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ETH/EPFL Summer School
Assembling Cities: Studying planning practices and urban issues with STS
Organizers: Julio Paulos (ETH), Marija Cvetinovic (EPFL), Marko Marskamp (UNIL)
Dates: September 18 to 21, 2016
Location: ETH CASE, Faculty of Architecture, ETH Zurich
Keynotes: Laura Lieto (University of Naples), Simone Abram (Durham University)
CfP deadline: June 19, 2016ASSEMBLING CITIES is an international summer school that explores the relevance of science and technology studies (STS) in general, and actor-network theory (ANT) in particular, in the fields of planning and urban studies. We invite applications from recent graduates, PhD candidates and post-doc researchers interested in discussing how STS can inspire problematizations, descriptions and formulations of spatial planning and urban issues. The aim is to provide students with a set of concepts and methods attuned to tracing and writing the assembling–i.e. the formation, negotiation and stabilization–of cities in everyday, professional and research practice.
In keynote lectures, reading workshops and paper presentations, the summer school elaborates on the STS repertoire productive for urban analysis, and develops the notion of the city always in the making. Thus understood as a relational and multiple entity enacted at specific sites of socio-material practice, the city is taken as the empirical site and the analytical object in the summer school. Tracing and analyzing the makings and becomings of the city, it emphasizes the city as a collection of assemblages, actor-networks and socio-technical artifacts that can be studied relationally through ethnographies, discourses and comparisons. This analytical stance is developed according to three research moves which form the thematic structure of the summer school:
1. PROBLEMATIZING deals with how to ask (new) questions in urban settings with STS, and the concepts and tools STS provides to frame these questions. It sets the scene for the discussion and exploration of conceptual approaches to urban and planning issues.
2. DESCRIBING elaborates on the adage of ‘following the actors’ and the many ways to operationalize this in empirical urban research. It goes into ways of taking field notes and writing ethnographies in participant observation, and points to the reflexivity of the researcher.
3. ASSEMBLING addresses the question of how to go about rich data sets and develop illustrative accounts. It discusses strategies of data analysis to locate, select and describe situations, and provides insight on preparing vignettes.
The summer school is organized and funded by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETHZ) and Lausanne (EPFL). Confirmed keynote speakers are Laura Lieto and Simone Abram, and more speakers will be announced soon. The participation fee is 270 CHF and the summer school offers 2 ECTS. See for the program and more information
www.assembling2016.ethz.ch.
Please forward your abstracts (max. 300 words) and a short bio (max. 100 words) by June 19 to Julio Paulos (
[log in to unmask]), Marija Cvetinovic (
[log in to unmask]) and Marko Marskamp (
[log in to unmask]).
Key dates and informationDeadline CfP: June 19, 2016
Notice of Acceptance: July 4, 2016
Deadline for papers: August 28, 2016
Participation fee: 270 CHF (covers accommodation and all meals)
Credits: 2 ECTS
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Marko Marskamp
PhD candidate / Research assistant
IGD, UNIL / ETH CASE, ETH Zurich