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Tag Archives: Geography

大卫·哈维的黄金时代

02 Thursday Dec 2021

Posted by Yimin in Academic, Reading

≈ 1 Comment

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critical, Geography, politics, theory, urban

Paris, 16 Jul 2018 (photo by Yimin Zhao)

巴黎是一种观念。

如果说,雨果在遥远的海岛上如此追忆的时候,所表达的主要是一种怀旧和乡愁,那么大卫·哈维则把这个观念变得更加理论化和可操作化。或者,更确切地说,他把巴黎变成了一种方法。

在一篇最新发表的论文中,哈维对自己的学术生涯做了明白晓畅的反思。他坦承道:

在阅读了马克思的《路易波拿巴的雾月十八日》和《法兰西内战》之后,我开始关切1848年革命和1871年公社之间的巴黎。我尤其对圣心大教堂的建筑和象征意义特别着迷,并开始将其作为令人愉快的副业进行研究。因此,在我逐步推进马克思研究的同时,之前所设想的针对城市化的历史地理研究也逐渐落脚在了第二帝国时期的巴黎。最终,巴黎项目变成了一种爱的劳动 (a labour of love),当周遭一切都变得糟糕的时候,它成为了我远离世界的喘息机会。

Harvey, 2021: p.4

正是在这一探索的延伸处,哈维明确界定了他的研究兴趣的内核所在:“对1848 年至 1871 年间巴黎的城市巨变进行历史地理唯物主义视角下的探询,并由此出发重新定向和推进马克思对资本运动规律的理论探索“ (p.4)。这一关切构成了他全部学术著作的核心推动力,也成为他选择自己最重要著作的准绳——在哈维自己看来,能够代表他的研究的两部著作分别是出版于1982年的 Limits to Capital 和出版于2003年的 Paris, Capital of Modernity(初稿是1985年出版的 Consciousness and the Urban Experience)。

这一选择着实有点出乎读者如我的意料。在我自己的阅读经验中,这两本书都没有被视作核心的理论文本,更多的时候是被当作某些著作的前传,或者某些理论的经验注脚。从中文世界的接受度来看,这两本书的影响力也明显逊色于《新自由主义简史》和之后的一些新书,甚至不及他作于1969年的那本计量革命时代的标志性作品——《地理学中的解释》。所以,巴黎到底发生了什么?

谈到巴黎,我们常会想到波德莱尔,想起本雅明,遇见海明威那个“流动盛宴”的比喻,以及前些年伍迪·艾伦的午夜故事。我们也许听说过哈维对巴黎所做的讨论,但是此前可能并没有真的意识到,第二帝国时期的巴黎才是哈维追思和写作的中心地带。在他尝试着理解马克思并与之对话的时候,他发现与马克思同时代的巴黎才是展开对话的最好舞台,那里的肮脏、混乱、暴动、革命和随之而来的城市空间改造,是践行历史地理唯物主义这一分析工具的“试金石”。

在这样一个黑暗而黄金的时代里,哈维与巴黎相遇,并确立了自己此后的研究道路——“如同在一条幽深的隧道中行走,瞬间点燃旋又熄灭的火光,突如其来地照亮了整个背景,似真似幻。”

哈维与马克思和巴黎的相遇,需要巴尔的摩作为中介。

作为剑桥出身的地理学家,哈维成长于那时候盛行的区域-历史研究传统之中,并在1960年代随着整个学科走上了计量革命的道路。他在1969年出版了计量革命时代的一部标志性作品——《地理学中的解释》,同年从 Bristol 跳槽到了 Johns Hopkins。

在最新的这篇论文里,哈维半开玩笑地说道:从英国移居美国的学者往往都会经历一次政治立场的演进,要么走向“极左”,要么变得“极右”。他自己在巴尔的摩观察到的种族问题、住房问题,亲身经历的民权运动,以及为了分析住房市场失灵而尝试着使用的使用价值-交换价值分析框架,逐渐促使他反思之前秉持的实证主义立场和视角。由此,哈维开始拒绝事实与价值、主体与对象、事物与认知、公共与私人之间的二分,并继而摒弃了实证主义对“科学”的狭隘定义。

