Study guide:
1. Daily Study Breakdown (High-Retention Method)
A. 15 minutes — Multiple Choice Prep
Goals: memorize definitions, thinkers, processes, examples
Format: Active Recall Flashcards
Flashcards should cover:
Space (absolute, relational, social)
Place
Scale
Urbanization & Urbanism
Socio-spatial dialectic
Rational vs. Advocacy vs. Communicative vs. Indigenous planning
Rent gap, gentrification types
Global/World/Globalizing cities
PPPs, neoliberal governance, financialization
Social reproduction
Racialization of space (redlining, covenants, blockbusting, etc.)
Method: try to answer → check answer → rewrite only the ones you got wrong
B. 15 minutes — Definition Practice
Write out 2–3 sentences for core terms (matches exam expectations).
Rotate through definitions such as:
Space (absolute → relational → social)
Place
Socio-spatial dialectic
Entrepreneurial city
Use value vs. exchange value
Social reproduction
Gentrification
Urban political ecology
Platform urbanism
Sustainability fix
Method:
Write → compare to your notes → rewrite concisely.
C. 20–30 minutes — Short Answer Training
Use a 5–6 sentence model:
Start with a clear definition
Add 2 course concepts
Include 1 specific example (Breonna Taylor; Airbnb; Redlining; Red Vienna)
End with why it matters for studying cities
Practice Topics:
Racialization of space
Social reproduction
Gentrification (rent gap + cultural + postcolonial)
Neoliberal urbanism
Global cities
D. 30 minutes — Essay Prep (Most Important)
Use the Four-Box Essay Framework every day:
BOX 1 — Define the big idea
(e.g., financialization, gentrification, planning)
BOX 2 — Theoretical approaches
(e.g., Harvey, Sassen, Jacobs, Wirth)
BOX 3 — Real-world examples
(US public housing, PPPs, Airbnb, Red Vienna, Breonna Taylor, redlining)
BOX 4 — Link back to learning outcomes
(e.g., socio-spatial dialectic, space/place/scale, global flows)
Write ONLY OUTLINES some days and FULL ESSAYS other days.
2. Study Sheet Structure (Use for Daily Review)
Use this as your “master sheet.”
It is the high-level structure that matches your whole course.
⭐ A. FOUNDATIONS (Unit 1) — Cities & Urban Geography
What is a city?
Definitions vary (population metrics, economic region, administrative boundary, social imagination) — PDF confirms multiple definitions and strengths/weaknesses
Intro to Urban Studies
.
Wirth (1938):
Cities = large population, density, heterogeneity → creates “urbanism as a way of life.”
Intro to Urban Studies
Why study cities?
Homo urbanus: over half of humanity now lives in cities; 5+ billion by 2030.
Intro to Urban Studies
Cities = sites of:
inequality
innovation
climate crisis
housing crises
social movements (BLM, DEI backlash)
Core geographic concepts
Space: absolute, relational, social
Place: meaning & identity
Scale: local → global
Socio-spatial dialectic: people shape cities, cities shape people (BLM example)
⭐ B. URBAN PLANNING
Origins
Industrial cities → severe pollution, crowding
Garden City movement
Authoritarian planning approaches
Modern professional planning begins in 19th–20th centuries
Approaches
Rational planning (Banfield): objective, technocratic
Advocacy planning (Davidoff): planners as advocates
Communicative planning (Forester, Healey): planners as mediators
Indigenous planning: land stewardship, anti-universalist
Thinkers
Jane Jacobs: people-centered, street life
David Harvey: capitalism & urbanization, uneven development
⭐ C. RACIALIZATION OF SPACE & SOCIAL REPRODUCTION
Racialization of space
Redlining
Blockbusting
Restrictive covenants
De jure vs. de facto segregation
Territorial stigma
Core idea: Race shapes access to urban space; space shapes racial inequality.
Social Reproduction
Reproducing the workforce → housing, education, childcare, transportation
Gendered: unpaid, feminized labor
Intersectional burdens: race + class + gender
Cities organize and control the terrain of social reproduction
⭐ D. GLOBAL CITIES, URBAN COMPETITION, ENTREPRENEURIALISM
Global/World Cities
Friedmann & Wolff: command/control centers
Sassen: APS services, extreme inequality
“Globalizing cities”: constant process of becoming
Entrepreneurial Cities
Branding, competition for capital
Post-Fordist economy
Knowledge-based industries
Regional competition (Silicon Valley model)
Critiques
Democratic deficits
Gentrification
Exclusion of poor residents
⭐ E. GLOBAL FLOWS & POLICY MOBILITIES
Cities connected through:
migration
information
ideas
money
policy models (e.g., “New York-style policing” spreading elsewhere)
Policies mutate as they travel — not truly local OR global.
⭐ F. GENTRIFICATION
1. Rent Gap (Smith)
Gap between current vs. potential rent → investment opportunity.
2. Cultural/Consumptive (Zukin)
Desire for authenticity → loft living, “edgy” neighborhoods.
3. Post-Colonial Interpretation (Courthard)
Urban displacement parallels Indigenous dispossession (“urbs nullius”).
4. Frontier Myth
“Urban pioneers” rhetoric replicates colonial language.
5. Geographies of Gentrification
Disinvestment → feelings of degradation
Cultural displacement (“root shock”)
Relative deprivation
Racialized impacts (Breonna Taylor case)
⭐ G. FINANCIALIZATION & NEOLIBERAL URBANISM
Financialization
Housing / city becomes an asset
Subprime crisis
Speculation in mortgages & municipal services
Neoliberalism
Market logic in urban governance
Austerity
Deregulation
Public-private partnerships (PPPs)
PPPs
Pros:
efficiency
innovation
Cons:
gentrification
exclusion
loss of democratic control
⭐ H. URBAN–NATURE RELATIONSHIPS
Shifting views
Nature as escape
Nature as resource
Modern environmentalism (protect nature for its own value)
Urban Political Ecology
Nature + society + power relations intertwined.
Urban Sustainability Fix
Selective sustainability — shaped by competing urban interests.
Abolition Ecologies
Environmental justice + dismantling racialized harm.
⭐ I. HOUSING, COMMODIFICATION, & URBAN CRISES
Engels: The Housing Question
Capitalism cannot solve housing inequality.
Use vs. Exchange Value
Use value = shelter
Exchange value = commodity price
Commodification of Housing
Extreme market orientation → speculation.
Platform Urbanism
Airbnb → removes long-term rentals → raises rents.
Decommodified Housing Examples
US public housing (post-WWII)
Red Vienna
⭐ J. FIELD METHODS (Project Component)
Observations
Mapping
Interviews
Grounded, place-based research
Linking findings to space/place/scale
Final exam structure:
Final Exam Structure + timing
Structure
10 multiple choice question
Definitions (3)
1 short answer questions (2 options choose 1)
1 long essay question (3 or 4 options, choose 1)
Timing
Total time for exam available: 120 mins
Average length test is designed to take for average student: 80 mins (= 40 mins extra buffer time)
Approximate amount of time per section:
Multiple choice - should take about 15 mins
Definitions - approx. 15 mins should be about 2 setences
Short Answer - approx. 20 mins
Long Essay - 30 mins for entire essay
Examples of Themes and concepts covered (non-exhaustive list)
Cities - what are they, how are they studies, why should you care, cities for whom?
