Global Cities Culture November 23

Representation, identity and culture in global cities

Global Cities - November 23, 2009Adrina Ambrosii, Hani El Masry, Kerry Girvan, Chiara Camponeschi

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Presentation OutlineContext: Intro

Transnational Networks & Production

Multiculturalism & Belonging

Consuming Global Cultures

Leads: Adrina & Hani

Culture flowsCultural consciousness

Perspectives Social & spatial polarization

Postcolonialism

DISCUSSION: Debate ?

Ulf HannerzSteven Flusty

Anthony D. KingNihal Perera

Leonie SandercockUte Lehrer

Stefan Krätke

Lead: Kerry

CosmopolisGlobal identity

Post-modernismGlobal culture

Lead: Chiara

Media production centersTechnology, internet

Creative CitySubcultures

Introduction

“Culture is one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language.” ~ Raymond Williams, 1976

-material production-symbolic systems-sociological differences

ˈkəl ch ər: the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively

Civilization

Nationalism

Ethnicity

Gender

Beauty

Identity

Language

Religion

Politics

Literature

Theatre

History

Heritage

Traditions

Who are we anyway?

“Identity choices are made by individuals as they respond to social, economic and political influences around them” (Taiaiake and Corntassel, 2005).

Is it possible to choose our own identity?

Types of Culture

pop culture

high culture

free culture

tree culture

urban culture

rural culture

Authors: clip/video to music

Leonie Sandercock

Ulf Hannerz (Swedish, Sociologist)

Anthony D. King

Stefan Krätke

Ute Lehrer

Nihal Perera

Steven Flusty (American, Geographer)

Ulf HannerzWhite male, SwedishProfessor of Sociology, Stockholm University, SwedenSociologist

Research: - urban societies- local media cultures- transnational cultural processes- globalization

Most known for: - His works Soulslide and Exploring the City are classic books in the area of urban anthropology.- In 2000, Hannerz delivered the Lewis Henry Morgan Lecture at the University of Rochester, considered by many to be the most important annual lecture series in the field of Anthropology.

Steven Flusty

White male, AmericanProfessor of Geography, University of TorontoGeographer

Research: Global formation

Back In Time, video

http://www.torontourbanfilmfestival.com/films/back-time

Art Gallery of Metropolitan Moments - 3 exhibitsThe global city is “a fluidly demarcated global urban field upon which we all wrestle with the very definitions of alien and native, foreign and domestic, cosmopolitanism and locality.” ~ Steven Flusty

Exhibit IVivaldi’s violin VS. MacIsaac’s fiddle ~ 16th century-timeless

Transnational Networks & Production

Flows of CultureCultural Consciousness (internal diversity, identity)

Commodity clusters (materiality)Globalization

PerspectivesCultural Interactions

Cultural ConvergencesPolarization (economic, social, spatial)

Flows of Culture ~ Ulf Hannerz

1) Corporate elites (managerial and entrepreneurial class)

2) Third world migrant populations

3) Cultural producers/consumers

4) Tourists - turnover

“Market”: culture flow as buyer and seller

“Form-of-life”: free reciprocal cultural exchanges

“What they have in common is the fact they are in one way or other transnational; the people involved are physica%y present in the world cities for some larger or sma%er

parts of their lives, but they also have strong ties to some other place in the world...Without these people, in one conste%ation or other, however, these cities would

hardly have their global character” (Hannerz, p. 314).

“We carry our worlds with us, refit them to the cities in which we find ourselves, and transmute the city as best we can to accommodate our worlds” (Flusty, p. 351).

Icons, idols and representations

World city systems/citydom = metapolis

Cultural Consciousness ~ Steven Flusty

“Commerce bedecked itself irrevocably in Culture, and to this day the contemporary world city is without a soul in the absence of the art museum and the concert hall - without the cultural capital, the intellectual capital at the helm of fiduciary capital will not come” (Flusty, p. 348)

Internal Diversity

InhibitionsRestraints

Social stigmaSocial Pressure

ConformityFreedom of choice?

IndividualCo%ective

Politics of difference (hybrid identities)

Subcultures

Commodity Clustershttp://losangeles.cacophony.org/consume.htm

The cultural market-place (Hannerz, p. 316)

Presence of expressive specialists (intellectual/aesthetic stimulation)

“local potentialities of world city interrelations” (ie. where it all happens).

3 phases in the “career of cultural commodities”:

Meanings and meaningful form in subcultural communities

Communities at large

Wider market for more agreeable consumption

Materiality wood vs. metal

nature vs. technology

Cyborg cities

Globalization

Subcultural, transnational communities

Centre-periphery relationships (Hannerz, p. 318)

“The world cities are no doubt still frequently the points of origin of global cultural flow, but they also function as points of global cultural brokerage” (Hannerz, p.318)

“The metapolis, then, is not simply a world city system but system of world city systems, and at these systems’ proliferating intersections divergent cities manifest within one another across wide distances” (Flusty, p. 350).

