and mythology that created a space that the fairy survived in as a product of colonial resistance and identity.

My practice-led project explores the indexical lamination of memory, history, narrative and reality afforded by photography imbued with the illusion of spatial dimensionality. This thesis investigates the notion that far from freezing a ‘slice of time’ photography reanimates perception through sensation rendering duration flexible and elastic. Using the liminal landscape of South Australia as time’s stage, I contend that time is ‘collapsible’, constantly unfolding and repeating. In embracing this temporal flow, I submit that photomedia becomes our most compelling connection to time itself, as lived experience. It is this connection that can act as an ethical agent of change for the betterment of the landscape in which we live. The project includes work created in South Australia, the ACT, the United States and the Outer Hebrides and Shetland Islands of Scotland. It includes artefacts photographed in the Adelaide Civic Collection, The South Australian Museum and the National Museum of Australia.

What happens after a place has been exploited, isolated, and neglected? What occurs when that place is bound – confined – by impenetrable voids of dereliction? Its core, slowing diffracting, with no opportunity to perceive outward – beyond the derelict terrain to the boundless expanses of earth and water that have perpetuated its vitality. And what then, if for a moment, this decaying place is given a view beyond these boundaries? Deindustrialization has invariably altered modern cultural conceptions of control over nature. The terrain remaining after decades of resource exploitation is composed of deep voids and fissures that reside physically, psychologically, and theoretically in-between the accepted realms of culture and nature. This thesis explores the perversion and dissolution of these two opposing realms within the sublime and fantastical derelict landscape of a declining town. Deindustrial voids are considered as both barrier and bridge; serving as persistent symbolic reminders of the volatile and hubristic relationship between culture and nature, and offering potential reconnection to the natural landscape of a city’s foundation. Reacting to collective nostalgia through memorialisation, totemism, and erasure, typical design interventions continue to prioritize cultural domination and emphasize the designer as creator in order to reassert control over the chaos of deindustrialization, often resulting in placeless infilling of the void. Ideas of extimacy, alterity, and ruination, with influences from the fields of industrial archaeology and landscape architecture, ground contemporary reactions to the deindustrial void and explore the role of landscape in the creation and fragmentation of ideas of place for the dissolving North American industrial city. Both inspired and situated within the declining former town of Fort William, Ontario, this thesis surveys an abandoned industrial corridor that encircles the town, severing it from the liminal water’s edge and landscape beyond. Viewed as a palimpsest, this site is considered beyond its most recent industrial usage to expose a place-specific natural/cultural terrain comprised of material and immaterial layers of evolution and exploitation. This thesis positions the architect as perceiver, hoping to inspire sensitivity, pause, and reflection and resists ideas of forced transformation as a means of outwardly expressing progress. It immerses itself within the in-between places that blur preconceived boundaries – natural and cultural, past and future, controlled and chaotic – in order to encounter the inherent existential qualities of a site in transition.

In contemporary North America, death is contained within a network of cemeteries, crematoria and funeral homes. Death-space and its associative funeral rituals are both sacred and abject resulting in marginalization that adversely affects how the living understand their mortality. Our perception of death influences our place in the world and funeral ritual facilitates our departure from it. In most cities, the funeral home houses this liminal ritual, while also providing the clinical handling and processing of the deceased body. Investigation of the funeral home and its role within the city addresses how architecture can influence cultural views on death. Through the funeral home there is an opportunity to balance the seemingly opposing narratives of the living and the deceased by bringing them together for the funeral. In the City of Toronto, the density of its diverse neighbourhoods is not reflected by a proportionate number of local funeral homes. This thesis proposes a non-denominational space for funeral ritual and cremation within the dense St. Lawrence Neighbourhood. The placement of the Funeral Centre satisfies the practical requirements of this growing community, while the adjacency to the St. Lawrence Market juxtaposes the vibrancy of the ordinary and the solemnity of the sacred. This proposal extends into a network for the scattering of ashes throughout the city aiming to reconnect people to the realities of their existence.