Basically just define a city in the unit 1, just essentially why did we review this topic in Unit 1, as it sets the foundation for understanding the complexities of urban environments and our roles within them.
Urban Geography - origins, concepts (eg space, place, scale, sociospatial dialectic, etc), approches (structural, post-colonial etc)
Urban Planning - origins (industrial cities, garden cities vs authoritarian planning approachs), concepts (eg zoning, official and secondary plans, etc), approches (eg modern planning, rational planning, communicative planning indigenous planning, Jane Jacobs vs David Harvey understandings of economies and city, etc)
Racialization of space/spatialization of race + examples
Social reproduction + examples
Film Content - eg public housing in the US, urban design, urban austerity
Project Content - field research methods and approaches to understanding the city
Continued
World/Global Cities, city rankings
Urban competition
Urban entrepreneurialsm
Free trade, Global flows + examples
Policy mobilities + examples
Gentrification
a rent gap explanation, culture explanation, post-colonial interpretation, historic preservation as selective nostalgia, geographies of gentrification (relative deprivation, root shock, etc) the role of gentrification in Breonna Taylor's murder
Financialization,
Post-Fordist city/entrepreneurial city, neoliberalism/neoliberal urban governance, PPPs, Global financial/subprime crisis impacts on cities, urban austerity,
Review PPPs (Public-Private Partnerships)
and their implications for urban infrastructure development, emphasizing how they can facilitate gentrification and exacerbate social inequalities while also addressing the potential benefits they bring in terms of efficiency and innovation in service delivery.
arttuciulate for rhe development of several approaches to understand ing the urban and how it is possible togain insight from eac
look at learning outcomes
the red gap, this was mainly facoties and the lower ring was mainly for poor communities, and if those people dont match what the inner suburb is happening the CBC gap then the rent would go down and people seems disinvested and rent went lower, and the potential would be higher then the current charged or right now due to dis investment.
Continued
Shifting conceptions of urban/nature relationship
Urban political ecology
Planning for sustainable cities/Urban sustainability fix
Anthropocene, abolition ecologies
Engles' The Housing Question
Exchange value vs Use value, (hyper)commodification of housing
Role of urban crises/relationship to housing
Platform Urbanism/algorithmic rents + examples
Decommodified Housing case studies
THE U.S. already tried to do this but also look into this
Right to the city?
2 blue books, and pencils
Syllabus:
Learning Outcomes
At the conclusion of this course, students wil be able to:
Ariculate the rationale for the development of several approaches to understanding the urban and how it is possible to gain insights from each. (highly definite)
Define the concepts of space, place, scale, urbanization, urbanism and planning and understand how they help us study cities from a geographic perspective (highly definite)
Describe current urbanization trends and projects for countries around the world, with a particular knowledge of the post WWiI North American urban context
Critically discuss a variety of materials related to city development and effectively communicate ideas to different audiences
Gain first hand experience with field-based methods of urban research.
Collaborate with peers through problem-based learing activities to explore concepts and research related to city development
Core Courses - Social & Behavioral Science
Social & Behavioral Science This course may be used to fulfil the social and behavioral sciences component of the university Core
Top
urban processes have a spatial act and spatial dynamic as well as the intertweining
disospaital and spatial dialect and you can see this in BLACK LIVES MATTER, DEI social movement with a socially backlash and a rise of power and a removable of dei practices.
Cities
Cities: Urban studies examines the complex dynamics of cities, focusing on social, economic, and spatial aspects. They are complex entities that can be defined by population metrics, economic regions, socio-cultural imaginations, and administrative boundaries. Cities are crucial because many people live in them, they hold significant public capital, face tough challenges like homelessness and climate crisis production/experience, and are sites where problems, solutions, and the "messiness of life" unfold.
Urban Geography
Urban Geography: Explains the distribution of towns and cities, as well as the similarities and differences within and between them, emphasizing the role of space in various processes.
Space: A multifaceted concept that is both physical and socially produced, encompassing physical dimensions, social, and cultural meanings influenced by human interactions and societal structures.
Absolute space: A mathematical understanding of space where objects exist in relation to each other.
Relational space: Space that is produced and given meaning by people and the relationships between places, functioning as a dynamic concept shaped by cultural, economic, and political contexts rather than a mere backdrop.
Social space: Refers to how societal interactions and cultural practices shape human understanding and experience of space, highlighting the dynamic nature of human relationships within spatial contexts.
Place: The meaning people give to locations based on their experiences, emotions, and social interactions, transforming a geographical entity into a significant part of their identity and culture.
Scale: The levels of analysis from the local to the global, including municipal, state, and federal levels in politics, and global, world regional, state, regional, provincial, metropolitan areas, local/municipal, and neighborhoods in geography.
Socio-spatial dialectic: A continuous two-way process where people create and modify urban spaces while simultaneously being conditioned by the spaces in which they live and work, emphasizing the dynamic interplay between individual agency and structural influences.
Urban Planning
Urban Planning: A future-oriented process of designing and managing change in the built environment, requiring a comprehensive understanding of social, economic, and environmental factors.
Planning as transhistorical: The idea that some form of urban planning has existed as long as human settlements, spanning multiple eras of human history.
Planning as a modern profession: Originated from European progressivism, modernism, and utopian thinking during the Industrial Revolution, characterized by tensions and numerous paradigm shifts.
Rational planning model: Associated with Edward Banfield, this approach promoted planning as an objective science, though it quickly faced challenges in the 1960s and 1970s for failing to account for social complexities.
Advocacy planning: Proposed by Davidoff (1965), it recognizes power imbalances in planning and suggests planners act as advocates for marginalized groups.
Communicative turn in planning: Key thinkers like John Forester and Patsy Healey shifted from advocacy planning, viewing planners as politically articulate actors and guides rather than just experts.
Critiques of universalism in planning: Argues that planning institutions and by-laws are often based on and enforce dominant cultural norms, potentially erasing Indigenous histories of land use and neglecting the "right to difference" in the city.
Indigenous planning: Refers to the long-standing, community-based approaches to land use and environmental stewardship by Indigenous peoples prior to, and often in contrast with, modern professional planning practices.
Racialization of Space / Spatialization of Race
Landscapes of segregation: Urban settings where racial and ethnic minorities are often confined to specific areas, leading to limited access to resources and opportunities, thus reinforcing social inequalities.
Redlining: A practice where government maps rated lending risks to different neighborhoods, embedding racial discrimination into the urban landscape and contributing to racial wealth disparities.
De jure segregation: Practices, standards, or powers that are legally established and officially recognized by law, such as "Jim Crow laws," which explicitly separated Black and white Americans.