Metapolis rising

Perspectives

Reactions to diversity (Hannerz, p.315)

centre vs. periphery

Refunctionalizing (Hannerz, p.315)

tourists “typifying” everything

Inseparability of sense from place (Hannerz, p.316)

spectacle is part of local setting

"I Will Not Lose" ~ a Haitian Identity poem by Wilkine Brutus

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6p5npKLIfY&feature=player_embedded

Cultural Interactions

Cultural Convergences

Xenophobia = Fear of the “other”

Xenophilia = an affection for unknown/foreign objects or human beings

“Foundations of resistance (for being Indigenous) include: strong families, grounding in community, connection to land, language, storyte%ing and spirituality” (Taiaiake

and Corntassel, 2005).

Polarization

Economic

Social

Spatial

Economic Injustice

Social Polarization

StereotypesClass structures

Segregation within the cityMobility between cities

Spatial PolarizationScalar injustices

Access

Scalar injusticesAccess

“Suburbia is where the developer bu%dozes out the trees then names the streets a'er them.”

HighlightsHannerz:

inhabitants of urban spaces are active co-producers and participant observers in the process of cultural production

culture is not fixed within dominant societal institutions

socio-cultural formations in world-cities do not represent linear outcomes of abstract socioeconomic forces and hierarchical power relationships.

Flusty:

icons, idols and representations of cultural consciousness

Xenophilia, appreciation for the unfamiliar

“Which sha% it [the world city] be? A place where difference divides, privilege is conserved, and the devil take the hindmost? Or a

place where the otherness engages, disparity is dismantled, and the

production of a metapolitan culture becomes a common,

conscious project? We culture the world city, so the

choice is ours” (Flusty, p. 352).

Exhibit IIThe Tim Horton’s Phenomenon - on consignment ~ 1964-timeless

Multiculturalism and Belonging

Cosmopolitanism and Global Identity

Capitalism- global identity and class struggle

Migration

Modernism and Post-modernism

• Cosmopolitanism: vagueness of definition

1) ideal

2) quantifiable; as analytic tool

• As liberal, western values

• Identity Politics

Canada• Global City: Toronto

• Canadian Identity as global identity

• Tim Hortons- Symbol of Canada

• Who’s Canada, who’s values?

Global Identity and Class Struggle

Hegemony of Multiculturalism

Bourgeois Urbanism

Migration• Migration of People

• Migration of Ideas

• Global Culture

Modernism and Post-modernism

• Ulrich Beck

• Challenge of cultural relativism

• Belonging and Solidarity

What do you think?

Exhibit IIIHipsters, holsters, whores and homies ~ 20,000 BCE-timeless

CONSUMING GLOBAL CULTURES

Krätke’s

Global Media Cities: Major Nodes of Globalizing Culture

Photo Credits: http://bit.ly/3dTnWI

“the market-related self-stylization of individuals competing for positions in societies characterised by the all-embracing

mediatisation of social communication, consumption patterns

and lifestyles.” Wednesday, November 18, 2009

“incorporates different sectors and functions as agents of information, influence and

persuasion” Wednesday, November 18, 2009

“Seek a ‘subcultural’ urban district they can use as an extended stage for self-portrayal.”

“a flourishing creative and knowledge economyis based on place-specific socio-cultural milieuswhich positively combine with the dynamics ofcluster formation within the urban economic

space.”Wednesday, November 18, 2009

“Islands of renewal in seas of decay.”Urban Pioneers .

Critical Infrastructure

Hipster Olympics: youtube.com/watch?v=kAO4EVMlpwM

http://highrise.nfb.ca

Art Gallery of Metropolitan Moments ~ is now open for discussion...

Quotes for discussion

“Identities are (re)constructed at multiple levels - global scale, state, community, individual. Group identity varies with time and place” as such “Identity can only be confirmed by others who share that identity.” (Taiaiake and Corntassel, 2005). If this is true, then what are the implications in a multicultural, neoliberal city such as Toronto?

“If you do not sing the songs - if you do not tell the stories and if you do not speak the language - you will cease to exist (as Apache)” (Taiaiake and Corntassel, 2005). Can culture and/or identity disappear?

Discussion Questions

Given the constant change in urban multiculturalism, how do these various components (ie. culture, identity, etc.) influence the built environment?

Does being part of a culture that’s “less dominant” make it less of a culture?

Are we in North America becoming isolated in our individualistic “culture”? Is this a direct result of capitalism?

Is it possible to be objective when it comes to culture?

The Location of Culture

Homi Bhabha (1994), Routledge

ReferencesTowards cosmopolis: a postmodern agenda (2002) - Leonie Sandercock

The cultural role of world cities (1996) - Ulf Hannerz

World cities: Global? Postcolonial? Postimperial? Or just the result of happenstance? Some cultural comments (2005) - Anthony D. King

‘Global media cities:’ major nodes of globalizing culture and media industries (2005) - Stefan Krätke

Willing the global city: Berlin’s cultural strategies of interurban competition after 1989 (2005) - Ute Lehrer

Exploring Colombo: the relevance of a knowledge of New York (1996) - Nihal Perera

Culturing the world city: an exhibition of the global present (2005) - Steven Flusty

Taiaiake Alfred and Jeff Corntassel’s “Being Indigenous: Resurgences against Contemporary Colonialism,” Government and Opposition, 40, 4 (2005), 597-614.

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