[Bilimsel Haber] Home, Migration and the City

[Sule Tarakci]

Home, Migration and the City: Spatial forms and practices in a
globalising world



OPEN HOUSE INTERNATIONAL
SPECIAL ISSUE CALL FOR PAPERS

Home, Migration, and the City: Spatial forms and practices in a
Globalising world

The study of globalisation as the increasing interconnectedness between
all aspects of social, cultural, economic, and political space has seen
an unprecedented interest across social and political sciences,
humanities, and urban studies. Seen as the direct result of
globalisation, migration is now at the forefront of this investigation
of cross-border connections, but this interest has predominately
focussed on poor migrants’ experiences in their host countries. Studies
of globalisation have been silent on the connections between migration
and built environments. On the one hand, it is suggested that the
unprecedented movement of people in a globalising world will put
particular emphasis on cities (in ways that they seek to attract
particular types of people); and on the other hand, it is argued that
such movement has led to a death of ‘home’ as a fixed place. Can cities
be understood as dense agglomerations of built forms, which are also
‘home’ to those who live there? If so, what does the death of ‘home’ in
a globalising world mean for the future of place, of built forms, and of
cities?

In this call for papers, we would like to invite a range of
interdisciplinary explorations from academics and practitioners alike,
who can offer new perspectives and new insights, explore alternative
theoretical models, and offer proposals that construct new meanings of
‘home’, migration, and the city in a globalising world. For this special
issue, we lay particular emphasis on globalising cities of the South
that are undergoing rapid social, cultural, and economic changes and can
no longer be seen simply as the ‘lands of origin’ of migrants but
increasingly as destinations. Similarly, there are those elite
transnationals in the global South, whose mobilities challenge migration
as a linear movement, and whose presence is increasingly felt in cities
through the rise in luxury housing. On the other hand, the recent
expansion of the European Union has meant the increased presence of
post-socialist subjects in the global North, which has led to changes in
the geographies and identities of public space in Northern cities. We
want to ask how the everyday lives and subjectivities of such migrant
subjects are represented in the cities through built forms. How are
places and built forms re-appropriated, re-negotiated, and transgressed
through such diverse forms of mobility? How does mobility produce
spatialised struggles for migrant identities in cities? What are the
various ways that built forms and spatial practices become new markers
of a globalising world?

We are interested in fostering dialogue between academics and
practitioners and in spatialising the notion of home and migration in
both the North and the South. Our goal is to contribute to a new
articulation of theory, practice, and ethics that help us better
understand and deal with the conditions of globalisation and mobility
through an examination of place, built forms, and spatial practice in
cities across the world. The full length of the manuscripts is 4000
words. The Special Issue guest editor is Dr Ayona Datta, Lecturer,
London School of Economics, UK. Please submit a 1000 word abstract and a
150 word author bio by 31st July 2007 in the first instance by email to
a.datta2 at lse.ac.uk.

Open House International is a refereed scholarly journal concerned with
housing, design, and development in the built environment. It is
interested in articles on theories, tools, and practices with special
emphasis on the local scale. Since 2006, Open House International has
been selected for coverage in Thomson’s ISI Citation index products- The
Social Science Citation Index, The Arts & Humanities Citation Index,
Social Scisearch, Current Contents/Social & Behavioral Sciences, Current
Contents/Arts & Humanities and Journal Citation Reports / Social
Sciences Edition.
	
Dr Ayona Datta
Department of Sociology
London School of Economics
London WC2A 2AE
UK
Email: a.datta2 at lse.ac.uk

Visit the website at http://www.openhouse-int.com