De facto segregation: Practices, powers, or states of affairs that exist in reality or practice, even if not legally or officially recognized, such as racial segregation persisting through social practices and socioeconomic factors after laws prohibiting it are passed.
Restrictive covenants: Legal agreements that restrict property use, historically used to prohibit certain racial or ethnic groups from residing in specific neighborhoods, thereby contributing to patterns of segregation.
Blockbusting: A real estate practice where agents exploited racist fears of neighborhood change to buy housing cheaply from white owners and then sold it at higher prices to Black families desperate for housing, exacerbating segregation.
Racialization of space/spatialization of race (summary): The interplay where race and racism significantly shape urban spaces, influencing access, mobility, and opportunity for different communities through social, economic, and political factors.
Social Reproduction
Social Reproduction: The various ways the workforce is sustained and replenished under capitalism, including childbirth, child-rearing, and daily care (food, sleep, pleasure, regeneration of the body). It happens in homes and through institutions like healthcare, education, transportation, and housing systems.
Social reproduction in the city: Focuses on how life is maintained in urban environments, with urban landscapes shaping the terrain upon which social reproduction occurs and influencing a city's ability to function.
Gendered aspects of social reproduction: Highlights that the labor of social reproduction is disproportionately feminized and often unpaid or underpaid, reflecting shifts from the idealized "stay-at-home mother" of Fordism to the "working mother" of post-Fordism.
Intersectionality in social reproduction: Acknowledges that the burdens of social reproduction are not equally distributed across different class and race statuses, meaning categories of difference cannot be understood singularly and intersect to shape experiences.
World/Global Cities
Global cities: Key nodes in the global economy that function as centers for finance, commerce, culture, and innovation (e.g., New York, London, Tokyo).
World cities: Cities that exert influence over global affairs through socio-economic, political, and cultural practices, often experiencing rapid growth and transformation.
World cities approach (Friedmann and Wolff): Focused on identifying specific cities that served as "command and control" centers coordinating the global economy, forming an urban hierarchy of influence.
Global cities approach (Sassen): Advanced Friedmann and Wolff's work by emphasizing that "command and control" cities function as a system providing Advanced Producer Services and are characterized by significant inequality.
Globalizing cities: A term indicating that achieving or maintaining global city status is an ongoing goal or process for cities, rather than a fixed end-state, reflecting the dynamic nature of globalization and urbanization.
Urban Competition / Urban Entrepreneurialism
Entrepreneurial city: A shift from traditional urban governance models where cities actively compete for capital and investment by promoting unique identities and experiences.
Post-Fordist mode of production: Began in the mid-1970s, characterized by a focus on knowledge-based economies and the growth of services over mass production, leading to a new international division of labor.
Knowledge-based economy: An economic system increasingly dependent on knowledge, information, and high skill levels, with businesses and public sectors needing ready access to these resources.
Modes of economic competition (Harvey): Strategies cities use to gain competitive advantage, including clustered industries, consumption-oriented/cultural attractions, hosting command and control centers, and governmental redistribution/services.
Regional as scale of competition: Emphasizes regions with specialized districts (like Silicon Valley) where municipalities cooperate rather than compete, leading to polycentric urban forms and collaborative solutions.
Critiques of entrepreneurial governance: Raises questions about democratic control (often elite-led decision-making), contributions to gentrification, and whether economic policies truly benefit all community members.
Global Flows
Global flows: Refers to the various interconnections between cities beyond economic factors, including the movement of people, information, ideas, and sometimes illicit activities.
Policy mobilities: Studies the global spread of policies across different cities, analyzing how and why certain ideas become popular and how they mutate as they travel, demonstrating that policies are neither purely local nor global.
Gentrification
Gentrification: A complex process of neighborhood change where wealthier residents move in, often leading to the displacement of existing lower-income residents and significant alterations to the area's economic, social, and cultural character.
Rent gap thesis (Smith, 1979): Posits that gentrification occurs when a significant gap forms between the actual capitalized ground rent (income from current use) and the potential ground rent (income from the highest and best use) of a property, attracting investors to redevelop.
Cultural/consumptive reasons (Postmodernism) for gentrification: Attributes gentrification to the demands and characteristics of incoming gentrifiers, particularly those in professional and managerial occupations seeking specific urban experiences and lifestyles in a post-industrial economy.
Production and consumption in gentrification (Zukin): Explored how cultural desires for authenticity (e.g., for derelict loft spaces in NYC) created opportunities for capital investment, illustrating the interplay between cultural appeal and economic transformation.
Post-colonial interpretation of gentrification (Courthard): Argues that gentrification is not solely driven by capital or culture but also by racism and colonialism, drawing parallels between the historical dispossession of Indigenous peoples from land ("terra nullis") and their displacement from urban spaces ("urbs nullis").
Frontier Mythology in gentrification: The use of metaphors like "urban pioneers" or "new frontier" in gentrifying language, which implies redeveloping or creating something new from what is perceived as empty or neglected land, similar to colonial narratives.
Intersectional analysis in Gentrification: Examines how interlocking categories of difference (e.g., race, class, gender) mutually constitute identities and experiences, revealing how gentrification impacts specific marginalized groups through the interplay of various forms of oppression.
Geographies of gentrification: Encompasses various social and economic impacts of gentrification, including disinvestment (leading to feelings of degradation), the displacement of poor populations, loss of control over one's neighborhood, cultural displacement (rootshock), and relative deprivation.
Financialization
Financialization: The increasing influence of financial motives, markets, actors, and institutions in the operation of domestic and international economies, often applied to cities to describe the role of financial investment in urban environments and municipal services.
Neoliberalism and Financialization: Neoliberal policies, which promote market-oriented urban governance in the post-Fordist era, created the conditions for expanded financialization, leading to an increased use of public-private partnerships (PPPs).
Accumulation, speculation, and the Global Financial Crisis: Financialization is linked to capitalism's drive for capital accumulation and profitable returns. The 2008 financial crisis exemplified this, originating from speculation in urban real estate through sub-prime mortgages, illustrating a "boom and bust" effect.
Financialization and urban governance/services: Involves financial actors speculating in municipal services, often through the sale of future user fee revenues. This can impact democratic decision-making and policy options available to municipal governments.
Subprime mortgages: Loans given to borrowers categorized as having lower-than-prime credit (higher risk), who are then charged higher interest rates, playing a key role in the 2008 financial crisis when they were bundled and resold.
Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs)
Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs): Collaborations between government agencies and private companies to fund, build, and operate urban services or infrastructure projects. Under financialization, these are often owned and speculated on by financial actors, raising concerns about gentrification and social inequalities.
Shifting Conceptions of the Urban/Nature Relationship
Nature as separate from the city or as an escape from the city: The understanding that nature is something to be protected and incorporated into urban environments for harmony (positive environmentalism), or to be escaped to from urban life.
Nature as resource to conserve: A perspective where regions are planned based on their natural environments and resources, which should be preserved for their utility (e.g., resources for miners, woodmen, hunters, etc.).
