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The City: Analyzing Contemporary Transformations and Structures University of Bielefeld, Germany - Workshop March 9-10, 2012 Abstracts: October 1, 2011 Today, we focus on different aspects of urbanity when we talk about characteristics of and challenges for contemporary societies and their built environment. Depending on the respective point of view, demographic changes, the anticipated climate change potentially altering human behavior, the different appreciation of knowledge and information or transformations in production patterns are taken as factors affecting the appearance, the characteristics and the functions of the places of societies - and therewith also of cities. Social sciences dealing with urban phenomena generally ask for the interrelations of the social and the physical/spatial. Urban structures, understood as results of social processes, are in focus.But there are different thematic traditions: In Germany, social inequality in cities, resulting in social and spatial segregation, has long been a topic of great importance. In the Anglo-American context, housing and racial differences have been major research areas for several decades. In addition to these specific traditions of studying the city, phenomena themselves show regionally differing characteristics, greatly visible in the cases of shrinking cities and mega cities. And processes of urban transformation have always had transnational, maybe even global facets, too, as it can be seen in the case of global cities. The workshop asks for both urban transformations and urban structures that can be analyzed by social scientists. What are recent developments and transformations of cities? What are the specific challenges researchers are confronted with in these cities? How can we adequately analyze and analytically formulate contemporary urban phenomena? In what respect do cities possess features that are specific for the late 20th and beginning 21st century, i.e. what are typical structur

Model Cities: the Construction of Urban Exemplarity 20 May 2011 * Geography Institute * University of Neuchâtel City governments, planners and policy-makers are increasingly modeling their urban policies on successful 'best practices' borrowed from elsewhere. Some cities have thus become 'model cities', to such an extent that their name resonates with urban policy-makers all over the world. Expressions such as 'Vancouverism', or the 'Barcelona model', have become global references of exemplarity among urban practitioners and researchers. Yet, while there is a growing body of literature on the circulation and reproduction of urban models in diverse locations, we still have a limited understanding of the ways in which model cities acquire paradigmatic status. The workshop will try to deepen our grasp of this phenomenon by examining the historical and political processes behind the construction of urban exemplarity, and by analysing the 'careers' and trajectories of model cities. Guest speakers Shane Ewen, Leeds Metropolitan University: From the Megalopolis to the City of Bits: Approaches Towards the History of the Model City Jennifer Robinson, University College London and MOVE Network-UNINE: The Topological Spaces of Policy Learning: how Urban Policy Ideas Circulate Kevin Ward, Manchester University: Relational Comparisons: the Assembling of Cleveland's Waterfront Plan Andy Thornley, London School of Economics: Olympic Model Meets Real Cities Emeline Bailly, Université Paris-Est: Cross-cultural Urbanism The workshop is organised by Prof. Ola Söderström, Prof. Francisco Klauser and Dr. Laurence Crot, Geography Institute, University of Neuchâtel. A detailed programme will be posted on the Geography Institute's website starting 1st May 2011 (http://www2.unine.ch/inst_geographie). Attendance of the workshop is free and open to all but requires pre-registration. For registration and practical information (travel, accommodation, meals) pl

Urban Machinery investigates the technological dimension of modern European cities, vividly describing the most dramatic changes in the urban environment over the last century and a half. Written by leading scholars from the history of technology, urban history, and the sociology of science and technology, the book views the European city as a complex construct entangled with technology. The chapters examine the increasing similarity of modern cities and their technical infrastructures (including communication, energy, industrial, and transportation systems) and the resulting tension between homogenization and cultural differentiation. The contributors emphasize the concept of circulation-the process by which architectural ideas, urban planning principles, engineering concepts, and societal models spread across Europe as well as from the United States to Europe. They also examine the parallel process of appropriation-how these systems and practices have been adapted to prevailing institutional structures and cultural preferences. Urban Machinery, with contributions by scholars from eight countries and more than thirty illustrations (many of them rare photographs never published before), includes studies from northern and southern and from eastern and western Europe, and also discusses how European cities were viewed from the periphery (modernizing Turkey) and from the United States. Contributors Hans Buiter, Paolo Capuzzo, Noyan Dinckal, Cornelis Disco, Pal Germuska, Mikael Hard, Martina Hessler, Dagmara Jaje?niak-Quast, Andrew Jamison, Per Lundin, Thomas J. Misa, Dieter Schott, and Marcus Stippak

