THEMATIC GROUPS
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- Parent Category: THEMATIC GROUPS
- Category: Public Spaces and Urban Cultures
"BECOMING LOCAL: Transforming spaces, redefining localities"
International workshop
October 23 - 24 - 25, 2014
La Villette School of Architecture, Paris, France
The Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie of La Villette School of Architecture organizes a three-day workshop for the AESOP thematic group of “Public Spaces and Urban Cultures”. The Parisian meeting will be the fourth to take place under the ‘Becoming Local’ theme following Istanbul (November 2013), Bucharest (June 2014) and Vienna (August 2014). The aim of the ‘Becoming Local’ series is to discuss and share international, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary perspectives in the study of public spaces and urban cultures.
The Paris workshop will be dedicated to question the conflict between the local and global scale in contemporary public spaces by proposing a reflection on notions and categories used to describe local identities in the context of urban transformation. Through a "talk, walk and work" gathering, researchers, scholars and practitioners, will improve a comparative approach on the meaning of "local" in different case studies around the world and will live the experience of "becoming local" in Paris.
The Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie has, since its birth in 1981, been rooted in the school of architecture of La Villette and works in the field of anthropology of the city. Its aim is to create a new understanding of urban transformation processes through an anthropological approach. Our interdisciplinary research considers these processes as moments in which space and time are continually imagined, narrated and negotiated by the people who live it and by those who design and manage it. Different tools drive this approach: 1) the articulation of spatial and temporal scales, narratives and imaginations; 2) the questioning of acquired notions and categories; 3) the methodological experimentation on representation tools (see: www.laa.archi.fr/Cartes-habitantes and www.laa.archi.fr/Chronotopies). The LAA is one of the founding groups of the Laboratoire Architecture Ville Urbanisme Environnement (LAVUE), the biggest French research unit on urban studies.
CONTACTS
Becoming Local Paris organizational group:
‘BECOMING LOCAL’
Transforming spaces, redefining localities
If we assume urban public space to be an arena of social conflict and collective strategies, what happens when places are under transformation? Urban transformation processes reveal the different types of conflicts occurring in uses, representations, and legitimacy. These dynamics can be observed at all planning scales, from macro to micro, such as global metropolitan centralities planning, ex-industrial areas renovation, social housing renewal, public space reshaping, and urban furniture design.
In the ongoing debate about the city, from the critics of Modernism to the discussions about Globalization, architects, urban planners, and researchers have been called upon to develop new tools for considering and evaluating “local contexts”. The local scale has become a central issue in contemporary projects aiming to reconnect the multiple uses of public space with the human dimension and restore a social sense of community. At the same time the processes of metropolization and gentrification, which take place in large European cities like Paris, are dictating the need of conceiving the city as a polycentric ensemble of urban centers that should enhance its economic “international attraction”.
Through this workshop we propose to face this conflict between the local and global scale in contemporary public spaces by analyzing both the words we use to talk about this conflict as well as the misunderstandings that the use of these same words can provoke in different contexts.
Questioning what the locality is and who the locals are, is a way of challenging the contemporary notion of “commons” in global cities. To answer these questions, urban planners and researchers need to reassess the use of apparently neutral categories such as inhabitants, dwellers, users, citizens, as well as those categories with more specific connotation, such as gentrifiers or stakeholders. In order to question urban design and its relation to local identities, a better understanding of who the “locals” are in cosmopolitan and global cities, is needed. Which local identities are we talking about? How do we name the inhabitants of a street/neighborhood/city? What is the scale of locality? To what extent the notions and terms, applied to describe ‘target groups’ of urban projects, are problematic? The focus on “dwellers”, for example, could result in excluding other users of the public space of a neighborhood that utilize and transform the space daily. Moreover institutions and policies contribute to the redefinition of the scale of public spaces not only by implying a legitimate user but also by framing “sensitive areas”. These actions produce a continuous recomposition of urban identities and bring into question what it means to belong to the local or global scale for inhabitants. What is the role of public spaces in this redefinition and reconfiguration of identities? For whom are public spaces designed in these contexts? Which names are used to describe the future users of a space?
In the same way, participatory policies, lately introduced as a pivotal part of urban transformation processes, are relevant subjects for critical inquiry. These policies propose to focus on the needs of “inhabitants” or “citizens”. But to what extent is the use of “inhabitants”/”citizens” a relevant category for urban design in the context of globalising cities? With whom do experts and politicians "negotiate" their visions of the future in the urban environment? When inclusive public space is planned and designed, who are the interlocutors? Who is at the same time excluded?