Modern environmentalism: A shift to protecting nature for its inherent value, recognizing natural resource limits, and addressing negative environmental effects of economic activity, accelerated by the threat of climate change.
Urban Political Ecology (UPE)
Urban Political Ecology (UPE): A branch of urban geography emphasizing the interconnected relationships between society and nature, focusing on how social groups interact with nature and the power dynamics influencing resource distribution, ecological practices, and policy impacts on marginalized communities.
Planning for Sustainable Cities / Urban Sustainability Fix
Sustainable city: An urban environment that integrates ecological systems, incorporates green spaces, and employs sustainable practices to enhance both urban living and environmental health.
Urban sustainability fix: The selective incorporation of environmental goals within cities, determined by the balance of pressures for and against environmental policy, aiming for sustainability while often navigating competing interests.
Anthropocene
Anthropocene: While not explicitly defined in the notes, it is implied as a geological epoch marked by significant human impact on Earth's geology and ecosystems, highlighting that the planet's ecosystems are affected by human activity.
Abolition Ecologies
Abolition Ecologies: A concept that emphasizes addressing systemic inequalities and social injustices (like racism) within approaches to environmental sustainability, particularly how environmental hazards disproportionately impact marginalized communities.
Engels' "The Housing Question"
Engels' "The Housing Question": Argues that capitalist housing markets inherently fail to provide enough affordable housing for the poor and working class because profit margins prioritize housing for the wealthy, leading to a perpetual surplus for the rich and a deficit for other socioeconomic groups.
Commodification of Housing
Commodification of housing: Refers to the extreme degree to which housing is treated as a commodity in real estate markets, prioritizing its function as a financial asset over its role as a human right.
Use value: The inherent value of a commodity that is derived from its utility or practical function to consumers (e.g., air provides use value for breathing; a house provides shelter).
Exchange value: The value a commodity holds in exchange for an equally valuable different commodity in the market. For housing, its exchange value (price) represents a complex social relationship influenced by market dynamics and societal structures.
Role of Urban Crises / Relationship to Housing
Urban crises: Manifest simultaneously in national/international political contexts and within urban spaces, having urban origins and effects. They also present opportunities, though who benefits is subject to urban politics.
Crises of capital (Harvey): Reoccurring crises in capitalist systems where real estate and urban infrastructure become key assets in financial investment flows, making them vulnerable to financial crises and leading to "boom and bust" cycles in housing and urban development.
Platform Urbanism / Algorithmic Rents
Platform technologies and platform capitalism: Involves platforms (like Airbnb, Uber) mediating social interactions and economic transactions, effectively turning services into commodified offerings. This spreads rentier relations and concentrates control and economic value among a few large corporations.
Airbnb: A platform that connects property owners (landlords) with short-term guests, increasing the profitability of properties but often reducing the supply of long-term rental housing stock and impacting urban life and affordability.
Decommodified Housing Case Studies
Homeownership in the US: Grounded in the idea of individual property ownership as a foundational right, culturally linked to adulthood and financial achievement, and supported by widespread mortgage debt as a state project with anti-Communist roots.
Public housing (post-war context): Government initiatives, particularly after WWII, aimed at providing affordable housing for veterans and expanding families, addressing housing shortages and promoting urban development.
Urban "underclass": evolution of a concept: Initially (early 1960s, Myrdal), explained by structural conditions of persistent unemployment and poverty. Later (1967-1970s), shifted to behavioral explanations, attributing poverty to cultural pathologies of certain racial/ethnic groups.
Territorial stigmatization: The process where a specific urban area or geography becomes negatively associated with stereotypes about the traits of its residents.
Red Vienna (1919-1934): A social experiment in municipal socialist housing, characterized by city-owned, well-maintained, and affordable housing fully funded through luxury
At the conclusion of this course, students will be able to:
Articulate the rationale for the development of several approaches to understanding the urban and how it is possible to gain insights from each.
The notes demonstrate various approaches to understanding cities, acknowledging that "what makes a city a city is always changing and up for debate." The course emphasizes that cities can be defined through "population metrics, economic regions, sociocultural imaginations, administrative boundaries," and each definition has "strengths and weaknesses." This outcome is supported by the exploration of diverse analytical frameworks, such as the geographical approach (studying space as absolute and relational, place, and scale), as well as critical geographic approaches including structuralism, postmodernism, and postcolonialism, which provide insights by focusing on different aspects like economic systems, human difference, and the ongoing effects of colonialism.
Define the concepts of space, place, scale, urbanization, urbanism and planning and understand how they help us study cities from a geographic perspective.
The notes provide explicit definitions for these core concepts. "Space" is defined as a "multifaceted concept that encompasses not only physical dimensions but also social and cultural meanings," including "absolute space," "relational space," and "social space." "Place" refers to "the meaning that people give locations based on their experiences, emotions, and social interactions." "Scale" involves "the levels of analysis from the local to the global," covering municipal to global levels. "Urbanization" is the "clustering of population in increasingly large, dense, and diverse, cities over time." "Urbanism" is described as "a character or way of life associated with residence in an urban area." "Urban planning" is a "process of designing and managing change in the built environment." These concepts are fundamental to a geographical approach, as geographers "emphasize the role of space in their study of a variety of processes."
Describe current urbanization trends and projects for countries around the world, with a particular knowledge of the post WWII North American urban context.
The notes highlight significant global urbanization trends, stating that "more than half the world's population" lives in cities and is projected to reach "more than five billion people" by 2030, with a dramatic increase in cities with over 10 million people from 2 in 1950 to a projected 27 by 2025. For the post-WWII North American context, the notes discuss the "Long boom' after World War II" leading to "suburbanization" and the growth of "autos and highways." It also touches on government initiatives like "public housing: post-war context" aimed at veterans and families, though also acknowledges historical practices like "Redlining" which embedded racial discrimination into landscapes.
Critically discuss a variety of materials related to city development and effectively communicate ideas to different audiences.
The course materials themselves exemplify this, presenting diverse perspectives on topics like gentrification (e.g., "natural processes," "economic reasons," "cultural reasons," "racist and colonial logics") and urban governance (e.g., "Critiques of entrepreneurial governance"). The various theories and historical accounts, such as "Engels' \"The Housing Question\"" and "Broken World Thinking," require students to analyze differing viewpoints on urban problems and solutions. The critical approach taken throughout the notes, questioning issues like "cities for whom?" and the uneven impacts of policies, prepares students to engage in informed and effective discussions.Gain first-hand experience with field-based methods of urban research.
The syllabus explicitly states that "Project Content - field research methods and approaches to understanding the city" will be covered. Although the detailed methods are not in the main notes, it is a stated learning outcome, indicating practical application of urban research techniques.Collaborate with peers through problem-based learning activities to explore concepts and research related to city development.
This learning outcome is directly stated in the syllabus, emphasizing the pedagogical approach taken in the course. It implies that students will work together on challenges related to city development, enhancing their understanding through shared inquiry and problem-solving.
1. Cities
Definition: Complex entities defined by population, economic regions, socio-cultural imaginations, and administrative boundaries.