但是,哈维并不认为自己的计量方法著作和社会正义探询之间存在认识论意义上的断裂。这一点倒是颠覆了我们读者之前的惯常解读。时至今日,他依然相信,《地理学中的解释》(1969)中对“科学方法”的探索和《社会正义与城市》(1973)中对社会关系、伦理和意义系统的探索,同时构成了讨论城市议题的两种不同视角,它们彼此相互补充,也许存在张力,但并非互相排斥。

话虽如此,哈维自己此后再也没有回到计量革命时代的方法论框架之中,而是逐渐走向了马克思主义知识体系,并着手在其间探索新的认识论工具。

在哈维到达巴尔的摩的那几年,美国地理学界的批判潮流也开始逐渐兴起,这首先体现在1960年代后期创刊的 Antipode 杂志,随后又在1971年的AAG年会上的激进地理学者论坛中得到放大。哈维置身其间,也开始从批判理论传统中寻找新的资源。当时给予了他智识启发的学者有很多,我们中国读者比较熟悉的可能有地理学家 Brian Berry, Torsten Hagerstrand, Alan Pred,规划理论家John Friedmann 和 Jane Jacobs,以及区域科学开创者Walter Isard。

那时的哈维也已经读到了列斐伏尔的两本著作:La Revolution Urbaine (1970) 和 La Pensee Marxiste et la Ville (1972),但是列氏最著名的《空间的生产》(1974)当时尚未出版,也因此并未影响哈维在1973年著作中的论述。换句话说,当哈维在这本书中强调绝对空间、相对空间和关系性空间的辩证统一时,列斐伏尔关于空间实践、空间表征和表征空间的三元论(spatial triad)观点尚未面世,这两种空间概念框架事实上是分别独立被提出来的。

哈维在最新的追忆中披露,当时促使他形成这一框架的思想资源很多来自地理学之外。这其中包括了哲学家 Ernst Cassirer, Susan Langer 和 Jean Piaget,也有不少社会和文化人类学家的身影,比如 Irving Hallowell。

在这一智识的旅程中,也许最让人吃惊的一点是哈维直到35岁才真正“遇见”马克思——开始阅读《资本论》。那是1970年,在《社会正义与城市》出版三年前。这让我想起阿尔都塞在自传《来日方长》中的一句话:“我是在1964-1965学年,就是最终产生了《阅读<资本论>》的研讨班那一年才读《资本论》的。” 两位马克思主义者与马克思的相遇似乎都不是注定的、正统的或者教条的,他们都是在探索和解答自己困惑的道路上与之不期而遇,并在不断地搏斗中加深了自己对马克思的认识,并最终加深了整个思想脉络对现实的把握力度。

在哈维看来,马克思带给他的最重要启示就是:针对城市化和不均衡地理发展的空间性的讨论,离不开对形塑了整个资本主义体系的社会、经济和政治过程的把握,空间性的变迁背后是被资本主义改写了的社会关系 (p.3)。为此我们需要进一步探究资本循环、积累与城市化和空间生产之间的关系。只是,马克思在《资本论》中对固定资本的循环问题论述并不清晰,尤其是生息资本的流动与土地市场(包括土地投机)之间的关系在理论上还没有得到清晰的说明,而这就成了哈维在 Limits to Capital (1982) 中想要解决的主要问题。

哈维的野心不仅在于要解决马克思遗留的理论问题,还在于他想用马克思自己的方法来解决这一问题。为此,他开始了长达四十余年、每年至少一轮的《资本论》(第一卷)教学,主要目的则是为了让自己不断浸入(immersing)马克思的思考和论述过程之中,从而真正把握辩证法这一认识论工具,而不是将之简化为黑格尔版本的抽象的唯心主义教条。

除了马克思之外,哈维也在不断扩展自己对话的对象,借助别的理论资源来夯实乃至重塑辩证法的实践路径。他接受了 Bertell Ollman 针对辩证法的关系性视角,并由此进一步扩展到了怀特海的过程哲学,甚至把 David Bohm 的量子理论和 Levins & Lewontin 的“辩证生物学”也纳入到自己的理论资源之中。伴随着视野的如此扩展,对马克思方法的把握得以从机械和教条的路径中解脱出来,哈维也逐渐实现了他的上述理论雄心:

