Urban Ontology - what is a city?

Adolphson Spatial Analysis provides a course in Urban Ontology - urban structure in a perspective of Social Theory.

The town and city structure can be understood from multiple perspectives. Architects, transportation engineers, historians, real estate developers and city planners understand and see the urban fabric from their perspective - all valid. To facilitate communication and understanding of the city, a cognitive map will help. This course provides insight into the most influential social theories with regard to urban structure and its physical components. This course contributes partly to a further understanding of the urban fabric, and partly to a possible consensus on the subject.

The course is offered in three levels of ambition - Café, Prof 1 or Prof  2

Lecture and level

1. General: listening 20 min, discuss 10 min.

2. Proffessional 1: 45 minutes, including discussion

3. Proffessional 2: 2 * 45 minutes including reading and assignments that relate to the proffessional daily work.

 Language: English or Swedish

1. Introduction: Presentation of the course. Challanges and opportunities

2. Giddens: The city is reproduced every day. Why?

3. A Marxists approach:

What can we learn from Marx?

4. Durkheim: A deterministic approach.

Does the city govern our actions?

5. Weber: The individual in the iron cage.

6. Simmel: Social structure

7. Parsons: The city as part of a social system

8. Blau: Deeper understanding of social structure - relations between minorities and majorities

9. Habermas: Life world and system.

Why is planning necessary?

How can urban planning contribute to the development of identity, solidarity and social responsibility.

10. Foucault: Discourses of the elite

11. Bourdieu: Urban position taking and urban  structural exercise.

Why do people act in certain ways?

12. Recent theories

13. Discussion: The use of knowledge in our daily work

Contact:

Adolphson Spatial Analysis (ASA)

Marcus Adolphson, PHD, Urban and Regional Studies

Vapengatan 9, S-126 52 Hägersten, Sweden

e: adolphson@spatialanalysis.se

p: +46(0)702640874

w: www.spatialanalysis.se