The Making of the 20th Century City: Towards a Transnational Urban History of Japan and Europe.
Rainer Liedtke (ed.), Takahito Mori (ed.), Katja Schmidtpott (ed.):
The Making of the 20th Century City: Towards a Transnational Urban History of Japan and Europe
Published 2023 by Franz Steiner Verlag
Broadening the global perspective is high on the agenda for the current study of urban history. It is widely accepted in contemporary Japanese urban history that the prototype of the modern city was formed in the decades between the 1900s and the 1930s, when, against the background of accelerating urbanisation, the ideas of modernity in terms of regularity, functionality and rationality contributed to the establishment of mass culture and ultimately to social mobilisation for ‘total war’. These views coincide with those of European urban history.
In order to understand this coincidence, the volume is divided into three parts: 1. Surveys of mutual historiographical perceptions, 2. Case studies of urban architecture, the garden city concept, concepts of urban disaster prevention, infrastructure building and organised urban leisure, 3. Observations from the perspective of European urban history. The combination will not only elucidate the process of making the 20th century Japanese city, but also help the reader to rethink the modern European city in a global context.
More information HERE
Metropolitan Research – Methods and Approaches (Jens Martin Gurr/Rolf Parr/Dennis Hardt (eds.))
Book publication by the Research Area on Methodologies (within the Competence Field Metropolitan Research) by transcript Verlag 2022
Prof. Dr. Jens Martin Gurr (Speaker of KoMet) and Prof. Dr. Rolf Parr, together with former KoMet office staff member Dennis Hardt (Diplom in Geography), published this English-language methodology handbook in 2022. Numerous KoMet researchers have contributed articles to it. You can view the articles and their authors by clicking on this LINK.
Abstract: Metropolitan research requires multidisciplinary perspectives in order to do justice to the complexities of metropolitan regions. This volume provides a scholarly and accessible overview of key methods and approaches in metropolitan research from a uniquely broad range of disciplines including architectural history, art history, heritage conservation, literary and cultural studies, spatial planning and planning theory, geoinformatics, urban sociology, economic geography, operations research, technology studies, transport planning, aquatic ecosystems research and urban epidemiology. It is this scope of disciplinary – and increasingly also interdisciplinary – approaches that allows metropolitan research to address recent societal challenges of urban life, such as mobility, health, diversity or sustainability.
ISBN: 978-3-8376-6310-5
More HERE
KoMet researchers develop a regional biodiversity strategy for the Ruhr region – 200-page publication release
KoMet researchers Prof. Dr. Daniel Hering (Faculty of Biology, UDE), Prof. Dr. Harald Zepp, and Prof. Dr. Thomas Schmitt (both from the Department of Geography, RUB) are involved in developing the “Ruhr Region Regional Biodiversity Strategy.” The project has been funded by the state government since mid-2020 as part of the Ruhr Conference and as a subproject of the “Green Infrastructure Initiative 2030.” The strategy is being developed by a consortium comprising Ruhr University Bochum (RUB), the University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE), and the Biological Station of the Western Ruhr Area (BSWR) under the leadership of the RVR. The Urban Biodiversity Network examines biodiversity in the Ruhr region from various perspectives and derives proposals for its conservation and promotion. The 200-page publication “Positions on a Regional Biodiversity Strategy for the Ruhr Region” can be found here: https://urbane-biodiversitaet.de/positionspapiere.html
The position papers address nine thematic areas: species and habitat conservation, industrial landscapes, urban agriculture, urban forest management, open spaces and habitat connectivity, climate change and climate adaptation, urban green spaces and social cohesion, urban green spaces and preventive healthcare, and environmental education. The final project output will be the development of an action plan, which will be refined during the region’s participatory process for the “Green Infrastructure Strategy” and adopted by the RVR Assembly.
„Evaluating the impact of nature-based solutions“ – New handbook published by the European Commission (2021) – with contributions from Dr.-Ing. Julita Skodra
The European Commission’s handbook “Evaluating the impact of nature-based solutions” was published in early May 2021 to help decision-makers and practitioners develop scientifically sound monitoring and evaluation plans for assessing nature-based solutions (NbS). Seventeen EU-funded NbS projects and collaborating institutions contributed to the development of the handbook.
