Apologies in advance for cross-posting and multiple copies!
Dear colleagues,
please find attached and below the CfP for the session "Urban Utopias
and Heterotopias" at the 32nd International Geographical Congress in
Cologne (IGC) 2012 in Cologne.
Any kind of papers are wellcome.
Abstracts should be submitted via submission system of the IGC
(www.igc2012.org) by January 8th, 2012
See you in Cologne, best wishes
Christina West
Urban utopias and heterotopias: Theorizing, analyzing, and evaluating urban
spaces (Session)
Many recent discourses in urban research focus on 'urbanity' or rather
on the production of ?The Urban? as a negotiation process between
urban planning, private investors anddevelopers, frequently referring
to newly developed ?urbanities? or reformulated urbanspaces. At the
same time, other stakeholders appear who conceive urbanity
beyondneoliberal reasoning and confrontationally claim a ?right to the
city?. New forms of urbanresistance are changing the concepts of
urbanity, it is still unknown how these forms operate in time and space.
This complexity of society with its power relations and strong linkage
to the physical and material space is drawn up by Lefebvre's
comprehensive work. He conceptualises the urban as ?ouvre? ? as an
expression of human creativity. The urban appears in his philosophy of
practice as an experimental utopia, a scenario for the situation
right now and here but yet to come, but especially open?ended.
His concept can be contrasted to Foucault's dispositif as a
discoursive relation of power, knowledge and space, without strong
notions on materiality, albeit they are conceivable in his works.
Particularly his fragmental thoughts about 'Heterotopias' as localized
utopias open discursive ties.
Our session seeks to link these concepts to the discussion on 'The
Urban' for a better understanding of urban complexity at a theoretical
and empirical level. The theoretical approaches of Lefebvre und
Foucault to utopias and heterotopias not only promise an observation
and description of the processes of production of space within
different functional systems and power groups, but also to elucidate
how individual and collective comprehensions of social and spatial
interrelations are created. Discussed will be the capabilities of the
concepts for an analysis of the relation of social discourses and
materiality as well as of different types of power in negotiation
processes, and thus for an identification of new forms and processes
of urban governance.
Chairs:
Christina West, Chair of Economic Geography, University of Mannheim, Germany,
west[at]uni-mannheim.de
Thomas Doerfler, Institut für Soziologie, Georg-August-Universität
Göttingen, Germany
Abstracts should be submitted via submission system of the IGC
(www.igc2012.org) by January 8th, 2012
--
Dr. des. Christina West M.A./LaG
Chair of Economic Geography
School of Law and Economics
University of Mannheim
68131 Mannheim
Germany
Lehrstuhl für Wirtschaftsgeographie (Abt. VWL)
L7, 3-4 (Raum P01)
Fakultät für Rechtswissenschaft und Volkswirtschaftslehre
Universität Mannheim
68131 Mannheim
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