Our Cities and Our Selves

Catalog description

What is a city? How do cities shape the everyday lives and experiences of those who live in them, as well as cultural conceptions of modernity and civilisation? Pairing texts drawn from literature and the interdisciplinary field of urban studies, this course will study how writers and thinkers have sought to express and analyse what it means to live in cities. By reading literary accounts of urban life such as Mu Shiying in Shanghai, James Joyce in Dublin, Michel de Certeau in New York, and Orhan Pamuk in Istanbul, alongside perspectives from urban planners and sociologists such as Liang Sicheng, Jane Jacobs, Saskia Sassen, and Spiro Kostof, you will engage with some of the most creative and influential ideas concerning the complex relationship between our cities and ourselves. 001767