Importance:
Most people live in cities; central for economic and cultural production.
Sites of challenges: homelessness, climate crises, urban austerity.
Sites of solutions, social movements, and lived experience.
Urban Studies Question: “Cities for whom?” → Consider inequalities, planning outcomes, and social reproduction.
2. Urban Geography
Origins & Concepts:
Space: Physical + socially produced.
Absolute space: fixed, mathematical.
Relational space: created through human relationships.
Social space: shaped by culture, society, and politics.
Place: Meaning attached to locations by people.
Scale: Levels of analysis (local → global).
Socio-spatial dialectic: People shape space; spaces shape people.
Approaches: Structural, post-colonial, critical geography.
Key Example: Black Lives Matter and urban spatial activism → shows socio-spatial dialectic in action.
3. Urban Planning
Origins: Industrial cities → Garden Cities → Authoritarian approaches.
Concepts:
Zoning, official/secondary plans, rational planning, advocacy planning, communicative planning.
Modernist vs. Indigenous approaches (planning as transhistorical).
Thinkers: Jane Jacobs (bottom-up urbanism), David Harvey (economics & city).
Critiques: Universalist planning can erase indigenous histories; power imbalance in urban decision-making.
4. Racialization of Space / Social Reproduction
Racialization of Space:
Segregation, redlining, restrictive covenants, blockbusting, de jure/de facto segregation.
Spatialization of race → urban spaces are socially and politically coded.
Social Reproduction:
Sustaining the workforce: childcare, health, education, daily care.
Urban settings influence who performs reproduction and how.
Gendered & intersectional dimensions: feminized, often unpaid labor.
5. Global & World Cities
Global Cities (Sassen): Command centers for finance, commerce, culture.
World Cities (Friedmann & Wolff): Influence global affairs, coordinate economy.
Globalizing Cities: Continuous process to maintain status.
6. Urban Competition / Entrepreneurialism
Entrepreneurial City: Cities compete for capital and investment; promote identity and experiences.
Post-Fordist Economy: Knowledge-based, service-oriented.
Harvey’s Modes of Competition: Clustered industries, cultural attractions, redistribution services.
Critiques: Elite-led governance, gentrification, unequal benefits.
7. Global Flows & Policy Mobilities
Global Flows: Movement of people, ideas, info, and capital.
Policy Mobilities: Policies travel globally → mutate across local contexts.
8. Gentrification
Rent Gap Thesis (Smith): Gap between actual vs. potential rent → triggers redevelopment.
Cultural/Consumptive Explanations: Desire for authenticity, professional lifestyles (Zukin).
Post-Colonial Lens: Displacement mirrors historical dispossession (Courthard).
Frontier Mythology: “Urban pioneers” → colonial narratives.
Geographies of Gentrification: Disinvestment, root shock, relative deprivation, cultural displacement.
Example: Role in Breonna Taylor case → social and spatial inequities.
9. Financialization & Neoliberal Urbanism
Financialization: City as investment asset → speculation in housing & infrastructure.
Neoliberal Policies: Public-private partnerships (PPPs), urban austerity.
Subprime Crisis: Example of speculative finance impacting housing and cities.
PPPs: Can accelerate gentrification but also improve efficiency.
10. Urban-Nature Relations & Sustainability
Perspectives:
Nature separate from city (escape), nature as resource, modern environmentalism.
Urban Political Ecology: Interconnections between society and nature; power in resource access.
Urban Sustainability Fix: Partial integration of environmental goals; often limited by politics.
Abolition Ecologies: Address systemic inequities in environmental policy.
11. Housing & Commodification
Engels’ Housing Question: Capitalist markets fail to provide affordable housing.
Commodification: Housing as financial asset vs. human right.
Use value: Shelter.
Exchange value: Market price.
Platform Urbanism: Airbnb, algorithmic rents → reduces affordable housing stock.
Decommodified Housing: Public housing (post-war), Red Vienna (municipal socialism).
Urban Crises: Booms & busts → impact on housing affordability.
12. Key Methods
Field Research: Observations, mapping, interviews to understand urban spaces.
Collaborative Learning: Problem-based exercises → explore city development issues.
13. Core Concepts Quick Definitions (Good for Definitions Section)
Term | Definition |
|---|---|
Urbanization | Clustering of population in cities over time. |
Urbanism | Way of life associated with city living. |
Urban Planning | Process of designing & managing change in built environment. |
Space | Physical + social dimensions (absolute, relational, social). |
Place | Meaning attached to location by people. |
Scale | Levels of analysis (local → global). |
Socio-spatial Dialectic | Two-way interaction: people shape spaces, spaces shape people. |
14. Potential Essay/Short Answer Themes
Compare and contrast urban planning approaches (modernist vs Indigenous).
Analyze gentrification through rent gap, cultural, and post-colonial lenses.
Discuss financialization and neoliberal urban governance impacts.
Role of global cities and competition in shaping urban economies.
Urban-nature relationships and political ecology in sustainability.
Tips for Exam
Multiple choice: focus on definitions, thinkers, key processes.
Definitions: 1-2 sentences → clear and precise.
Short answer: use examples + concepts together.
Long essay: pick a topic you can connect with multiple frameworks (e.g., gentrification + policy + finance + race).
Step 4: Prioritize High-Impact Topics
Focus on core concepts + examples that appear repeatedly in your notes:
High-priority terms & concepts:
Space, place, scale, socio-spatial dialectic
Urban planning approaches: rational, advocacy, communicative, Indigenous
Gentrification (rent gap, cultural, post-colonial)
Financialization, PPPs, neoliberal urban governance
Global cities, urban competition, entrepreneurial city
Social reproduction, racialization of space
Urban political ecology, sustainability, Anthropocene
Examples to memorize:
Breonna Taylor / racialized space
Airbnb / platform urbanism
Red Vienna / municipal socialist housing
Jane Jacobs vs David Harvey (planning & economy)
Step 5: Active Review & Self-Test
Day before exam:
Quick flashcard review (15–20 min)
Practice one short answer + essay outline
Re-read key examples & case studies
Visualize how you would organize essay under time constraints
Exam Strategy:
Multiple choice: 1.5 min per question, guess if unsure, flag for review.
Definitions: Be concise, clear, and precise (2 sentences).
Short answer: Use 1–2 examples + 2–3 concepts.
Essay: Outline first (3–5 min), integrate frameworks, use 2–3 examples per paragraph, keep argument coherent.
✅ Key Success Principles
Active recall beats passive reading – quiz, write, explain.
Connect concepts + examples – don’t memorize in isolation.
Time yourself – simulate the actual exam pace.
Prioritize recurring themes – gentrification, financialization, planning, social reproduction, urban/nature relations.
Visual tools – diagrams, concept maps, tables for fast review.