Dr.-Ing. Julita Skodra, Institute for Urban Public Health (InUPH), a member of the KoMet research area ‘Urban Health’, contributed to several sections of the handbook and served as coordinating lead author of Chapter 2 (Principles for NbS Performance and Impact Assessment). She contributed to the interdisciplinary discussions with theoretical foundations in urban health and sustainable development, as well as to the practical experiences with NbS assessment from the EU-funded CLEVER Cities project.
The handbook presents a set of robust indicators and methods for assessing the impacts of nature-based solutions across 12 societal challenge areas.
The handbook you find HERE and the Appendixof this book HERE.
„A tale of one City“ – New Publication from Prof. Dr. Dieter Haller
Prof. Dr. Dieter Haller (RUB) concludes a metropolitan project with the monograph “Tangier/Gibraltar – A Tale of One City” – An Ethnography (Transcript, Bielefeld 2021). The project examined the political, demographic, economic, and, above all, cultural relationships between the two cities. The cultural-historical section is based primarily on material from earlier, multi-year field research in the region (Gibraltar 1995/96; Tangier 2013–present) as well as archival work; the ethnological section focuses on Brexit and its impact on relations between the two cities as well as between Morocco and the EU (field research 2019–20). Through research on these connections—some of which are very ancient—the concepts of identity, ethnicity, and culture are examined and redefined.
Anthology “Wege zur schönen Stadt – Akteure, Erfahrungen, Handlungsstrategien” edited by Dr. Sandra Huning and Prof. Dr. Uwe Altrock
How Do You Build a Beautiful City? Volume 25 of Planungsrundschau presents a variety of perspectives and interpretations from city users, planners, investors, and architects, as well as from the fields of historic preservation and urban renewal. The book’s chapters and interviews with experts from various professions demonstrate how differing conceptions of the “beauty” of a city repeatedly clash, and, with the help of numerous examples, they paint a colorful picture of creative mediation and design strategies guided as much by design, urban cultural, and social principles as by resource, return-on-investment, and profit-oriented considerations, as well as technical requirements. In doing so, the possibilities and limitations of conveying beauty become apparent, and the concrete framework conditions of contemporary urban development are critically examined. At the same time, the contributions advocate for openness toward diverse perspectives.
More information HERE
“Charting Literary Urban Studies – Text as models of and for the City” from Prof. Jens Martin Gurr erschienen (by Rotledge Verlag)
Abstract
Guided by the multifaceted relations between city and text, Charting Literary Urban Studies: Texts as Models of and for the City attempts to chart the burgeoning field of literary urban studies by outlining how texts in varying degrees function as both representations of the city and as blueprints for its future development. The study addresses questions such as these: How do literary texts represent urban complexities – and how can they capture the uniqueness of a given city? How do literary texts simulate layers of urban memory – and how can they reinforce or help dissolve path dependencies in urban development? What role can literary studies play in interdisciplinary urban research? Are the blueprints or ‘recipes’ for urban development that most quickly travel around the globe – such as the ‘creative city’, the ‘green city’ or the ‘smart city’ – really always the ones that best solve a given problem? Or is the global spread of such travelling urban models not least a matter of their narrative packaging? In answering these key questions, this book also advances a literary studies contribution to the general theory of models, tracing a heuristic trajectory from the analysis of literary texts as representations of urban developments to an analysis of literary strategies in planning documents and other pragmatic, non-literary texts.
Publication: Jens Martin Gurr. Charting Literary Urban Studies: Texts as Models of and for the City. New York: Routledge, 2020. ISBN 9780367628345
Open Access: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003111009
KoMet – Researchers have produced a special issue/magazin of STANDORT on the Knowledge Metropolis Ruhr Region
Researchers from the research area “Knowledge Metropolises” within the Compentence Field Metropolitan Research have jointly produced a special issue of “STANDORT – Journal of Applied Geography.” Through an editorial, an interview, and six academic articles, the authors explore various aspects of the Ruhr as a knowledge metropolis. A knowledge metropolis is defined here as an urban agglomeration whose social and economic development depends on its ability to generate, apply, and utilize knowledge, as well as to absorb and disseminate it. The special issue was coordinated by Prof. Matthias Kiese, one of the co-spokespersons for the Knowledge Metropolises research field.