This workshop intends to be a moment of shared reflection, an open dialogue between planners, designers, researchers, and the civil society. The aim is to reflect different points of view at the intersection of different disciplines and between theory and practice. Participants are invited to share analytical outcomes and practical answers from different fields and (self-reflected) experiences about the words and notions that are used for (re)defining locality.
The event will be developed in three parts:
Talk / International Conference: A public conference exhibiting participants’ reflections on, and practices in, projects and urban “rescaling” processes, with the aim of comparing and sharing different experiences and definitions. The interventions will seek to answer, from different points of view, the question: Who are the recipients of urban projects? And how does a “legitimate user” redefine the urban scale of a place/space? Contributions will also provide a reflection on the idea of “locality” and “users”.
Walk / In the Field: The ongoing process of Paris metropolization is rich in examples that can be used as fertile case studies for our group discussion. We will propose to focus on some emblematic Parisian areas on which our team is working at the moment (such as Barbès and la Chapelle in the 18th arrondissement and the town center of the Montreuil municipality). The objective of the fieldtrip will be to stimulate as many encounters and exchanges as possible with the involved actors (institutions, NGOs, architects, ...).
Work / Brain Storming: The final moment of collective discussion and work is producing a “word cloud” and a list of revisited definitions of the emerging notions. The words that will emerge during the debates and the field trips will be translated and associated in order to develop and enhance a comparative common approach. We expect this exchange to create new interpretative and practical tools for use in further research and project experiences. Participants and organizers will be challenged to experiment with methodological tools in approaching debate, translation, and description.
The event will produce two types of outcomes in different temporalities: a “word cloud” poster along with a blog documenting the workshop in fieri, and a final publication after the meeting.
Abstract Submission
Please submit an abstract of no more than 300 words and a short biography of 100 words to the organizational board:
Meeting Schedule
Thursday – October 23th 2014 – International conferences Friday - October 24th 2014 – Fieldtrips and keynote speeches Saturday – October 25th 2014 - Workshop and summing up
Fees
Participation in the meeting is free of charge.
Organizational Board
AESOP TG Representatives
Sabine KNIERBEIN (coord.), Interdisciplinary Centre for Urban Culture and Public Space, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, Vienna University of TechnologyTihomir VIDERMAN (coord.), Interdisciplinary Centre for Urban Culture and Public Space, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, Vienna University of Technology
Local Organizers
Sara CARLINI, Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE
Silvana GAHLI, Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – Université Paris X
Federica GATTA (coord.), Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – Université Paris X
Maria Anita PALUMBO (coord.), Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – EHESS (Paris)
Flavia PERTUSO, Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – Université Paris X Véronique ZAMANT (coord.), Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – Université Paris X
Advisory Board
A l e s s i a d e B I A S E , Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE, École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture Paris La Villette
O l i v i e r B O U C H E R O N , Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE, École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture Paris La Villette
Massimo BRICOCOLI, Department of Architecture and Planning, Politecnico di Milano
Marìa A. CASTRILLO ROMON, Instituto Universitario de Urbanística, Departamento de Urbanismo y representación de la arquitectura, Universidad de Valladolid
Carlo CELLAMARE, Dipartimento di Ingegneria Civile, Edile ed Ambientale, Università della Sapienza (Rome)
Aglaée DEGROS, Artgineering (Rotterdam) - Foundation A12NU (Utrecht) - Member of Council of Spatial Planners from Belgium
Ferdinando FAVA, Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – Dipartimento di Scienze Storiche, Geografiche e dell'Antichità, Università di Padova
Yankel FIJALKOW, Centre de Recherche sur l’Habitat UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE, École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture Paris Val de Seine
Sabine KNIERBEIN, Interdisciplinary Centre for Urban Culture and Public Space, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, Vienna University of Technology
Claire LEVY-VROELANT, Centre de Recherche sur l’Habitat UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE, Département de sociologie, Université Paris VIII
N a d j a M O N N E T , Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE – École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Marseille
Sylvie TISSOT, Laboratoire Cultures et Sociétés Urbaines UMR CNRS 7217 CRESPPA, Département de Sciences Politiques, Université Paris VIII
Stéphane TONNELAT, Center for International Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences NYU CNRS (New York) - Centre de Recherche sur l’Habitat UMR CNRS 7218 LAVUE
Tihomir VIDERMAN, Interdisciplinary Centre for Urban Culture and Public Space, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, Vienna University of Technology
Related Links
The meeting blog (operational from September 2014 on): www.becominglocalparis.wordpress.com
Laboratoire Architecture Anthropologie: http://www.laa.archi.fr/
Laboratoire Architecture Ville Urbanisme Environnement: http://www.lavue.cnrs.fr
École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture Paris La Villette: http://www.paris-lavillette.archi.fr/cms/ Aesop: http://www.aesop-planning.eu/
- Details
- Parent Category: THEMATIC GROUPS
- Category: Public Spaces and Urban Cultures
http://becominglocalbucharest.ro
Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism will host a four-day annual meeting of the AESOP thematic group of Public Spaces and Urban Cultures in Bucharest, Romania. The meeting is a second one under ‘Becoming Local’ theme, following an inspiring first meeting in Istanbul in November 2013. The aim of the ‘Becoming Local’ series is to share international, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary perspectives in studies of public spaces and urban cultures.