This dissertation presents an investigation into three works by the South African artist Pauline Gutter (b. 1980) that were originally shown in her exhibition Opslag (2008) [this title is almost impossible to translate; it can refer to the sound of a gun, or it can mean to butcher something; it has an association of suddenness]. The works that were selected for scrutiny in this dissertation are Uit die blou van onse hemel [translated as From our blue skies; or Ringing out of our blue heaven – the first words of the erstwhile South African anthem] (2004), Into the landscape I (2007), and Landskap naby Zastron [Landscape close by Zastron] (2006). The choice of works was based on the particular mode of and imaginative re-presentation of the landscape that can be discerned in each of these works – different, yet conceptually quite similar. I argue that Gutter‟s landscape works in the exhibition Opslag (as representative of the thematic concerns of the show as a whole) are indicative of an imaginative re-presentation of a liminal experience (which is informed to a large degree by the artist‟s acute awareness of the threat posed by cruel and rampant attacks on the farming community). This liminal experience, as embodied in the artworks, is in its turn a reflection of the liminal existence as lived and interpreted by the artist‟s perception of her environment and community – speficially, the Boer farming community of South Africa, and even more specificially, in the Free State Province. Those aspects of a liminal experience that can be gleaned from a reading of the selected works Uit die blou van onse hemel, Into the landscape, and Landskap naby Zastron, are powerlessness, instability, the transitory shift of status, disorientation, isolation, marginalisation, and uncertainty. I argue, furthermore, that the imaginative re-presentation of the liminal experience is achieved by means of certain strategies and approaches towards landscape painting that are associated with the sublime. Where the sublime, in the context of the re-presentation of the landscape is often associated with a sense of being overwhelmed, even with awe, I demonstrate that Gutter achieves what Coetzee (1988:49) refers to as a singularly distinct understanding of the sublime with reference to the unique character of the South African landscape. In this sense, specific themes associated with the sublime (portraying things like problems, the sudden and the unexpected, darkness [that connotes uncertainty], danger, fearsomeness, and emptiness [that relates to isolation]) can be related with elements of the liminal. By identifying the themes of sublime representation, the reading of the works demonstrate firstly Gutter‟s unique and distinct application of sublime landscape painting. Secondly, it emerges that the portrayal of the liminal is achieved by means of these strategies towards landscape painting, and thirdly, that the imaginative re-presentation of the liminal is suggestive of a particular dimension of the existence of the contemporary Boer/farming community. Gutter‟s reflection of and on the landscape demonstrate a particularly poignant projection of a theme onto the landscape, and seems to suggest that while the liminal experience is potentially a place of growth and renewal, it can also induce a sense of paralysis as a result of the overwhelming uncertainty experienced by the particular community.
MA (History of Art), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

