Negotiating Urban Conflicts: Interaction, Space and Control
Abstract: Cities have always been arenas of social and symbolic conflict. As places of encounter between different classes, ethnic groups, and lifestyles, cities play the role of powerful integrators; yet on the other hand urban contexts are the...
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Abstract: Cities have always been arenas of social and symbolic conflict. As places of encounter between different classes, ethnic groups, and lifestyles, cities play the role of powerful integrators; yet on the other hand urban contexts are the ideal setting for marginalization and violence. The struggle over control of urban spaces is an ambivalent mode of sociation: while producing themselves, groups produce exclusive spaces and then, in turn, use the boundaries they have created to define themselves. This volume presents major urban conflicts and analyzes modes of negotiation against the theoretical background of postcolonialism
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An ecocritical reading of Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener"
Abstract: This research is an ecocritical reading of Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener". Melville's treatment of the environment is described and analyzed with regard to Augé's theory of non-Places. The examples of non-place in Melville's Wall...
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Abstract: This research is an ecocritical reading of Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener". Melville's treatment of the environment is described and analyzed with regard to Augé's theory of non-Places. The examples of non-place in Melville's Wall Street story include the compartmentalized office, the urban labyrinth, artificial and natural greeneries and oriental landscapes. The motif of compartmentalization forms the binary of insider and outsider. A close attention to the binaries in this story reveal Melville's critical attitude towards urban culture that threatens the American identity and mocks the American predilection for mobility in open spaces. This story reveals the way social institutions of an urban culture can determine the tragic fate of an out of place individual. Melville, in this story, reveals the consequences of marginalizing nature and indicates his ecological concerns in mid-nineteenth century America. He mourns the fading out of biocentric view of nature and warns against
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Tote Orte und gelebte Räume: zur Raumtheorie von Michel de Certeau S. J
Abstract: "The spatial thinking of French Jesuit Michel de Certeau (1925-1986) has been frequently discussed and put in context with the spatial turn. De Certeau's spatial theory is organized through a framework of dualistic key-categories: space and...
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Abstract: "The spatial thinking of French Jesuit Michel de Certeau (1925-1986) has been frequently discussed and put in context with the spatial turn. De Certeau's spatial theory is organized through a framework of dualistic key-categories: space and place, map and tour, strategy and tactic. However, his theory has more to offer than a formal pattern for describing spatial practices in urban space in the vein of French structuralism. The distinction between spaces and places rather holds a strong normative implication. His practical transformation from places into spaces thus not only plays an important role for his cultural history of everyday life developed in Arts de faire, but also in his work on historical writing and meta-historiography, and his research in early modern mysticism. This paper examines the main features of de Certeau's theory of space and their interdisciplinary appropriation, as well as discusses the potential of the spatial practice approach for social and cultural stu
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