The Global City versus the City of Neighborhoods: Spatial Practice, Cognitive Maps, and the Aesthetics of Urban Conflict

Abstract

Political‐economy, which conceptualizes space as a resource over which different groups struggle, has long been the dominant perspective in the study of urban conflict. However space is also a cultural object from which actors derive particular meanings. In order to understand how meaningful interpretations of space give rise to urban conflict, this paper examines the architectural expansions of two Toronto museums. Both projects were fiercely opposed by local creative and professional class residents—a group who might be expected to welcome elite architecture and cultural investment. To explain the origins of this conflict, I demonstrate how the museum leadership and surrounding community understood the spatial context of the expansion projects in strikingly different ways. While the former group saw Toronto as a “global city” and looked to international landmarks for precedents, the latter saw Toronto as a “city of neighborhoods” and were more concerned with how the projects contributed to more mundane aspects of the neighborhoods such as parks and playgrounds. I attribute these different “aesthetic” interpretations to the distinct spatial practices and associated cognitive maps of each group.

On the Enactment of Roundabout Art: A Praxeological Analysis

“…In line with Theodore Schatzki (), a practice is understood as a nexus of doings and sayings that brings the individuals involved “into contact with objects, people, and events” (Patterson :168) in their everyday lives. A practice can be studied both by directing the attention to the performative carrying out of its activities through the individuals involved and by focusing on its constitutive organizing elements, where a distinction is made between specific understandings (how to do or say something), implicit or explicit rules, as well as specific leitmotifs in which human actors engage according to the situation and, in particular, to societal contexts (Schatzki ).…”

“…Certificates were presented, a message from the state government was read out, and the local music association provided musical accompaniment (ibid.). Last, but not least, “the seven fire brigades demonstrated numerous fire–fighting exercises” (NÖN 39/2005:16). Everyone involved had done their work.…”

Starchitects in Bohemia: An Exploration of Cultural Cities from the “Top-Down” and “Bottom-Up”

“…While important, these issues have tended to overshadow the characteristic that makes culture-led developments “cultural” in the first place: They serve as symbols that communicate meanings about place and identity. Growing evidence suggests, however, that cultural meanings have a significant impact on both the political (McGovern 2009; Miller and Silver 2015; Patterson 2016) and economic (Silver and Clark 2016; Silver and Miller 2013) characteristics of cities and neighborhoods. Thus, it is not only important that the cultural sector as a whole has gained prominence within urbanization; it is also important to account for particular types of culture-led development, the variable meanings they express, and the implications of those meanings for life in the city.…”

“…Similarly, Patterson (2016) demonstrated that the developers of two iconic projects in Toronto exhibited a more cosmopolitan sense of place than local residents, which led to conflict over how the projects should be designed in relation to their surrounding context.…”

Anatomy of Place-Making in the Context of the Communication Processes: A Story of one Community and one Square in a Post-Socialist City

“…Trying to describe the specificity of the former, Harvey (1996) indicated that a common phenomenon is the closing up of the people living in one area in order to prevent the invasion of socially unaccepted groups. If we add the activity of city authorities and city visitors, the participation of developers and other external entities in the city, it turns out that there are many exogenous factors causing social tensions in neighbourhood societies (Clark, Kearns et al 2016;Patterson 2016). When we complete this picture of potential tensions in neighbourhoods with internal differences -ethnic (Glikman, Semyonov 2012;Hanhörster, Weck 2016), social (Wu, Feng Hou et al 2011) and economic (Owens 2012), potential conflicts become practically inevitable (Buitrago 2013).…”