Limits (1982) 一书超越了马克思政治经济学的标准表述,将固定资本、金融和信贷、生息资本的流通、地租和房地产市场问题与自然和空间的生产结合在了一起。 它还强调了加速周转时间和逐步“通过时间消灭空间”在资本循环和积累理论中的重要性。

Harvey, 2021: p.4

沿着这个路径接着往下走,哈维开始形成他命名为“历史地理唯物主义”的理论体系,为马克思的政治经济学添加了地理/空间的维度。这不仅包括了前述的固定资本、地租和空间生产问题的讨论,也随着环境议题的不断涌现而把自然的生产及其新陈代谢机制纳入了进来,最终在 Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference (1996) 成为讨论的一个重要环节。

在哈维不断推进和马克思进行对话的过程中,巴黎扮演了重要的角色。

1975至1976年,哈维利用学术年假前往巴黎。他本以为在那里能够“匍匐在马克思主义思想的伟大阐释者们的脚边“ (p.3),从而更好地把握相关理论的意蕴。但是现实却狠狠教训了他。哈维发现,迎接他的是自己薄弱的法语能力、法共的教条主义(禁止党员与来自北美的学者交谈)以及高卢式的左翼傲慢的集合——这些“伟大的阐释者们”认为所有北美来的人都是政治上的无知者,他们甚至连什么是阶级都不太可能弄明白 (pp.3-4)。

其中当然有例外,比如 Manuel Castells 就热情地招待了哈维,并让他一直感念(虽然哈维不认同 Castells 后来宣称的与马克思主义理论传统的决裂)。当他在巴黎的知识圈遇冷的时候,那里的夏日阳光和美丽的图书馆接纳了他:“我喜欢在巴黎度过夏天,在巴黎市历史图书馆 (Biblioteque Historique de la Ville de Paris) 那令人惊叹的美丽环境中阅读各种记录和文件。” (p.4) 由此,哈维最终还是在巴黎抓住了开头提到的那个研究兴趣内核——让第二帝国的巴黎与马克思的理论对话,从而产生能够烛照我们当下的政治经济理论脉络。

哈维在巴黎的遭遇不是孤例,他此后在巴尔的摩和纽约也在不断遇见类似的情形。他曾于1987至1993年间被聘为牛津大学麦金德讲座教授,并于1993年结束在牛津的合同回到霍普金斯大学。那是一个非常特殊的历史时期,苏东剧变让哈维在霍普金斯的大多数同事对他的马克思研究嗤之以鼻,认为这一研究方向已经近乎一种时代错乱 (p.5)。他的《资本论》研读班门可罗雀,身体也在那一时期出现了问题,并在1996年不得不做了一次心脏搭桥手术。在政治的、智识的、职业的和身体的多重压力之下,他逼自己写出来了Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference (1996) 这本书,这本没有(没法)结尾的书。

在我自己看来,这本书才是哈维的集大成之作。他在这本书里进一步扩展了辩证法的理论内涵,借助更多的社会学和人类学资源完善了空间和地方的概念体系,还结合当时生态马克思主义的讨论,把环境和自然纳入到了历史地理唯物主义的分析框架之中。哈维自己也非常看重这本书(虽然并没有认为它是最重要的两本之一),所以非常失望于批判学者对这本书的忽视和否定。他认为这一结局的部分原因在于生态马克思主义者们不能接受他关于资本的主导逻辑会和环境问题并行不悖的观点:

即使面对它所产生的最可怕和最不受欢迎的环境变革形式,资本仍可以作为一种社会关系和一种积累方式继续盛行。

Harvey, 2021: p.7

2001年,哈维终于离开了工作了数十年的霍普金斯,一个变得越来越“有毒”的学术环境,跟随他之前的学生 Neil Smith 来到了纽约市立大学研究生院 (CUNY Graduate School)。有趣的是,他在这里就职于人类学系而非地理系,因为那儿的地理学家们同样也不关心或欢迎他所从事的这一类地理学——哪怕哈维那时候已经荣获了美国地理学会杰出贡献奖(1980)、英国皇家地理学会金奖(赞助人勋章)(1995)、世界地理学界最高奖 Vautrin Lud Prize(1995)等一系列荣誉,并当选为英国学术院院士(1998)。