English, Afrikaans and Zulu summaries
While there is increasing interest in the effect of landscape on ancient imagination, less attention has been paid to the impact of restless karst hydrology on ancient beliefs. By identifying shared themes, this study compares and contrasts the way Hittites and Aegean people in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages reshaped peripheral karst landscapes into physical and imagined transitional zones. Karst geology underpins much of the Aegean and Anatolian landscape, allowing subterranean zones to be visible and accessible above ground via caves, springs, sinking streams, sinkholes and other unusual natural formations. In both cultures, certain dynamic landscapes were considered to be sacred porous points where deities, daemons, heroes and mortals could transit between cosmic realms. Evidence suggests that Hittites and Aegean people interpreted dramatic karst landscapes as liminal thresholds and spaces situated between the world of humans and the world of deities. Part One investigates physical zones of transition via the karst ecosystems of rural sanctuaries. Part Two considers the creative interpretation in myth and iconography of karst phenomena into metaphysical zones of transition. The examples reveal the way in which Hittites and Aegean people built their concept of the sacred on the extraordinary characteristics of karst geology. Numinous karst landscapes provided validity and a familiar reference point for the creation of imagined worlds where mortal and divine could connect.
Vandag is daar toenemende belangstelling in die effek van die landskap op die verbeelding van die mensdom in die oudheid - maar minder aandag word bestee aan die impak van die rustelose karst landskap op die mens se gelowigheid in die oudheid. Deur die identifisering van sekere gemene temas, vergelyk hierdie verhandeling die manier waarop die Hetiete en die Egeïese volkere in die Laat Brons- en vroeë Ystertydperke die omliggende karstlandskap herskep het in fisiese en denkbeeldige oorgangszones. Die Egeïese en Anatoliese landskap bestaan grotendeels uit karst geologie, met tot gevolg dat ondergrondse zones bo die grond sigbaar en toeganklik is in die vorm van grotte, bronne, sinkgate en ander uitsonderlike natuurlike formasies. In beide bogenoemde kulture is sekere landskapstonele beskou as heilige en poreuse punte waar gode, demone, helde en sterwelinge tussen die kosmiese zones kon beweeg. Die getuienis van die tyd suggereer dat die Hetiete en die Egeïese volkere die dramatiese karst landskappe as grense of drempels tussen hulle wêreld en dié van die gode beskou het. Deel Een ondersoek die fisiese oorgangszones deur te kyk na die karst ecostelsels waarin plattelandse heiligdomme hulle bevind het. Deel Twee beskou die kreatiewe gebruik van karst verskynsels as voorstellings van metafisiese oorgangszones in die gekrewe bronne en ikonografie. Die geselekteerde voorbeelde dui aan die manier waarop die Hetiete en Egeïese volke hulle konsepte van heiligdom gebaseer het op die buitengewone verskynsels van karst geologie. Numineuse karst landskappe het hulle idees gestaaf en ‘n bekende verwysingspunt uitgemaak waar die menslike en die goddelike met mekaar in kontak kon kom.
Ngenkathi intshisekelo ekhulayo yethonya lokwakheka komhlaba emcabangweni wasendulo, kunakwe kancane umthelela we-karst hydrology engenazinkolelo ezinkolelweni zasendulo. Ngokukhomba izingqikithi okwabelwana ngazo, lo mqondo uqhathanisa futhi uqhathanise indlela amaHeti nabantu base-Aegean kweLate Bronze kanye ne-Early Iron Ages abuye abuye abumbe kabusha imigwaqo ye-karst yomngcele ibe yizingxenye zesikhashana zomzimba nezicatshangwe. I-Karst geology isekela kakhulu indawo yezwe i-Aegean ne-Anatolian evumela ukuthi izindawo ezingaphansi komhlaba zibonakale futhi zifinyeleleke ngaphezu komhlaba ngemigede, iziphethu, imifudlana ecwilayo, imigodi yokushona nokunye ukwakheka okungokwemvelo okungajwayelekile. Kuwo womabili amasiko izindawo ezithile eziguqukayo zazithathwa njengezindawo ezingcwele zokungena lapho onkulunkulu, amademoni, amaqhawe nabantu abafayo bengadlula phakathi kwezindawo zomhlaba. Ubufakazi bukhombisa ukuthi amaHeti nabantu base-Aegean bahumusha imidwebo emangazayo yekarst njengemikhawulo yemikhawulo nezikhala eziphakathi komhlaba wabantu nezwe lonkulunkulu. Ingxenye yokuqala iphenya izindawo eziguqukayo zomzimba ngokusebenzisa imvelo ye-karst yezindawo ezingcwele zasemakhaya. Ingxenye Yesibili ibheka ukutolikwa kokudala kunganekwane nakwizithonjana zezinto ze-karst kube izingxenye eziguqukayo zenguquko. Izibonelo ziveza indlela abantu abangamaHeti nabantu base- Aegean abawakha ngayo umqondo wabo ongcwele ngezimpawu ezingavamile ze-karst geology. Amathafa amahle we-karst ahlinzeka ngokusebenza kanye nephuzu elijwayelekile lesethenjwa lokwakhiwa kwamazwe acatshangelwe lapho abantu abafayo nabaphezulu bangaxhuma khona.
Biblical and Ancient Studies
M. A. (Ancient Near Eastern Studies)