Final exam structure:
Final Exam Structure + timing
Structure
10 multiple choice question
Definitions (3)
1 short answer questions (2 options choose 1)
1 long essay question (3 or 4 options, choose 1)
Timing
Total time for exam available: 120 mins
Average length test is designed to take for average student: 80 mins (= 40 mins extra buffer time)
Approximate amount of time per section:
Multiple choice - should take about 15 mins
Definitions - approx. 15 mins should be about 2 setences
Short Answer - approx. 20 mins
Long Essay - 30 mins for entire essay
Examples of Themes and concepts covered (non-exhaustive list)
Cities - what are they, how are they studies, why should you care, cities for whom?
Basically just define a city in the unit 1, just essentially why did we review this topic in Unit 1, as it sets the foundation for understanding the complexities of urban environments and our roles within them.
Urban Geography - origins, concepts (eg space, place, scale, sociospatial dialectic, etc), approches (structural, post-colonial etc)
Urban Planning - origins (industrial cities, garden cities vs authoritarian planning approachs), concepts (eg zoning, official and secondary plans, etc), approches (eg modern planning, rational planning, communicative planning indigenous planning, Jane Jacobs vs David Harvey understandings of economies and city, etc)
Racialization of space/spatialization of race + examples
Social reproduction + examples
Film Content - eg public housing in the US, urban design, urban austerity
Project Content - field research methods and approaches to understanding the city
Continued
World/Global Cities, city rankings
Urban competition
Urban entrepreneurialsm
Free trade, Global flows + examples
Policy mobilities + examples
Gentrification
a rent gap explanation, culture explanation, post-colonial interpretation, historic preservation as selective nostalgia, geographies of gentrification (relative deprivation, root shock, etc) the role of gentrification in Breonna Taylor's murder
Financialization,
Post-Fordist city/entrepreneurial city, neoliberalism/neoliberal urban governance, PPPs, Global financial/subprime crisis impacts on cities, urban austerity,
Review PPPs (Public-Private Partnerships)
and their implications for urban infrastructure development, emphasizing how they can facilitate gentrification and exacerbate social inequalities while also addressing the potential benefits they bring in terms of efficiency and innovation in service delivery.
arttuciulate for rhe development of several approaches to understand ing the urban and how it is possible togain insight from eac
look at learning outcomes
the red gap, this was mainly facoties and the lower ring was mainly for poor communities, and if those people dont match what the inner suburb is happening the CBC gap then the rent would go down and people seems disinvested and rent went lower, and the potential would be higher then the current charged or right now due to dis investment.
Continued
Shifting conceptions of urban/nature relationship
Urban political ecology
Planning for sustainable cities/Urban sustainability fix
Anthropocene, abolition ecologies
Engles' The Housing Question
Exchange value vs Use value, (hyper)commodification of housing
Role of urban crises/relationship to housing
Platform Urbanism/algorithmic rents + examples
Decommodified Housing case studies
THE U.S. already tried to do this but also look into this
Right to the city?
2 blue books, and pencils
Syllabus:
Learning Outcomes
At the conclusion of this course, students wil be able to:
Ariculate the rationale for the development of several approaches to understanding the urban and how it is possible to gain insights from each. (highly definite)
Define the concepts of space, place, scale, urbanization, urbanism and planning and understand how they help us study cities from a geographic perspective (highly definite)
Describe current urbanization trends and projects for countries around the world, with a particular knowledge of the post WWiI North American urban context
Critically discuss a variety of materials related to city development and effectively communicate ideas to different audiences
Gain first hand experience with field-based methods of urban research.
Collaborate with peers through problem-based learing activities to explore concepts and research related to city development
Core Courses - Social & Behavioral Science
Social & Behavioral Science This course may be used to fulfil the social and behavioral sciences component of the university Core
Top
urban processes have a spatial act and spatial dynamic as well as the intertweining
disospaital and spatial dialect and you can see this in BLACK LIVES MATTER, DEI social movement with a socially backlash and a rise of power and a removable of dei practices.
Cities
Cities: Urban studies examines the complex dynamics of cities, focusing on social, economic, and spatial aspects. They are complex entities that can be defined by population metrics, economic regions, socio-cultural imaginations, and administrative boundaries. Cities are crucial because many people live in them, they hold significant public capital, face tough challenges like homelessness and climate crisis production/experience, and are sites where problems, solutions, and the "messiness of life" unfold.
Urban Geography
Urban Geography: Explains the distribution of towns and cities, as well as the similarities and differences within and between them, emphasizing the role of space in various processes.
Space: A multifaceted concept that is both physical and socially produced, encompassing physical dimensions, social, and cultural meanings influenced by human interactions and societal structures.
Absolute space: A mathematical understanding of space where objects exist in relation to each other.
Relational space: Space that is produced and given meaning by people and the relationships between places, functioning as a dynamic concept shaped by cultural, economic, and political contexts rather than a mere backdrop.
Social space: Refers to how societal interactions and cultural practices shape human understanding and experience of space, highlighting the dynamic nature of human relationships within spatial contexts.
Place: The meaning people give to locations based on their experiences, emotions, and social interactions, transforming a geographical entity into a significant part of their identity and culture.
Scale: The levels of analysis from the local to the global, including municipal, state, and federal levels in politics, and global, world regional, state, regional, provincial, metropolitan areas, local/municipal, and neighborhoods in geography.
Socio-spatial dialectic: A continuous two-way process where people create and modify urban spaces while simultaneously being conditioned by the spaces in which they live and work, emphasizing the dynamic interplay between individual agency and structural influences.
Urban Planning
Urban Planning: A future-oriented process of designing and managing change in the built environment, requiring a comprehensive understanding of social, economic, and environmental factors.
Planning as transhistorical: The idea that some form of urban planning has existed as long as human settlements, spanning multiple eras of human history.
Planning as a modern profession: Originated from European progressivism, modernism, and utopian thinking during the Industrial Revolution, characterized by tensions and numerous paradigm shifts.
Rational planning model: Associated with Edward Banfield, this approach promoted planning as an objective science, though it quickly faced challenges in the 1960s and 1970s for failing to account for social complexities.
Advocacy planning: Proposed by Davidoff (1965), it recognizes power imbalances in planning and suggests planners act as advocates for marginalized groups.
Communicative turn in planning: Key thinkers like John Forester and Patsy Healey shifted from advocacy planning, viewing planners as politically articulate actors and guides rather than just experts.
Critiques of universalism in planning: Argues that planning institutions and by-laws are often based on and enforce dominant cultural norms, potentially erasing Indigenous histories of land use and neglecting the "right to difference" in the city.
Indigenous planning: Refers to the long-standing, community-based approaches to land use and environmental stewardship by Indigenous peoples prior to, and often in contrast with, modern professional planning practices.
Racialization of Space / Spatialization of Race
Landscapes of segregation: Urban settings where racial and ethnic minorities are often confined to specific areas, leading to limited access to resources and opportunities, thus reinforcing social inequalities.
Redlining: A practice where government maps rated lending risks to different neighborhoods, embedding racial discrimination into the urban landscape and contributing to racial wealth disparities.
De jure segregation: Practices, standards, or powers that are legally established and officially recognized by law, such as "Jim Crow laws," which explicitly separated Black and white Americans.