好在,CUNY的其他同事对他的事业都很是支持。在纽约的这二十年依然是哈维的高产期——甚至可以说他变得更加高产。他在这里延续了1990年代开始启动的 “马克思项目” (the Marx Project),并同时通过通俗和学理两种方式进行分析和阐释。这其中的通俗著作以《新帝国主义》(2003) 和《新自由主义简史》(2005) 为代表,学理著作则包括 The Enigma of Capital (2010)、Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism(2014) 和最近的 Marx, Capital and the Madness of Economic Reason (2017)。他还在学生的帮助下建立了个人网站,把《资本论》研读课的视频放了上去,后来又在 Verso 出版社的邀请下把讲义集结成册出版并畅销一时。

当下这个时代肯定不是哈维心目中的黄金时代。他在最近这些年的写作中进一步坚定了自己的反资本主义 (anti-capitalist) 立场,认为这个词比起其他很多同源的词语都更好,因为它的否定性把所有在资本主义体系中受到了负面影响、被剥夺、被排斥、被异化的人群都纳入了进来,最终也许就能推动一种更加包容、反本质主义的政治项目的实现。

但就像第二帝国的巴黎一样,这其实也许正是哈维的黄金时代。他的周遭和远方发生的所有问题塑造了他的写作,邀请他与包括马克思在内的理论家对话,并由此开启了一段漫长而又充满活力的理论创造的旅程。如同马克思笔下的巴黎,哈维笔下的当代世界也不仅仅是经验再现,更是理论介入的起点。他的论述彻底改写了当代的社会理论地景,让所有有志于社会正义问题的研究者都多了若干可以对话的理论框架。

也许《资本论》应该倒着读,第三卷里的启发可能会比第一卷更大。也许哈维所设想的“反资本主义”几乎无法在近期变成现实,因为政治的计算和算计大概并不只是理性的抉择。也许城市变迁的过程不仅仅只有一个结构或逻辑,它所造就的诸多碎片也可能组合成为别的故事。也许当今空间和地方的形塑和再造已经出现了其他不同的轨迹,需要我们寻找新的分析工具和视角,就像当初的哈维面对马克思理论和现实的脱节时所做的那样…… 当所有这些呼喊汇聚在一起,我们依然还得从大卫·哈维出发,因为他的理论框架构成了我们的起点,不管是作为分析的基础,还是作为反思的对象。

大卫·哈维的黄金时代是我们的起点,虽然几乎可以肯定这不会是归宿。

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CFP RGS-IBG 2018: Is the present a “foreign country”?

26 Friday Jan 2018

Posted by Yimin in Academic, Events

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Geography, modernity, space, urban

Is the present a “foreign country”? Modernity and urban space in comparative perspective

RGS-IBG 2018 Annual Conference: Cardiff, UK, 28 to 31 August 2018

Organisers: Yimin Zhao (Department of Geography and Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science); Boya Guo (Graduate School of Design, Harvard University)

Discussants: TBC

 

The hegemony of modernity has been rooted in a teleological temporality for centuries, where a linear time is upheld, exhausting the possibilities of our living experience as well as our envisioning of the future (Sewell 1996). Postcolonial critiques of historicism have been inviting us to “provincialise Europe” and its universal history (Chakrabarty 2000), aiming to unlearn the taken-for-granted privileges of Eurocentric traditions and at the same time learn from the “historical others” (Scott 2012). This dialectical process of learning and unlearning questions the nature of modernity and requires us to conceive different ways to acknowledge co-existing multiplicities.

Space matters here because our re-imaginations of it might put forward a new perspective, through which we could “dislocate” modernity, recognise multiplicities, and drop such dichotomies as West/Non-West, modern/ traditional, and innovation/imitation (Massey 1999, Robinson 2006). But there are still challenges, empirically, to follow this call for spatialising the history of modernity with “ordinary cities.” For, the living experience and space (of the “historical others” in particular) are yet deeply inflected by the teleological temporality, which could be evidenced by Thames Town in Shanghai (Wu 2010), Norman Foster-facilitated utopian landscapes in Astana (Koch 2012), and the archaising reconstruction of the whole city in Datong, China (Zhou 2015), to name just a few.

