A Reflexive Reading of Urban Space (original) (raw)
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Place Within The Contemporary Urban Space
IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS), 2024
This article aims to discuss the concept of place based on its evolution since the 1970s. It is argued that the existing places reaffirm the experiences of space that have meaning, while the uneven development of capitalism produces metropolitan fragmentation-often materialized in renovation and re-signification projects. The sociospatial transformations observed in the contemporary metropolises tend to de-characterize traditional urban fabrics and their identities, and this reality is engendered above all by current urban services supported by the entrepreneurial management of space and the consumer culture. In this sense, the research focuses on the possibility of the existence of places in the context of fragmentation and loss of local identities. The articulation of the different processes of space modification legitimizes new paradigms that suggest questions about the relationship between space and its places, their contexts and scales of influence, the conflicts they entail and the search for maintaining places of meeting and exchange. The main assumption of this work is: the place can exist in the midst of a reurbanization process, which results in renewed landscapes contiguous to interstices that, sometimes, differentiate into voids or places. These interstices can symbolize the potential for resistance and permanence and currently allow for experiences of identification towards the urban-contrary to the context of permanent transformation and of the loss of symbolic references. In this context, this work aims to contribute to the discussion about the relationship between the unstoppable urban transformations and the manifestos and representations seen in small localities that survive the imposition of the socioeconomic interests of the capitalist society.
SPACE AND PLACE IN URBAN CULTURE
When we think of art as an integral part of the construction and transformation of urban culture, we find the public space as the main stage of this event. The public space, as José Pedro Regatão defends, is "a territory of political character that reflects the structure of the society in which it operates." (Regatão, 2007). This way, we may think the crisis of social structure as being the responsible for the identity crisis of public spaces, which may lead them to what is called "non-places”. These correspond to a functional logic that creates a contractual level of social relations, in contrast to the concept of place, which brings together space, culture and memory. Places are reservoirs of memory. They cover a dual visible and invisible landscape. Anne Whiston Spirn is a landscape architect that defends the place as private, "a tapestry of woven contexts: global, disclosed and lasting and ephemeral, local and reveal, now and then, past and future..." (Spirn, 1998). Addressing concepts such as space, public space, place, home and urban art, we intend to understand how art is responsible for social transformation in communities and what’s their place within them. Placing art in city public spaces will enable a dialogue between the collective and the individual, often prompting personal memories to enable the appropriation of space/place city.
Understanding Place Holistically: Cities, Relationality, and Space Syntax (2015)
JOURNAL OF SPACE SYNTAX, vol. 6, no. 1 (fall), pp. 19-33., 2015
This article discusses two contrasting conceptual understandings of place. The approach of analytic relationality interprets places as sets of interconnected parts and their relationships. In contrast, synergistic relationality interprets places as integrated, generative fields, the parts of which are only parts as they both sustain and are sustained by the constitution and dynamism of the particular place as a whole. This article presents one interpretation of place as synergistic relationality by describing six interrelated, generative processes: place interaction, place identity, place release, place realization, place creation, and place intensification. The article considers how concepts and principles relating to space syntax contribute to understanding places as synergistic relationality broadly; and to understanding the six place processes specifically.
Overview: In light of the number of scholars working on the spatial turn from very different disciplines and using diverse methodological and theoretical frameworks, I thought we could seize this opportunity to create a space for interdisciplinary inquiry to discuss how space is framed, described and imagined in different areas and periods of study. The meeting will be used to engage with diverse audiences, such as graduate and undergraduate students other than the experienced researchers. The purpose is to gather researchers from different disciplines and career stages for a small, research-intensive and collegial workshop that aims to expand our understanding of how the spatial turn is changing the social sciences and humanities. We will also have the chance to discuss the possible uses of spatial theory in our own work and explore potential collaborations. Topics addressed will include the historical changes of the concept of public space and the relation between space and power in urban environments. The main aim is to provide tools and methodologies to understand and read space in different research topics and areas and help to set new standards for the study of space and landscape. Abstract: The spatial turn is a theoretical approach that places emphasis on space and place in disciplines linked with social sciences and the humanities. While never ignoring the fact that we are temporally bound beings, during the past few decades, the use of this approach in different fields of study has increasingly emphasised the importance of spatiality in understanding the history of the human being and of its relation with the environment. The subject is challenging, because it demonstrates that space is no longer a neutral concept and cannot be considered independent from that which it contains, and therefore neither can it be considered as immune to historical, political and aesthetic changes. Ideas of the reciprocal causal relationship between subjects and their environments have been common currency in spatially oriented disciplines (e.g. archaeology. geography, history, urban studies). Instead, other areas, and especially the ones focused on the study of antiquity through textual evidence
City and space: a hermeneutic perspective
This paper presents a philosophical reflection on the city and the space. It proposes a different interpretation of the city, shifting the traditional focus on the historical and time-related aspects to a consideration of the space as a central category of analysis. This perspective seeks to define what a city is and to understand the different dynamics and processes that influence its constitution, development, transformation, or disappearance. In contrast to the traditional approach focused on the city with a temporal perspective, this paper highlights the relevance of the space as a fundamental element of analysis. The central premise lies in presenting an interpretation that highlights how the existence of the city is not only based on the processes of construction but also on the very act of inhabiting. This act, cemented by our relations with space, enables the existence of spatiality.