De facto segregation: Practices, powers, or states of affairs that exist in reality or practice, even if not legally or officially recognized, such as racial segregation persisting through social practices and socioeconomic factors after laws prohibiting it are passed.
Restrictive covenants: Legal agreements that restrict property use, historically used to prohibit certain racial or ethnic groups from residing in specific neighborhoods, thereby contributing to patterns of segregation.
Blockbusting: A real estate practice where agents exploited racist fears of neighborhood change to buy housing cheaply from white owners and then sold it at higher prices to Black families desperate for housing, exacerbating segregation.
Racialization of space/spatialization of race (summary): The interplay where race and racism significantly shape urban spaces, influencing access, mobility, and opportunity for different communities through social, economic, and political factors.
Social Reproduction
Social Reproduction: The various ways the workforce is sustained and replenished under capitalism, including childbirth, child-rearing, and daily care (food, sleep, pleasure, regeneration of the body). It happens in homes and through institutions like healthcare, education, transportation, and housing systems.
Social reproduction in the city: Focuses on how life is maintained in urban environments, with urban landscapes shaping the terrain upon which social reproduction occurs and influencing a city's ability to function.
Gendered aspects of social reproduction: Highlights that the labor of social reproduction is disproportionately feminized and often unpaid or underpaid, reflecting shifts from the idealized "stay-at-home mother" of Fordism to the "working mother" of post-Fordism.
Intersectionality in social reproduction: Acknowledges that the burdens of social reproduction are not equally distributed across different class and race statuses, meaning categories of difference cannot be understood singularly and intersect to shape experiences.
World/Global Cities
Global cities: Key nodes in the global economy that function as centers for finance, commerce, culture, and innovation (e.g., New York, London, Tokyo).
World cities: Cities that exert influence over global affairs through socio-economic, political, and cultural practices, often experiencing rapid growth and transformation.
World cities approach (Friedmann and Wolff): Focused on identifying specific cities that served as "command and control" centers coordinating the global economy, forming an urban hierarchy of influence.
Global cities approach (Sassen): Advanced Friedmann and Wolff's work by emphasizing that "command and control" cities function as a system providing Advanced Producer Services and are characterized by significant inequality.
Globalizing cities: A term indicating that achieving or maintaining global city status is an ongoing goal or process for cities, rather than a fixed end-state, reflecting the dynamic nature of globalization and urbanization.
Urban Competition / Urban Entrepreneurialism
Entrepreneurial city: A shift from traditional urban governance models where cities actively compete for capital and investment by promoting unique identities and experiences.
Post-Fordist mode of production: Began in the mid-1970s, characterized by a focus on knowledge-based economies and the growth of services over mass production, leading to a new international division of labor.
Knowledge-based economy: An economic system increasingly dependent on knowledge, information, and high skill levels, with businesses and public sectors needing ready access to these resources.
Modes of economic competition (Harvey): Strategies cities use to gain competitive advantage, including clustered industries, consumption-oriented/cultural attractions, hosting command and control centers, and governmental redistribution/services.
Regional as scale of competition: Emphasizes regions with specialized districts (like Silicon Valley) where municipalities cooperate rather than compete, leading to polycentric urban forms and collaborative solutions.
Critiques of entrepreneurial governance: Raises questions about democratic control (often elite-led decision-making), contributions to gentrification, and whether economic policies truly benefit all community members.
Global Flows
Global flows: Refers to the various interconnections between cities beyond economic factors, including the movement of people, information, ideas, and sometimes illicit activities.
Policy mobilities: Studies the global spread of policies across different cities, analyzing how and why certain ideas become popular and how they mutate as they travel, demonstrating that policies are neither purely local nor global.
Gentrification
Gentrification: A complex process of neighborhood change where wealthier residents move in, often leading to the displacement of existing lower-income residents and significant alterations to the area's economic, social, and cultural character.
Rent gap thesis (Smith, 1979): Posits that gentrification occurs when a significant gap forms between the actual capitalized ground rent (income from current use) and the potential ground rent (income from the highest and best use) of a property, attracting investors to redevelop.
Cultural/consumptive reasons (Postmodernism) for gentrification: Attributes gentrification to the demands and characteristics of incoming gentrifiers, particularly those in professional and managerial occupations seeking specific urban experiences and lifestyles in a post-industrial economy.
Production and consumption in gentrification (Zukin): Explored how cultural desires for authenticity (e.g., for derelict loft spaces in NYC) created opportunities for capital investment, illustrating the interplay between cultural appeal and economic transformation.
Post-colonial interpretation of gentrification (Courthard): Argues that gentrification is not solely driven by capital or culture but also by racism and colonialism, drawing parallels between the historical dispossession of Indigenous peoples from land ("terra nullis") and their displacement from urban spaces ("urbs nullis").
Frontier Mythology in gentrification: The use of metaphors like "urban pioneers" or "new frontier" in gentrifying language, which implies redeveloping or creating something new from what is perceived as empty or neglected land, similar to colonial narratives.
Intersectional analysis in Gentrification: Examines how interlocking categories of difference (e.g., race, class, gender) mutually constitute identities and experiences, revealing how gentrification impacts specific marginalized groups through the interplay of various forms of oppression.
Geographies of gentrification: Encompasses various social and economic impacts of gentrification, including disinvestment (leading to feelings of degradation), the displacement of poor populations, loss of control over one's neighborhood, cultural displacement (rootshock), and relative deprivation.
Financialization
Financialization: The increasing influence of financial motives, markets, actors, and institutions in the operation of domestic and international economies, often applied to cities to describe the role of financial investment in urban environments and municipal services.
Neoliberalism and Financialization: Neoliberal policies, which promote market-oriented urban governance in the post-Fordist era, created the conditions for expanded financialization, leading to an increased use of public-private partnerships (PPPs).
Accumulation, speculation, and the Global Financial Crisis: Financialization is linked to capitalism's drive for capital accumulation and profitable returns. The 2008 financial crisis exemplified this, originating from speculation in urban real estate through sub-prime mortgages, illustrating a "boom and bust" effect.
Financialization and urban governance/services: Involves financial actors speculating in municipal services, often through the sale of future user fee revenues. This can impact democratic decision-making and policy options available to municipal governments.
Subprime mortgages: Loans given to borrowers categorized as having lower-than-prime credit (higher risk), who are then charged higher interest rates, playing a key role in the 2008 financial crisis when they were bundled and resold.
Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs)
Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs): Collaborations between government agencies and private companies to fund, build, and operate urban services or infrastructure projects. Under financialization, these are often owned and speculated on by financial actors, raising concerns about gentrification and social inequalities.
Shifting Conceptions of the Urban/Nature Relationship
Nature as separate from the city or as an escape from the city: The understanding that nature is something to be protected and incorporated into urban environments for harmony (positive environmentalism), or to be escaped to from urban life.
Nature as resource to conserve: A perspective where regions are planned based on their natural environments and resources, which should be preserved for their utility (e.g., resources for miners, woodmen, hunters, etc.).