Instead of labelling these stories as false/deviated/incomplete modernity, here we want to gather together critical interrogations of stories as such to advance our reflections on the present. After recognising these stories as symptoms of the hegemony of modernity, it is more critical to explore how the experiences of modernity are being shaped by local-historical conditions and politico-economic relations. Lowenthal (1985) once illustrates that “the past is a foreign country” since “they do things differently there.” We want to move a step further and interrogate if the present is a “foreign country” as well, where different conducts of “historical others” could be conceptualised as co-existing spatial differences rather than temporal sequences, and where the questioning of historical time could be contextualised in multiple and dynamic spatial practices.

The key question we want to put forward in this session is: how and how far has modernity been performed and enacted through diverse spatial practices in daily life, and how can we learn to be “modern” from the perspectives of “historical others”? All contributions related to the two keywords (modernity and urban space) are welcome; and we are especially looking forward to empirical illustrations on how to inhabit the hegemony of modernity spatially – and hence differently.

If you are interested in participating in this session, please send an abstract of 200-250 words to Yimin Zhao (y.zhao25@lse.ac.uk) and Boya Guo (bguo@gsd.harvard.edu) by 9 February 2018.

 

References

Chakrabarty, Dipesh. 2000. Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial thought and historical difference. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Koch, Natalie. 2012. “Urban ‘utopias’: the Disney stigma and discourses of ‘false modernity’.” Environment and Planning A no. 44 (10):2445-2462.

Lowenthal, David. 1985. The past is a foreign country. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Massey, Doreen. 1999. “Spaces of politics.” In Human geography today, edited by Doreen Massey, John Allen and Philip Sarre, 279-294. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Robinson, Jennifer. 2006. Ordinary cities: Between modernity and development. London and New York: Routledge.

Scott, David. 2012. “The Traditions of Historical Others.” Symposia on Gender, Race, and Philosophy no. 8 (1):1-8.

Sewell Jr, William H. 1996. “Three temporalities: Toward an eventful sociology” in The historic turn in the human sciences, edited by Terrence McDonald, 245-80. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

Wu, Fulong. 2010. “Gated and packaged suburbia: Packaging and branding Chinese suburban residential development.” Cities no. 27 (5):385-396.

Zhou, Hao. (Director). 2015. The Chinese mayor [Documentary Film]. London: BBC.

 

Space as method

22 Friday Sep 2017

Posted by Yimin in Academic, Publication

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ethnography, Geography, Greenbelt, method, space

My first “academic” article, one that reflects upon my own field experience in Beijing’s green belts, has recently been published in the City journal.

This paper has plenty of meanings for me. It is the very first chapter that was finished all through my thesis. I can still remember the readings I did for this paper, and the drafts I wrote and then scratched – all happened at the moment when the deadline of my thesis was approaching yet I was still in the middle of nowhere. It was also a revised version of the paper that won the third place in the student paper competition of China Geography Specialty Group at this year’s (2017) AAG Annual Meeting.

But most importantly, it shows the reflections I had after doing two spells of fieldwork by myself. Its starting point is a puzzle I had when in the field and its concluding remarks are at best an invitation for further discussions and debates on how to do fieldwork on the urban frontier with our bodily space-time. These works should be further developed, and I hope this paper could contribute some empirical observations that have not been registered in the literature before.

Below is the abstract of this paper, and the full access can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13604813.2017.1353342. Please feel free to contact me at y.zhao25#lse.ac.uk (replace # by @); all comments and suggestions are warmly welcome.

 

Abstract

Great urban transformations are diffusing across the global South, removing the original landscape of urban margins to make of them a new urban frontier. These processes raise questions of both validity and legitimacy for ethnographic practice, requiring critical reflection on both spatiality and method in fieldwork at the urban margins. This paper draws on fieldwork experience in Beijing’s green belts, which could also be labelled the city’s urban margin or frontier, to reflect on the space-time of encounter in the field. I aim to demonstrate how space foregrounds not only our bodily experiences but also ethnographic investigations of the daily life, and hence becomes a method. Beijing’s green belts symbolise a historical–geographical conjuncture (a moment) emerging in its urban metamorphosis. Traditional endeavours (immanent in various spatial metaphors) to identify field sites as reified entities are invalidated over the course of the space-time encounter, requiring a relational spatial ontology to register such dynamics. The use in fieldwork of DiDi Hitch, a mobile app for taxi-hailing and hitchhiking, reveals the spatiotemporal construction of self–other relations needing recognition via the dialectics of the encounter. In this relational framework, an encounter is never a priori but a negotiation of a here and now between different trajectories and stories as individuals are thrown together in socially constructed space and time.