From Abstract to Concrete: Subjective Reading of Urban Space
Journal of Urban Design, 2001
Urban designers, perceiving the city mainly as a morphological phenomenon, are primarily concerned with the sensory, and particularly with the visual, qualities of urban space. This view of the city as a spatial physical structure requires abstraction, to enable comprehension of the complexity and continuity of the urban space, its transparency and its indeterminacy. However, this abstraction often fails to take into account the properties of the city as a place of habitation, ignoring the sociocultural speci® cities of its different users. The paper attempts to take urban design beyond this abstraction, which is so indifferent to the human element, towards a more concrete and speci® c approach. It calls for a shift in the rather theoretical postmodern interest in the urban space, important though it is in its morphological inclusiveness, to embody a pluralistic subjective perception of the space and its use, bearing in mind fundamental relationships between space and social processes. most important concept is`type', which attempts to interpret and thus to restructure urban elements which recall and transcend culture and history . investigation of urban space types is just such an attempt to understand the spatial elements composing the city. It is based on a formal± morphological approach, and, although drawing upon real places, it fails to account for their properties as ª fundamental types of habitatº (Delevoy, 1978, p. 20), thus ignoring their utilitarian aspects, as well as their sociocultural contexts. Associated with the neo-rationalists, who sought to achieve urbanism by reconceiving the architectural object , this kind of investigation tries to build an autonomous architectural discourse of the urban space, separated from social, political or economic discussion. Denying the modernist association between form and function , this investigation of the city is based solely on its architecture . It is thus concerned with the physical aspects of the urban environment, focusing on its abstract morphological qualities. These qualities are perceived as being detached from urban use and appropriation as they would be discussed, for example, by Jacobs , , who regard the city primarily as a place of human habitation. 1 As pointed out by , this kind of architectural discourse seldom considers the way the space is actually used, by ignoring its everyday reality. It has often preferred ª the seduction and power of the work of Foucault and Derridaº , 2 leaving unexplored the links between space and power, as suggested for example by the notion of the`everyday life' developed by Lefebvre (1971) and . 3 Needless to say, concentrating on the abstract concept of the spatial experience rather than on concrete day-to-day life has ignored the users and their functional, social and emotional needs. Thus, although the city is examined and designed on the implicit premise of human experience, this experience is never discussed or considered speci® cally enough to make a difference. We seldom know who the people populating the space are, why they are there and what they are doing. We never see their faces or hear their voices. As a result of working under the assumption that the user of the urban space is ungendered, ageless and declassi® ed, the urban space produced is often undifferentiated and neutral.
FROM SPACE TO “PLACE”: the role of space and experience in the construction of “place”
Proceedings 6th international Space Syntax Symposium, 2007
This paper investigates the role of spatial structure and "urban narrative" in individual's experience of a "place". The spatial structure describes the actual space that individual navigates and occupies through its everyday activities. Whereas the term "urban narrative" describes the factors in urban history and social culture that create an imagined space that evolves through historical time and is navigated through city's cultural mythology. A main challenge that urban designers and planners are facing is of creating recognisable and valued "places" that people would like to live and work in. This paper deals with the nature of neighbourhood as spatial, social and economic phenomenon and brings to the fore the "sense of place" as its intrinsic characteristic. It is acknowledged that the latter has a long history of investigation. However, to date the research has focused either on individual's perceptions or attitudes towards geographical spaces or the local design features of urban areas with a lack of methods to deal with the physical and attitudinal together. This currently forms the major scientific challenge: to develop methods to bring together the analysis of urban structure, design and morphology with the broadly qualitative investigation of individual and community perceptions, attitudes and aspirations. This paper does not report new research results but it suggests a finer grain of analysis of neighbourhoods by differentiating the concept of "configured" space from the notion of "place". Setting the Scene The last decades that residential mobility has increased with a great number of people relocating themselves to new neighbourhoods, cities or countries, the challenge for recognisable and valued "places" became imperative need for distinctive urban environments that reinforce and sustain social and economic networks. Decision-makers and urban designers are in quest either for creating new sustainable urban neighbourhoods that will reinforce economic and demographic growth or for "re-designing" the old ones and creating a new positive dynamic for the existing social and economic forces within them. Haughton and Hunter (1994) describe a sustainable city as 'one in which its people and businesses continuously endeavour to improve their natural, built and cultural environments at neighbourhood and Keywords: Neighbourhood "Place" "Configured" space "Place" identity "Sense of place" Phenomenology Irini Perdikogianni
Planning Theory, 2020
This paper proposes a new theoretical perspective for understanding urban social spaces and their interrelations. In an effort to understand these multifaceted, complex relations, an inquiry committed to a flat ontology was deployed. Accordingly, we draw our theorization on the Lacanian ontological lack, Harman’s object-oriented ontology, and Laclau and Mouffe’s discursivity of social reality. Thus, we propose that urban social spaces are discursive and real entities with real and sensual qualities and constituted through specific relations. They are located within discursive social relations, where each urban social space has a “differential position” in an urban system of relations. Each urban social space has an “identity,” defined by its specific mixture of social groups and its specific real and sensual qualities. These qualities construct a sensual object with a specific sensual identity within the web of different urban social spaces. Therefore, urban social spaces are being ...
FROM SPACE TO “ PLACE ” : the role of space and experience in the construction of “ place ” 052
2007
This paper investigates the role of spatial structure and “urban narrative” in individual’s experience of a “place”. The spatial structure describes the actual space that individual navigates and occupies through its everyday activities. Whereas the term “urban narrative” describes the factors in urban history and social culture that create an imagined space that evolves through historical time and is navigated through city’s cultural mythology. A main challenge that urban designers and planners are facing is of creating recognisable and valued “places” that people would like to live and work in. This paper deals with the nature of neighbourhood as spatial, social and economic phenomenon and brings to the fore the “sense of place” as its intrinsic characteristic. It is acknowledged that the latter has a long history of investigation. However, to date the research has focused either on individual’s perceptions or attitudes towards geographical spaces or the local design features of u...