City Seminar 2009-10
Alternate Tuesdays in term, 17:15 - 19:00
CRASSH, 17 Mill Lane, Cambridge
Conveners
Neil Archer (French, MML)
Anita Bakshi (Architecture)
Konstantin Kastrissianakis (Architecture)
W Micah Trippe (Architecture)
The spatial transformations brought about by the rapid and endless growth
of cities, amassing larger and more disparate flows of people, are
challenging the categories of analysis that inform the study of human
settlements and human relations. Seemingly boundless sites of diversity and
difference, cities are indeed very difficult entities to grasp, but their
significance makes this task all the more critical. This seminar aims to
further an understanding of the specificity of the urban condition: as the
human condition is increasingly an urban one, how is it articulated
culturally, economically, socially, and politically?
Papers delivered during the Michaelmas Term will focus on two
topics: post-socialist cities grappling with Soviet legacy, and cities
experiencing large-scale urban interventions in the wake of international
athletic competitions, namely the 2012 Olympics and the 2010 World Cup.
Programme 2009-10
Michaelmas Term 2009
Tuesday 3 November, 5pm
Chris Schulte (Project Architect, Allies and Morrison, Olympic Legacy Masterplan Framework)
Back to Front and Side to Side. Olympics and Regeneration in the Lower Lea Valley
Tuesday 17 November, 5pm
Dr Claire Bénit-Gbaffou, Honorary Senior Lecturer, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
In the Shadow of 2010: Urban Policies, Party Politics and the Sedation of Civil Society around Ellis Park Stadium, Johannesburg
Tuesday 1 December, 5pm
Prof Caroline Humphrey (Dept of Social Anthropology, University of Cambridge)
Odessa: Pogroms and the Built City
Lent Term 2010
Tuesday 12 January, 5.15pm
Mark Shiel, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies, King's College, London
The Pacific Wall: Los Angeles and Cinema after 1968
Tuesday 26 January, 5.15pm
Steve Sabella, Palestinian Artist based in London
Deconstructing Jerusalem & Exile
Tuesday 16 February, 5.15pm
Marwan Rechmaoui, Lebanese Artist living and working in Beirut
Small Talk, Big Issues: Art and Beirut
Tuesday 23 February, 5.15pm
Professor Nigel Thrift, Vice-Chancellor, University of Warwick
Title TBC
Tuesday 9 March, 5.15pm
Lieven de Cauter, Katholieke University Leuven & The Brussels Tribunal
The Unaccountable City
Easter Term 2010
Tuesday 20 April, 17:15 hrs
Dr Daniela Vicherat Mattar (Marie-Curie Research Fellow, School of History, Classics and Archaeology,
University of Edinburgh, UK)
Did Walls Really Come Down? Contemporary B/ordering? Walls in Europe
Tuesday 4 May, 17:15 hrs
Dr Hazem Abu Orf (The University of Palestine, Scholarship Rescue Fund Visiting Researcher at the University of Cambridge, UK)
Urban informality in Divided Cities
Tuesday 18 May, 17:15 hrs
Dr Yael Navaro-Yashin (Department of Social Anthropology, University of Cambridge, UK)
Abjected Spaces: Débris
of War and its Affects