 

Keywords

urban ethnography, spatial ontology, spatial metaphors, the dialectics of the encounter, DiDi Hitch, Beijing

 

AAG 2017: China as Methods

25 Friday Nov 2016

Posted by Yimin in Academic, Events

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conference, Geography, space

Paper sessions in 2017 Annual Meeting of the American Association of Geographers (Boston, MA, 5-9 April 2017)

 

Organisers

Yimin Zhao (The London School of Economics and Political Science); Yueming Zhang (University of Birmingham); Yang Yang (University of Colorado – Boulder)

Sponsorship

Asian Geography Specialty Group, China Specialty Group, Cultural Geography Specialty Group, Urban Geography Specialty Group

Session introduction

In 1989, Mizoguchi Yuzo published China as Method and called for reversing Eurocentric theory and epistemological framework (Mizoguchi 2011 [1989]). For Mizoguchi, the end of conceiving China “should be the ‘study of China’ that transcends China” (cf. Chen 2010, 252). In other words, China is a method when understanding the world is the purpose – and in this multiplied “world”, as Chen Kuan-Hsing reminds us (ibid., 253), both China and Europe are elements. It is here that we can see some affinities between Mizoguchi’s position and recently rising comparative urbanism to study the world of cities (Robinson, 2006).

Mizoguchi’s proposition has methodological significances for it helps replace the vertical principle of history (which is teleological and dominated by Eurocentric theories) by a horizontal view of space-time where different elements are juxtaposed. Seeing in this way, claims of universalisation should be questioned, and investigations on the dynamic space-time are urgently needed. Some endeavours can be witnessed in the literature, such as Wang Hui’s (2011) discussion on “trans-systemic society” and “trans-societal system,” yet more efforts are required to rethink how and to what extent China can be a method to understand the world. This critical reflection on seeing China as a methodology approach can be potentially productive in geographical inquiries on/in/related to China.

In this session, we aim at continuing the proposition put forward by Mizoguchi almost three decades ago and focus on how the “study of China” may yield methodological and/or epistemological implications for not only studying China but also geographical inquiries in general. “China” is more than a field site, especially in the contemporary world where “the spectre of global China” (Lee, 2014) can be seen everywhere. Hence, we invite theoretical and empirical contributions that concern methodological and epistemological implications of the “study of China,” with “China” being broadly defined as the starting point and hopefully transcended at the end.

Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

  • What do China and the study of China mean in nowadays geographical research?
  • How can China be studied more than a subject, but as an entity, relation, process, nexus…?
  • What and how are theories used in and/or built from the study of China? What are the theoretical potentials and challenges in the study of China?
  • What kind of implications can be drawn from studies in/on China for broader concerns in fieldwork methods?
  • Where and how to locate China in comparative studies?

 

Paper Session I

Chair: Yueming Zhang (University of Birmingham, UK)

Discussant: Jennifer Robinson (University College London, UK)

(Extra)ordinary Beijing: On urban ontologies and artistic practice

  • Julie Ren (London School of Economics and Political Science, UK)
  • Murray Mckenzie (University College London, UK)

Space as a method: Field sites and encounters in Beijing’s green belts

  • Yimin Zhao (London School of Economics and Political Science, UK)

Provincialising the West, de-parochialising China: Some reflections from China’s urban centres and ethnic peripheries

  • Junxi Qian (University of Hong Kong, HK)

China in the African imaginary and the problems of solidarity

  • Xiaoran Hu (Queen Mary University of London, UK)

Paper Session II

Chair: Yimin Zhao (London School of Economics and Political Science, UK)

Discussant: Max D. Woodworth (Ohio State University, US)

From Xinjiang to Addis Ababa: Encountering China at its “periphery” and “frontier”

  • Ding Fei (University of Minnesota, US)

Displaying connections between Chinese and global Muslim communities through fashions in transnational urban space in the Hui Quarter in Xi’an

  • Yang Yang (University of Colorado – Boulder, US)

Of “other” people: The exotic landscape of Chinese diasporas (and its rejection) in Boston

  • Jing Luo (Tsinghua University, China)

Not “China as Methods” but “Chinese dialectics” as a methodology: The tongbian approach

  • Wing-shing Tang (Hong Kong Baptist University, HK)

 

References

Chen, K.-H., 2010. Asia as Method: Toward Deimperialization. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

Lee, C. K., 2014. The spectre of global China. New Left Review (89):29-65.