Frame Analysis: Theoretical PreliminariesThomas KönigFrame analysis is neither a full-fledged theoretical paradigm, nor a coherent methodological approach. Rather, frame analyses are a number of related, even though sometimes partially incompatible methods for the analysis of discourses (Scheufele 1999: 118). What unifies these analyses is a (fairly loose) theoretical connection to Goffman's (1974) work on framing. These pages will overview: the theoretical development of frame analyses;the measurement of frames;important conceptsin frame analysis;software suitable to aid frame analysis;a bibliography of frame analysis.Theoretical DevelopmentInitially frame analysis was initially predicted to become a niche method at best. One Contemporary Sociology reviewer complained that Frame Analysis is cumbersome to read (Davis 1975: 603), the other one wondered, if an adequate systematization of frame analysis would be feasible (Gamson 1975: 605). 1Probably the single most important factor for the success of Goffman's frame analysis despite this initial skeptical assessment is its unorthodox appropriation by scholars from very different traditions. Frame analysis is no longer Goffman's frame analysis, but is frequently only loosely connected to the original formulation. Notwithstanding the recurrent symbolic nods to Goffman, today's "frame analysis" spans a number of disparate approaches (D'Angelo 2002; Fisher 1997; Hallahan 1999; Maher 2001: 81f; Scheufele 1999: 103, 118). Three subject areas stand out in the development of frame analyses since Goffman: Management and organizational studies, social movement studies, and media studies. Each subject area has, of course, focused on different areas of framing theory and has approached the subject with different methods. Following the the work of 2002 Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman and his associate Amos Tversky (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979), management and organizational studies have focused on the behavioral effects of different

General Works Articles/Books about Individual Films Bibliography of articles/books about Metropolis (Fritz Lang) Bibliography of articles/books about Blade Runner (Ridley Scott) Abrams, Janet "Cine City: films en beschouwingen van de stedelijke ruimte 1895-1995 = Cine City: film and perceptions of pace 1895-1995." Archis 1994 July, n.7, p.10-12, Adil, Alev "Longing and (Un)belonging: Displacement and Desire in the Cinematic City." Paper from the Conference "INTER: A European Cultural Studies Conference in Sweden", organised by the Advanced Cultural Studies Institute of Sweden (ACSIS) in Norrköping 11-13 June 2007. Conference Proceedings published by Linköping University Electronic Press Aitken S. "Turnng the Self: City Space and SF Horror Movies." Lost in space : geographies of science fiction / edited by Rob Kitchin and James Kneale. London ; New York : Continuum, 2002. MAIN Stack PN3433.6.L67 2002 Albrecht, Donald. "Architecture and film: Utopia descending." Modulus 1987, no.18, p.[120]-133 Albrecht, Donald. Designing dreams : modern architecture in the movies New York : Harper & Row, c1986. ENVI: PN1995.9.S4 A41 1986 Albright, Deron. "Tales of the City: Applying Situationist Social Practice to the Analysis of the Urban Drama." Criticism-A Quarterly for Literature & the Arts. 45(1):89-108. 2003 Winter Aldrige, Henry B. "From Delight to Disaster: Images of New York City in Feature Films. (Cinema Studies).(Brief Article)." Michigan Academician 34.1 (Spring 2002): 22(1). AlSayyad, Nezar "The cinematic city: between modernist utopia and postmodernist dystopia." Built environment 2000, v.26, n.4, p.268-281 AlSayyad, Nezar Cinematic Cities: Historicizing the Modern from Reel to Real [Video] In this lecture Nezar AlSayyad, professor of Architecture, Planning and Urban History at UCB, addresses some of the themes in his book Cinematic cities, historicizing the modern from reel to real. This event took place at the University of California, Berkeley on November 28,

A multitude of concepts and ideas have shaped practices in professions such as planning, urban design and urban management. Now, however, the speed and intensity with which these ideas travel seems historically unprecedented. This paper explores how some of these ideas are formed and circulated, often with unpredictable consequences. In order to understand the circulation and impact of these ideas this paper constructs an analytical framework which views these concepts within wider networks of social agents and institutions. Using insights from actor-network theory and discourse analysis we propose a framework that focuses our understanding of how ideas are translated into new spatial settings. The...

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