Hierdie proefskrif bied ʼn nie-empiriese ondersoek en ʼn konseptuele analise van die verhouding tussen ruimte en identiteit in Eben Venter (1954-) se oeuvre binne die konteks van ballingskapliteratuur die postkoloniale diskoers. Die manifestasie van die ruimte- identiteitdialektiek, soos wat dit uitgebeeld word in Venter se skryfkuns, word beskryf aan die hand van postkoloniale teorieë en insigte wat verband hou met aspekte soos ruimte, plek, ballingskap, diaspora, ruimtelike verplasing, seksuele migrasie, intra-nasionale migrasie, internasionale migrasie, empiriese en kulturele landskappe, identiteit as sosio-kulturele konstruksie en Suid-Afrikaanse outobiografieë. Vir die doel van hierdie ondersoek is die volgende vertellings geselekteer: Ek stamel ek sterwe (1996), Twaalf (2000), Horrelpoot(2006) en Brouhaha (2010). In ʼn tydsgewrig van grootskaalse migrasie, globale onsekerheid, transnasionale kapitalisme en radikale dekolonisering in die vorm van geweldsmisdaad, gewelddadige betogings by universiteite, plaasmoorde, grondhervorming, haatspraak, arbeidsonrus, xenofobie en die aftakeling van minderheidsregte, sny Venter in sy verhale en outobiografie ʼn verskeidenheid van kwessies aan. Dit sluit in: die naweë van apartheid, die Afrikaner-diaspora, grondeienaarskap, die ideologiese toeëiening van grond, rassisme, homofobie, queer-migrasie, die haalbaarheid van ʼn inklusiewe Afrika-identiteit en die veranderde rol, plek en identiteit van Afrikaners sedert 1994. Die outobiografiese inslag van Venter se skryfkuns is opvallend en word bespreek deur te verwys na die verhouding tussen fiksionele en reële ruimtes en na outobiografie as hibridiese genre en kreatiewe projek. Hierdie studie bied ook ʼn krities-analitiese besinning van Venter se bemoeienis met skryftemas soos selfopgelegde ballingskap, die vervreemding tussen plek en self, globale plekloosheid en “exile as a discontinous state of being” (Said 2000: 177). Een van die belangrikste insigte wat Venter in sy skryfkuns demonstreer, is dat ruimte, soos identiteit, nie ʼn essensialistiese konsep is nie, maar ’n onvoltooide en vloeibare konstruksie wat voortdurend verander na gelang van sosio-politieke ingrepe, internasionale migrasiepatrone en die individu se subjektiewe gewaarwording van plekke,
This dissertation presents a non-empirical and a conceptual analysis of the relationship between space and identity in the works of prose of Eben Venter (1954) within the context of the postcolonial discourse and exile literature. The manifestation of the space-identity dialectic, as portrayed in Venter’s writing, is described on the basis of postcolonial theories and insights related to terms and concepts like space, place, exile, diaspora, spatial displacement, sexual migration, intra-national migration, international migration, empirical and cultural landscapes and identity as a social-cultural construction. For the purpose of this study the following narratives were selected: Ek stamel ek sterwe (1996), Twaalf (2000), Horrelpoot en Brouhaha (2010). At a juncture of mass migration, global uncertainty, transnational capitalism and radical decolonization in the form of violent crime, violent protests at universities, hate speech, farm murders, land reform, labour unrest, xenophobia and the dismantling of minority rights, Venter addresses an assortment of social issues. This include: the aftermath of apartheid, the Afrikaner-diaspora, landownership, the ideological appropriation of land, racism, homophobia, queer-migration, the viability of an inclusive African-identity and the altered role, place and identity of Afrikaners since 1994. The autobiographical element is evident in Venter’s writing and is discussed by referring to the relationship between fictional and real spaces and to autobiography as a hybrid genre and creative project. This study also presents a critical-analytical reflection of Venter’s involvement with writing topics such as self-imposed exile, estrangement between place and self, global displacement/non-belongingness and “exile as a discontinuous state of being” (Said: 2000: 177). One of the key insights Venter demonstrates in his writing, is that space, like identity, is not an essentialist concept, but an incomplete and diffuse construction that is constantly changing depending on socio-political interventions, international migration patterns and the individual's subjective perception of places.
Afrikaans and Theory of Literature
D. Litt. et Phil. (Afrikaans)

This particular telling and retelling from a living narrative inquiry (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000) into the early experiences of three high school science teachers – Beth, Joel, and Christina – explores the emergent inquiry landscapes constructed as we implemented a renewed, decolonizing, science curriculum in Saskatchewan founded on a philosophy of inquiry and on a broader, more holistic definition of scientific literacy, both Western and Indigenous. This inquiry draws on an ontology of lived experience (Dewey, 1938) and, more subtly, on the borderland of narrative inquiry and complexity science in order to illustrate the emergence and coming to knowing (Delandshire, 2002; Ermine, as cited in Aikenhead, 2002) of our identities in a way that avoids the reduction in complexity of our experiences. While my initial wonders persisted throughout the research as I lived alongside Beth, Joel, and Christina for two years, they diffracted into the contextualized wonder: how do we share a philosophy of inquiry with each other and with our students? As such, this inquiry is a sharing about our own identities, about our own agency, about identity work, and about which experiences we choose to (re)engage with as we attempt to (re)find the narrative diversity, both individual and collective, necessary to shift from enacted identities to 'wished-we-could-enact' identities. This exploration of our 'mo(u)rning stories', early experiences from our shifting identities after stepping through the liminal and onto emergent inquiry landscapes, or our 'stories to relive with' provides a language and context to our shifting identities and hence, to science education, as we move towards a more holistic and humanistic form of scientific literacy for all our students. What emerged through the enmeshing of our landscapes and through the construction of voids in existing practices, followed by deformalizations in assessment and planning, was the development of a way of sharing our philosophy of inquiry and hence, our shifting identities. The artifacting and sharing of our contextualized inquiry experiences highlighted the rich assessment making, and curriculum making experiences (Huber, Murphy & Clandinin, 2011) we shared with our students and highlighted a view of assessment as a relationship. As we told and retold our stories to relive with, our identities shifted towards those more akin to facilitator and anthropologist and away from sage and engineer/architect.