Modern environmentalism: A shift to protecting nature for its inherent value, recognizing natural resource limits, and addressing negative environmental effects of economic activity, accelerated by the threat of climate change.
Urban Political Ecology (UPE)
Urban Political Ecology (UPE): A branch of urban geography emphasizing the interconnected relationships between society and nature, focusing on how social groups interact with nature and the power dynamics influencing resource distribution, ecological practices, and policy impacts on marginalized communities.
Planning for Sustainable Cities / Urban Sustainability Fix
Sustainable city: An urban environment that integrates ecological systems, incorporates green spaces, and employs sustainable practices to enhance both urban living and environmental health.
Urban sustainability fix: The selective incorporation of environmental goals within cities, determined by the balance of pressures for and against environmental policy, aiming for sustainability while often navigating competing interests.
Anthropocene
Anthropocene: While not explicitly defined in the notes, it is implied as a geological epoch marked by significant human impact on Earth's geology and ecosystems, highlighting that the planet's ecosystems are affected by human activity.
Abolition Ecologies
Abolition Ecologies: A concept that emphasizes addressing systemic inequalities and social injustices (like racism) within approaches to environmental sustainability, particularly how environmental hazards disproportionately impact marginalized communities.
Engels' "The Housing Question"
Engels' "The Housing Question": Argues that capitalist housing markets inherently fail to provide enough affordable housing for the poor and working class because profit margins prioritize housing for the wealthy, leading to a perpetual surplus for the rich and a deficit for other socioeconomic groups.
Commodification of Housing
Commodification of housing: Refers to the extreme degree to which housing is treated as a commodity in real estate markets, prioritizing its function as a financial asset over its role as a human right.
Use value: The inherent value of a commodity that is derived from its utility or practical function to consumers (e.g., air provides use value for breathing; a house provides shelter).
Exchange value: The value a commodity holds in exchange for an equally valuable different commodity in the market. For housing, its exchange value (price) represents a complex social relationship influenced by market dynamics and societal structures.
Role of Urban Crises / Relationship to Housing
Urban crises: Manifest simultaneously in national/international political contexts and within urban spaces, having urban origins and effects. They also present opportunities, though who benefits is subject to urban politics.
Crises of capital (Harvey): Reoccurring crises in capitalist systems where real estate and urban infrastructure become key assets in financial investment flows, making them vulnerable to financial crises and leading to "boom and bust" cycles in housing and urban development.
Platform Urbanism / Algorithmic Rents
Platform technologies and platform capitalism: Involves platforms (like Airbnb, Uber) mediating social interactions and economic transactions, effectively turning services into commodified offerings. This spreads rentier relations and concentrates control and economic value among a few large corporations.
Airbnb: A platform that connects property owners (landlords) with short-term guests, increasing the profitability of properties but often reducing the supply of long-term rental housing stock and impacting urban life and affordability.
Decommodified Housing Case Studies
Homeownership in the US: Grounded in the idea of individual property ownership as a foundational right, culturally linked to adulthood and financial achievement, and supported by widespread mortgage debt as a state project with anti-Communist roots.
Public housing (post-war context): Government initiatives, particularly after WWII, aimed at providing affordable housing for veterans and expanding families, addressing housing shortages and promoting urban development.
Urban "underclass": evolution of a concept: Initially (early 1960s, Myrdal), explained by structural conditions of persistent unemployment and poverty. Later (1967-1970s), shifted to behavioral explanations, attributing poverty to cultural pathologies of certain racial/ethnic groups.
Territorial stigmatization: The process where a specific urban area or geography becomes negatively associated with stereotypes about the traits of its residents.
Red Vienna (1919-1934): A social experiment in municipal socialist housing, characterized by city-owned, well-maintained, and affordable housing fully funded through luxury
At the conclusion of this course, students will be able to:
Articulate the rationale for the development of several approaches to understanding the urban and how it is possible to gain insights from each.
The notes demonstrate various approaches to understanding cities, acknowledging that "what makes a city a city is always changing and up for debate." The course emphasizes that cities can be defined through "population metrics, economic regions, sociocultural imaginations, administrative boundaries," and each definition has "strengths and weaknesses." This outcome is supported by the exploration of diverse analytical frameworks, such as the geographical approach (studying space as absolute and relational, place, and scale), as well as critical geographic approaches including structuralism, postmodernism, and postcolonialism, which provide insights by focusing on different aspects like economic systems, human difference, and the ongoing effects of colonialism.
Define the concepts of space, place, scale, urbanization, urbanism and planning and understand how they help us study cities from a geographic perspective.
The notes provide explicit definitions for these core concepts. "Space" is defined as a "multifaceted concept that encompasses not only physical dimensions but also social and cultural meanings," including "absolute space," "relational space," and "social space." "Place" refers to "the meaning that people give locations based on their experiences, emotions, and social interactions." "Scale" involves "the levels of analysis from the local to the global," covering municipal to global levels. "Urbanization" is the "clustering of population in increasingly large, dense, and diverse, cities over time." "Urbanism" is described as "a character or way of life associated with residence in an urban area." "Urban planning" is a "process of designing and managing change in the built environment." These concepts are fundamental to a geographical approach, as geographers "emphasize the role of space in their study of a variety of processes."
Describe current urbanization trends and projects for countries around the world, with a particular knowledge of the post WWII North American urban context.
The notes highlight significant global urbanization trends, stating that "more than half the world's population" lives in cities and is projected to reach "more than five billion people" by 2030, with a dramatic increase in cities with over 10 million people from 2 in 1950 to a projected 27 by 2025. For the post-WWII North American context, the notes discuss the "Long boom' after World War II" leading to "suburbanization" and the growth of "autos and highways." It also touches on government initiatives like "public housing: post-war context" aimed at veterans and families, though also acknowledges historical practices like "Redlining" which embedded racial discrimination into landscapes.
Critically discuss a variety of materials related to city development and effectively communicate ideas to different audiences.
The course materials themselves exemplify this, presenting diverse perspectives on topics like gentrification (e.g., "natural processes," "economic reasons," "cultural reasons," "racist and colonial logics") and urban governance (e.g., "Critiques of entrepreneurial governance"). The various theories and historical accounts, such as "Engels' \"The Housing Question\"" and "Broken World Thinking," require students to analyze differing viewpoints on urban problems and solutions. The critical approach taken throughout the notes, questioning issues like "cities for whom?" and the uneven impacts of policies, prepares students to engage in informed and effective discussions.Gain first-hand experience with field-based methods of urban research.
The syllabus explicitly states that "Project Content - field research methods and approaches to understanding the city" will be covered. Although the detailed methods are not in the main notes, it is a stated learning outcome, indicating practical application of urban research techniques.Collaborate with peers through problem-based learning activities to explore concepts and research related to city development.
This learning outcome is directly stated in the syllabus, emphasizing the pedagogical approach taken in the course. It implies that students will work together on challenges related to city development, enhancing their understanding through shared inquiry and problem-solving.