AAG 2005 Call for Papers
GLOBAL GENTRIFICATION
Denver, Colorado, 5-9 April 2005
(http://www.aag.org/annualmeetings/call_for_papers/call_for_papers1.html)
Darren P. Smith, Geography Division, University of Brighton, Brighton BN2
4GJ, United Kingdom, [log in to unmask]
Tim Butler, Department of Geography, King’s College, Strand, London WC2R
2LS, United Kingdom, T
[log in to unmask]
Recent studies show that gentrification is a global phenomenon, with
empirical accounts from a breadth of continents, including Latin American,
Asian and African cities. Clearly, representations of gentrification as
a ‘relatively small scale and very geographically-concentrated phenomenon’
(Hamnett, 1991: 173) which is limited to North American, European or
Australian cities are out-dated; the processes of change have spread into
other contexts. Indeed, Atkinson and Bridge’s (2004) forthcoming edited
collection is titled: The New Urban Colonialism: Gentrification in a Global
Context’. But what does this ‘globalization of the process’ mean for
contemporary theoretical and conceptual understandings of gentrification,
or for the politics of gentrification and local community activist groups?
Does the expansion of gentrification suggest a need to encapsulate more
than, for example, the narrow process of residential rehabilitation or
class-related transitions? Does the globalization of gentrification point
to a positive process of urban change, or is the process tied to widescale
socio-economic and cultural polarization and marginalisation? Has the term
gentrification lost its conceptual power to capture the diverse expressions
of global urban change? If so, should the concept of gentrification be
narrowed to exclude related or integral processes of regeneration? How can
we most effectively theorise and conceptualise processes of urban
revitalization or regeneration that are unfolding on a global scale?
In this session we therefore want to explore the contemporary meanings and
uses of gentrification by international scholars. We take as our starting
point the diverse trajectories of processes of gentrification in different
national and global contexts, and are seeking papers which will illuminate
the commonalities and contradictions of the processes. To advance
theorisations of global gentrification, we particularly welcome papers
which embrace the ‘theoretical battleground’ of shifting and contingent
political and economic conditions, the consumption practices of distinct
socio-cultural groups and production activities of institutional actors and
intermediaries, as well as overarching processes of globalisation, such as
transnational migration, the global economy and technological developments,
which underpin new forms of global gentrification.
Please send expressions of interest to either of the organizers by 30
September 2004.
Abstract instructions:
http://www.aag.org/annualmeetings/call_for_papers/abstract_Instructions.htm
Details for organized paper sessions:
http://www.aag.org/annualmeetings/call_for_papers/organized_sessions.htm
Atkinson, R. and Bridge, G. (2004, forthcoming) The New Urban Colonialism:
Gentrification In A Global Context, Routledge, London.
Hamnett, C. (1991) The blind men and the elephant: the explanation of
gentrification, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 16:
173-189.
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Dr. Darren P. Smith
Senior Lecturer in Human Geography
New web site at:
http://www.brighton.ac.uk/environment/personal/darren_smith/index.htm
Division of Geography, School of Environment
Brighton University, Cockcroft Building, Lewes Road, Brighton, U.K., BN2 4GJ
Direct phone: +44 (0)1273 643318
Fax: +44 (0)1273 642285
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