The objective of Bucharest meeting is to debate locally present issues within a broader context of the post-socialistic communities across Europe and wider. The field-visits, presentations and discussions of high quality work of scholars and practitioners working on the theme aim to offer an insight into the topic as well as provide valuable sources of inspiration for further improvements of both theoretical and practical approaches in the field.
CONTACTS:
Gabriel Pascariu at
Matej Nikšič at
- Details
- Parent Category: THEMATIC GROUPS
- Category: Public Spaces and Urban Cultures
Marketplaces as Urban Development Strategies
Marketplaces are often romanticised as traditional spaces of 'pure' encounters between producers and consumers in an increasingly privatised world. Farmer’s Markets are well-known example of this and several city governments seem to have embraced the urban marketplace as a tool for ‘placemaking.’ Yet this enthusiasm needs to be supported by a critical analysis of how exactly, marketplaces act as inclusive public spaces that support residents, rather than merely real estate developers.
For this reason, Freek Janssens (UvA) and Ceren Sezer (TU Delft) published a Special Issue for the journal “Built Environment” (Peter Hall, David Banister, Stephen Marshall, editors) on “Marketplaces as Urban Development Strategies” (2013). The issue focuses on the ways in which marketplaces in the city can be strategically deployed to improve neighbourhoods, by facilitating interaction among different people and groups in the public space of the city, and hereby support inclusive city life.
( http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/alex/benv/2013/00000039/00000002 )
The next step in line will be focused round table session during the AESOP Annual Congress 2014. We therefore invite speakers from different fields of expertise on marketplaces to address the following question: How can marketplaces function as urban development strategies that facilitate the interaction among different people and groups in the public space of the city, and hereby support inclusive city life? The session aims to stimulate useful and collaborative conversations among academics as well as planners and designers on the role of marketplaces in today’s cities.
The confirmed list of the discussants of the session are:
http://www.aesop2014.eu
- Details
- Parent Category: THEMATIC GROUPS
- Category: Public Spaces and Urban Cultures
The Interdisciplinary Centre for Urban Culture and Public Space (SKuOR) in cooperation with the Centre of Local Planning (IFOER) at the Department of Spatial Planning, Faculty of Architecture and Planning of Vienna University of Technology, hosts a 7-days summer school (30 August – 5 September 2014) directed at international Master’s and PhD students, as well as early-stage researchers and practitioners dealing with public urban space. You are invited to join local residents, international keynote speakers, urban activists, planning professionals, and European scholars in changing urban realities.
An annual meeting of the AESOP Thematic Group on Public Spaces and Urban Cultures, a group operating under the institutional patronage of the Association of European Schools of Planning, is scheduled prior to the summer school (29 August 2014, Vienna). The meeting will bring together researchers and practitioners from around Europe to discuss the current umbrella theme of Becoming Local in a transdisciplinary way. The meeting is open to all summer school participants.
For more information about the summer school, please visit:
http://skuor.tuwien.ac.at/research/kongresse-tagungen/summerschool
- Details
- Parent Category: THEMATIC GROUPS
- Category: Public Spaces and Urban Cultures
BECOMING LOCAL BUCHAREST MEETING (June 11-14, 2014)
Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism will host a four-day annual meeting of the AESOP thematic group of Public Spaces and Urban Cultures in Bucharest, Romania. The meeting is a second one under ‘Becoming Local’ theme, following an inspiring first meeting in Istanbul in November 2013. The aim of the ‘Becoming Local’ series is to share international, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary perspectives in studies of public spaces and urban cultures.
The objective of Bucharest meeting is to debate locally present issues within a broader context of the post-socialistic communities across Europe and wider. The field-visits, presentations and discussions of high quality work of scholars and practitioners working on the theme aim to offer an insight into the topic as well as provide valuable sources of inspiration for further improvements of both theoretical and practical approaches in the field.