Mizoguchi, Y., 2011 [1989]. China as Method [Zuowei fangfade zhongguo]. Beijing: SDX Joint Publishing Company.

Robinson, J., 2006. Ordinary cities: Between modernity and development. Routledge.

Wang, H., 2011. Trans-systemic Society and Regional Perspective in Chinese Studies. boundary 2, 38(1):165-201.

RGS-IBG AC 2016: Sessions to go

30 Tuesday Aug 2016

Posted by Yimin in Academic, Events

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conference, Geography, London

 

This year’s RGS-IBG Annual Conference is going to start tomorrow in London. Below is a list of sessions that I want to hear more details during this three-day event. Welcome to join us if you are in London and are interested in any session listed below.

And by the way, I will give a short presentation in paper session No.339 (Friday 02 September 2016, 14:40 – 16:20). The abstract can be found here. I look forward to seeing you then and hearing any comment you would like to give.

 

Chair’s plenary lectures

The Ghost in the Nexus: Global Poverty and the Dilemmas of Development

Ananya Roy (University of California Los Angeles, USA)

Thursday 1 September 2016, 13.10, RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre

In this talk, I situate “nexus thinking” in the present conjuncture of sustainable development and in the long history of development as a global project. In doing so, I pay attention to the disciplines and professions that are being mobilized to solve urgent human problems, specifically that of poverty. Framed as scientific solutions towards a better world, such frameworks of action are also replete with distinctive aspirations and affects. Foregrounding the figure of the millennial – college students and young professionals enrolled in the global university and enlisted in the work of poverty action – I examine the potentialities and limits of the will to make poverty history, and thereby of nexus thinking.

Discussants: Jennifer Robinson (University College London, UK); Parvati Raghuram (The Open University, UK)

 

Plenaries, panels, workshops

Wednesday (31 August)

  • Area are sponsoring a panel on Ethics in/of geographical research, chaired by Peter Kraftl. Panellists: Sarah Marie Hall (The University of Manchester, UK); James Cheshire (University College London, UK); Anson Mackay (University College London, UK); Stephen Tooth (Aberystwyth University, UK); Jen Dickinson (University of Leicester, UK); and Andy Nobes (INASP/Author Aid, UK). Wednesday, 14.40; room: RGS-IBG Education Centre. This will be followed by a tea and cake reception.
  • The Antipode lecture, Recomposing Urban Collective Life: On Operations and the Inoperable, will be given by AbdouMaliq Simone (Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Göttingen, Germany). Wednesday, 16.50; room: RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre. This will be followed by a reception.

Thursday (1 September)

  • Author meets critics: Fiona McConnell – Rehearsing the State: The Political Practices of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile (RGS-IBG Book Series, Wiley-Blackwell). Thursday, 09.00; room: RGS-IBG Drayson Room.
  • The Progress in Human Geography lecture, Trust – in Geography, will be given by Charles Withers (The University of Edinburgh, UK). Thursday, 11.10; room: RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre.
  • Colleagues of John Urry (1946-2016) have organised a Remembrance and Book Launch in celebration of his work. Thursday, 16.50; room: RGS-IBG Council Room. This will be followed by a reception.
  • Authors meet critics: Planetary gentrification by Loretta Lees , Hyun Bang Shin and Ernesto López-Morales (Polity). Thursday, 16.50; room: RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre. To be followed by a drinks reception, sponsored by Urban Studies.

Friday (2 September)

  • The Social and Cultural Geography lecture, Beyond policing the migrant crisis: Geographical contributions, will be given by Parvati Raghuram (The Open University, UK). Friday, 09.00.
  • Colleagues and former students of Doreen Massey have organised a celebration of her life and work, including screening a montage made up from contributions from people who met her and worked with her in all spheres of her life. Friday, 16.50; room: RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre.

