-----Original Message-----
From: Shane Ewen <[log in to unmask]>

Urban History Group Conference
Sensing the City: Experience, Emotion and Exploration, 1600-2013
4-5 April, 2013
University of York, UK

The urban sensescape is an underdeveloped aspect of Urban History. This
conference explores the ways in which people have developed relationships
with, and to, the urban environment from early modern times to the present.
Recently, the 'emotive turn' has sought to address the neglected yet
important subjects of touch and smell in the city that Joseph Rykwert
identified in his book The Seduction of Place. This conference seeks,
therefore, to engage with the emotive turn to explore how people have,
since the early modern times, explored and experienced the city through
their senses. It also seeks to identify the types of strategies that
condition the development of an urban sensescape.

'Sensing the city' is not just confined to the sights, sounds, smells, feel
and taste of the city but is also concerned with the ways in which the
urban landscape is managed to enhance or hinder our sensory experience:
 for example, how mental maps of the city were formed before physical maps
were created or how circulation has been regulated by signage, improvement
acts, public health interventions through to the contemporary usage of QR
codes, sat-navs and app technology. The conference will also consider how
people's experiences of the city have been conditioned along class, gender
and/or ethnic lines, how individuals and groups have developed their own
sensory experiences of the city and how these experiences have changed over
time. Finally, the conference will consider the emotional responses to the
sensory experiences of place and how individuals and collectives react to a
changing sensory environment.

Issues to be considered include:

   - the development and regulation of an urban sensescape encompassing the
    visual, auditory, olfactory or tangible aspects
   - managing the sensory experience for personal or collective purposes
   - how technologies have enhanced or hindered the sensescape
   - environmental/public health aspects of the sensescape
   - conflicting urban sensescapes
   - representing the sensory experience through different forms such as
   media and visual arts
   - emotional reactions to sensory experiences
   - a sense of direction: navigating the city
   - the ways in which sensory experience informs place attachment, place
   identity and the sense of place

The conference committee invites proposals for individual papers as well as
for individual sessions of up to 3 papers. Sessions that seek to draw
comparisons across one or more countries, or open up new vistas for
original research, are particularly encouraged.

Abstracts of up to 500 words, including a title, name, affiliation and
contact details should be submitted to the conference organisers and should
indicate clearly how the content of the paper addresses the conference
theme outlined above. Those wishing to propose sessions should provide a
brief statement that identifies the ways in which the session will address
the conference theme, a list of speakers and paper abstracts. The final
deadline for proposals for sessions and papers is 28 September 2012.
The conference will again host its new researchers' forum. This is aimed
primarily at those at an early stage in a research project who wish
primarily to discuss ideas rather than present findings. Topics unrelated
to the main conference theme are particularly welcome as short papers in
this forum.

Bursaries. Students registered for a PhD can obtain a modest bursary to
offset some of the expenses associated with attending the conference.
Please send an e-mail application to Professor Richard Rodger at
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> and also ask your
PhD supervisor to send a message confirming your status as a registered PhD
student. The Urban History Group would like to acknowledge the Economic
History Society for its support for these bursaries.
For further details please contact the Conference Organisers:

Dr Rebecca Madgin
Centre for Urban History
University of Leicester
3-5 Salisbury Road
Leicester, LE1 7QR
e: [log in to unmask]
t: +44 (0) 116 252 5068

Dr Shane Ewen
School of Cultural Studies and Humanities
Leeds Metropolitan University
A214 Broadcasting Place
Woodhouse Lane
Leeds, LS2 9EN
e: [log in to unmask]
t:+44 (0)113 812 3340

Dr Shane Ewen
School of Cultural Studies and Humanities
Leeds Metropolitan University