Contacts
Gabriel Pascariu / Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism (on behalf of local organising team)
Matej Nikšič / Urban Planning Institute of the Republic of Slovenia (on behalf of AESOP thematic group)
CALL for PAPERS
‘BECOMING LOCAL’ BUCHAREST
The atomising society and public space – the case of post-socialistic territories
(Deadline for abstracts: Monday, April 14th 2014)
Eastern European countries have been in a state of a permanent socio-economic change in the last century. The last major change took place at a turn of a millennium and caused significant alterations of all social strata with human relationships redefined and individual and collective behaviours changed considerably. Consequently the communal spirit was replaced with the individualism and visible social segregation. The rise of commercialisation and privatisation more generally have been shaping a new type of consumerist society seemingly characterised by a weak social cohesion, weakened empathy and decreased solidarity.
The social changes are reflected more or less directly in a transformation and evolution of urban public space. Newly designed public spaces, created under the constrained financial budgets, profit-oriented economic rationale, and with the know-how bounded with post-fordist economies, often missed to address the cohesive dimensions. Some newly designed public spaces may appear to be inviting and attractive at a first glance, but a more thorough look often reveals their social flatness characterised by lack of spontaneous encounters and usages of space, exclusiveness to some user groups, exclusion of some disadvantaged users etc. This may partly be a result of a widely spread top-down planning approach which fails to understand and address communal as well as individual user’s values, behaviours and needs in the broadest sense, as well as a result of the ongoing commercialisation processes that have other than social well-being objectives.
Similarly as elsewhere across the continent there were however nuances of public life in Eastern European cities through time. Viewed from today’s perspective some of them are prized and some criticized for their (un)ability of supporting social life and building the commune. Many cities for example have had some good inter-world-war traditions of sense of public space, un- paralleled to any examples in the periods that followed. On the other hand a number of cities got public spaces that were not conceived for social contacts and improved sense of community in the post-WWII period as they were rather designed to host public events related to representation of political powers. Above all any generalisations are uneven as a considerable variety of the approaches to the provision of public space accross territories and times can be traced.
This complex situation opens challenging questions at both theoretical and practical levels:
- What is the role of public space in the environments with a lost sense of a community? Are there any specifics related to post-socialistic societies in this sense?
- In what way can a sociality of place be strengthened through public space provision?
- How local life was created in the frameworks of the communist regimes (totalitarian social design?) and in space of Western Fordist welfare states (total social design?) on the one hand, and how local life is created nowadays under the influence of global flows on the other? To what extent are the historical traditions and trajectories helpful in finding contemporary ways of reviving communal being given the contemporary socio-economic realities?
- Who is in charge of rethinking and improving urban public spaces in service of local communities? What are the roles of civil society groups, actors and collectives in these processes? What are the roles of each individual her-/himself?
- (How) Can grand planning schemes create livable public spaces today?
- How can civil society and how can local authorities deal with the increasing private interests in the field of public space (resulting in its privatisation, commoditisation and commercialisation) in order to protest and foster non-profit interests?
- How can market driven planning approaches be overcome in order to provide inclusive public spaces and fair redistribution of (public and collective) resources?
The Bucharest “Becoming Local” meeting aims to reflect different points of view from the widest professional and general publics. Having in mind that public space lies at an intersection of a number of disciplines and is a crossroads between theory and practices, a discussion beyond disciplinary or academic constraints is anticipated and contributors from any professional background as well as non-academic groups (NGOs, state actors, and so forth) are invited to add to the discussion.
Preliminary Meeting Schedule
Wednesday – June 11th 2014 – Arrivals & Introductory session
Thursday – June 12th 2014 – Field trip and discussions
Friday – June 13th 2014 – Workshops and panel discussion
Saturday – June 14th 2014 – Sum up & Departures
Abstract Submission (Deadline: April 14th 2014)
Please submit an abstract of no more than 300 words and a short biography of 100 words to Gabriel Pascariu at
Organisational and Advisory Board
Celia Ghyka, Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism,Bucharest
Liviu Ianăşi, Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism,Bucharest
Sabine Knierbein, Vienna University of Technology, Vienna
Matej Niksic, Urban Planning Institute of the Republic of Slovenia, Ljubljana
Gabriel Pascariu, Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism, Bucharest
Ceren Sezer, Delft University of Technology, Urban4, Delft
Tihomir Viderman, Vienna University of Technology, Vienna
Fees
Participation to the meeting is free of charge.
Related Links
* TG Bucharest meeting (operational from April 2014 on): www.becominglocalbucharest.ro
* Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism: http://www.uauim.ro/en/
* Aesop: http://www.aesop-planning.eu
