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The spread of newly 'invented' places, such as theme parks, shopping malls and revamped historic areas, necessitates a redefinition of the concept of 'place' from an architectural perspective. In this interdisciplinary work, these invented places are categorized according to the different phenomenological experiences they are able to provide. The book explores how such 'cloning spaces' use placemaking and placemarketing in attempt to replicate the characteristics found in urban spaces traditionally viewed as successful, and how these places can affect society's environmental perception. A range of international empirical studies illustrates how such invented places can be perceived as legitimate urban spaces, and contribute towards the quality of life in today's cities.
This new book argues that cities and citizens are not helpless victims in a global flow of events. Three crucial questions are addressed through the three part structure: What is the nature of the globalization? What resulting challenges now confront cities and localities? How can local leaders respond to this changing environment in ways which strengthen local democracy? Written by leading urban scholars in Europe and North America the book draws on a range of disciplines to enhance academic understanding and illuminate lessons for policy and practice.
Mexico is more than a country; it is a concept that is the product of a complex network of discourses as disparate as the rhetoric of Chicano nationalism, English-language literature about Mexico, and Mexican tourist propaganda. The idea of "Mexicanness," says Daniel Cooper Alarc—n, "has arisen through a process of erasure and superimposition as these discourses have produced contentious and sometimes contradictory descriptions of their subject." By considering Mexicanness as a palimpsest of these competing yet interwoven narratives, Cooper offers a paradigm through which the construction and representation of cultural identity can be studied. He shows how the Chicano myth of Aztlan was co...
Accompanying DVD contains the short documentary film The Village and the megacity / directed by Jacob Ipsen, Detlev Ipsen ; idea, concept, Detlev Ipsen.
The concept of governance has evolved into one of the most important but also controversial concepts in urban politics. While it encourages co-operation, participation and collective construction, at the same time, it has brought about new forms of public demission, oligarchic regimes and less local democracy. The dilemmas accompanying these changes are particularly relevant when observing the cities of Southern Europe, whose socio-cultural specificities very much structure local political and policy materialisations. Bringing together a team of leading scholars from across the social sciences, this volume examines the issues of urban governance in the Southern European context. Illustrated ...
Inspired by the “technologies of the self” theorized by Michel Foucault in the early 1980s, this volume investigates how contemporary individuals fashion their identity/identities using digital technologies such as ambient intelligent devices, social networking platforms and online communities (Facebook, CouchSurfing and craigslist), online gaming (SilkRoad Online, Oblivion and World of Warcraft), podcasts, etc. With high-speed internet access, ubiquitous computing and generous storage capacity, the opportunities for staging and transforming the self/selves have become nearly limitless. This book explores how technologies contribute to the expression, (co-)construction and enactment of identities. It examines these issues from various perspectives as it brings together insights from different disciplines – design, discourse analysis, philosophy and sociology.
Taking on the key issues in urban design, Shaping the City examines the critical ideas that have driven these themes and debates through a study of particular cities at important periods in their development. As well as retaining crucial discussions about cities such as Los Angeles, Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Brasilia at particular moments in their history that exemplified the problems and themes at hand like the mega-city, the post-colonial city and New Urbanism, in this new edition the editors have introduced new case studies critical to any study of contemporary urbanism – China, Dubai, Tijuana and the wider issues of informal cities in the Global South. The book serves as both a textbook for classes in urban design, planning and theory and is also attractive to the increasing interest in urbanism by scholars in other fields. Shaping the City provides an essential overview of the range and variety of urbanisms and urban issues that are critical to an understanding of contemporary urbanism.
This book uses the reflection of academics specialized in the urban area of Latin America, Europe and the United States, to initiate a comparative debate of the different dynamics in which Urbicidio expresses itself. The field or focal point of analysis that this publication approaches is the city, but under a new critical perspective of inverse methodology to that has been traditional used. It is about understanding the structural causes of self-destruction to finally thinking better and then going from pessimism to optimism. It is a deep look at the city from an unconventional entrance, because it is about knowing and analyzing what the city loses by the action deployed by own urbani...
During the last decade, the South American continent has seen a strong push for transnational integration, initiated by the former Brazilian president Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who (with the endorsement of eleven other nations) spearheaded the Initiative for the Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South America (IIRSA), a comprehensive energy, transport, and communications network. The most aggressive transcontinental integration project ever planned for South America, the initiative systematically deploys ten east-west infrastructural corridors, enhancing economic development but raising important questions about the polarizing effect of pitting regional needs against the colossal pr...