Urban Theory and the Urban Experience: Encountering the City
Posted by Urban Planning Theory at 1:32 PMFor the first time ever, the classic and contemporary approaches to urban theory have been brought together in an introductory text. From the foundations of Weber and Simmel to the contemporary work of Manuel Castells and the Los Angeles school, "Urban Theory and the" "Urban Experience" traces key developments in the idea of the city over more than a century, revealing the often unacknowledged debt that empirical and theoretical perspectives owe each other. Documentary, literary, and cultural sources bring theories to life, while hands-on studies and analysis of alternative ideas, such as "the garden city" and "the new urbanism" round out what is sure to be a key text for years to come.
Popular Passages:
No man is an island, entire of itself . . . any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee'. In this - Page 59
poem, where twice five miles of fertile ground with walls and towers were girdled round: And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree - Page 146
was a third alternative, in which all the advantages of the most energetic and active town life, with all the beauty and delight of the country, may be secured in perfect combination; and the certainty of being able to live this life will be the magnet which will produce the effect for which we - Page 54
city I wander thro' each charter'd street, Near where the charter'd Thames does flow. And mark in every face I meet Marks of weakness, marks of woe. - Page 100
The foundation of every division of labour which has attained a certain degree of development, and has been brought about by the exchange of commodities, is the separation of town from country. One might well say that the whole economic history of society is summed up in the movement of this antithesis. (Marx, - Page 102
something like counter-sites, a kind of effectively enacted Utopia in which the real sites, all the other real sites that can be found within the culture, are simultaneously represented, contested, and inverted'. Foucault - Page 146
as one finds it in history, is the point of maximum concentration for the power and culture of a community. . . . Here in the city the goods of civilization are multiplied and manifolded; here is where human experience is transformed into viable signs, symbols, patterns of conduct, systems of order. Here is where the issues of civilization are - Page 139
around so that there be no festering and wretched suburb anywhere, but clean and busy street within and open country without, with a belt of beautiful garden and orchard round the walls so that from any part of the city perfectly fresh air and grass and sight of far horizon might be reachable in a few minutes - Page 53
white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it - Page 91
Every great city has one or more slums, where the working class is crowded together. True, poverty often dwells in hidden alleys close to the palaces of the rich; but, in general, a separate territory has been assigned to it, where, removed from the sight of the happier classes, it may struggle along as it can - Page 103
Cover:
+ By Simon Parker
+ Published 2004 Routledge
+ 272 pages
+ ISBN 0415245923