 

Paper sessions on Wednesday (31 August)

No.16 The London nexus – metropolitan elites in the 21st century, new perspectives on Britain’s south-eastern skew

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40) || Skempton Building, Lecture Theatre 164, Imperial College London || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/16

No.24 Geography and Decolonization, c.1945-c.1980 (1)

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40) || Room 5, Skempton Building, Imperial College London || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/24

No.29 Post-phenomenological Geographies: methods and styles of researching and writing the human (1): Subjects

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40) || Royal School of Mines, Room G.05 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/29

No.56 Geography and Decolonization, c.1945-c.1980 (2)

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 2 (11:10 – 12:50) || Room 5, Sherfield Building || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/56

No.61 State, Territory, Urbanism: Exploring the Nexus Between Government and Infrastructure (2)

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 2 (11:10 – 12:50) || Room 10, Sherfield Building || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/61

No.69 Affect and the Geographies of Power

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre || Panel discussion: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/69

No.84 Nexus Thinking in Gentrification Studies (2)

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Skempton Building, Lecture Theatre 164 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/84

No.98 Forging politicised solidarities in, against and beyond the European crisis (1): Articulating local solidarities

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Royal School of Mines, Room G.05 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/98

No.102 Set in motion: walking the history of the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) c.1830-2016

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Offsite (field tour): http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/102

No.118 Nexus Thinking in Gentrification Studies (3)

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 4 (16:50 – 18:30) || Skempton Building, Lecture Theatre 164 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/118

No.128 Operations of capital: Studying the nexus of land, housing, and finance across the North-South divide

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 4 (16:50 – 18:30) || Sherfield Building, Room 7 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/128

No.132 Forging politicised solidarities in, against and beyond the European crisis (2): Towards trans-local solidarities

Timetable: Wednesday 31 August 2016, Session 4 (16:50 – 18:30) || Royal School of Mines, Room G.05 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/132

 

Paper sessions on Thursday (1 September)

No.181 Contested urban green spaces in the ‘austerity city’: Re-politicising the environment and commoning public spaces? (1): Funding and Management

Timetable: Thursday 01 September 2016, Session 2 (11:10 – 12:50) || Skempton Building, Room 064b || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/181

No.215 Contested urban green spaces in the ‘austerity city’: Re-politicising the environment and commoning public spaces? (2): Planning and Governance

Timetable: Thursday 01 September 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Skempton Building, Room 064b || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/215

No.217 The City-Hinterland Nexus in Global Context: The dynamics of rural-urban connections in different global contexts (1)

Timetable: Thursday 01 September 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Skempton Building, Lecture Theatre 164 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/217

No.234 Deaf spaces of Victorian London – a walking tour

Timetable: Thursday 01 September 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Offsite (field tour): http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/234

 

Paper sessions on Friday (2 September)

No.271 Geographies of Anti-colonialism (1): Theorising Anti-colonialisms

Timetable: Friday 02 September 2016, Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40) || Sir Alexander Fleming Building, Lecture Theatre G34 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/271

No.281 Beyond Borders and Nations: Transnational Geographies from Syria to Europe (1): Transnational Geographies of solidarity and resistance

Timetable: Friday 02 September 2016, Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40) || Skempton Building, Room 165 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/281

No.301 Geographies of Anti-colonialism (2): Histories of Anti-colonialism

Timetable: Friday 02 September 2016, Session 2 (11:10 – 12:50) || Sir Alexander Fleming Building, Lecture Theatre G34 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/301

No.311 Beyond Borders and Nations: Transnational Geographies from Syria to Europe (2): Transnational Geographies of segregation

Timetable: Friday 02 September 2016, Session 2 (11:10 – 12:50) || Skempton Building, Room 165 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/311

No.339 Narrating Displacements: A Radical Way to Rethink Urban Theories and Politics

Timetable: Friday 02 September 2016, Session 3 (14:40 – 16:20) || Skempton Building, Room 163 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/339

No.374 Rethinking Life at the Margins: The Assemblage of Contexts, Subjects and Politics

Timetable: Friday 02 September 2016, Session 4 (16:50 – 18:30) || Sherfield Building, Room 7 || Abstracts: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2016/374

 

Closing drinks reception

Friday 18:45-20:00; RGS-IBG Ondaatje Theatre

 

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