Slumdog Cities: Rethinking Subaltern Urbanism

Abstract

This article is an intervention in the epistemologies and methodologies of urban studies. It seeks to understand and transform the ways in which the cities of the global'Across a filthy, rubbish-filled creek we enter the slum's heaving residential area, treading carefully to ensure we do not step in human sewage. Live wires hang from wobbly walls; we crouch through corridor-like passages between houses made from reclaimed rubble as the sky disappears above our heads. Behind flimsy doorway curtains we spy babies sleeping on dirty mattresses in tiny single room homes, mothers busy washing, cooking and cleaning.The few hours I spend touring Mumbai's teeming Dharavi slum are uncomfortable and upsetting, teetering on voyeuristic. They are also among the most uplifting of my life.Instead of a neighbourhood characterised by misery, I find a bustling and enterprising place, packed with smallscale industries defying their circumstances to flourish amidst the squalor. Rather than pity, I am inspired by man's alchemic ability to thrive when the chips are down. ' Crerar (2010)

Methodological Challenges in Urban Food Systems Research: Case Study of Local Food Institutions in South Africa

“…In addition, given the range of informal livelihood strategies that urban residents utilize to access food across the globe, new methods are needed to understand the innovative ways that people navigate pathways to basic needs [39,40]. As noted by scholars [1,15], city dwellers have invented new means of accessing food beyond the market economy.…”

Canaã dos Carajás: um laboratório sobre as circunstâncias da urbanização, na periferia global e no alvorecer do século XXI

“…Por este motivo preconizam a criação de uma nova epistemologia do urbano capaz de universalizar o conceito e oferecer fundamentos para a emergência de uma teoria urbana critica renovada (BREnnER, 2013;2014;BREnnER;SChIMDt, 2015). no outro extremo, pesquisadoras ativistas destacam casos indianos e sul-africanos em defesa de uma abordagem anticolonialista, ou seja, há a necessidade de construção de novos conceitos para a caracterização dos processos vivenciados no Sul Global, face à forte contaminação do debate corrente pelas formas de pensar e pelas concepções de desenvolvimento hegemônicas (WAtSOn, 2009;ROBInSOn, 2011;ROy, 2011).…”

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