Urban Portal: Events

Narrating Spaces, Reading Urbanity Sep. 6

2012-04-25T19:45+00:00

Ever since the formation of the modern urban metropolis, the city is closely linked to various questions touching upon the construction of individual as well as collective identities and the organization of social life in general. Being a space of both confrontation and negotiation, the modern city is first and foremost characterized by interconnectedness. Thus, the complex relational network and possibilities of description and modes of artistic representation are broadly discussed within various academic disciplines.

The conference “Narrating Spaces – Reading Urbanity” focuses on the close connection of any approach to urban space and modes of representing and thus narrating spatiality. From the points of view of different disciplines and theoretical approaches, the conference strives for an interdisciplinary discussion of the formation and constitution of urbanity.

Urban Marginality and the State Jun. 20

2012-04-25T19:00+00:00

URBAN MARGINALITY AND THE STATE, a 2-day conference at the College de France in Paris on June 20-21, featuring keynote lectures from Loic Wacquant and Talja Blokland, together with contributions from numerous other distinguished urban scholars from all over the world.

Local Area Processes: Theories, Methods, and Models May. 18

2012-04-20T12:08+00:00

This conference will bring together sociologists, epidemiologists, psychologists, demographers, economists, and other social scientists concerned with the relationship between social behavior and space to address the theoretical, methodological, and substantive questions surrounding what are broadly understood as local context effects. The goal of this event is to identify some of the best models of processes of local contextual effects, assess how they complement each other, and advance the field through articulation and implementation of theory to integrate these with each other. Accordingly, the conference is organized around four themes: theoretical perspectives, methodological perspectives, social and cultural mechanisms, and spatial and network mechanisms.

The following presenters are confirmed for this event:

Luc Anselin, Arizona State University

Christopher Browning, The Ohio State University

Terry Nichols Clark, University of Chicago

David Harding, University of Michigan

Louise Hawkley, University of Chicago

Shige Oishi, University of Virginia

Robert Sampson, Harvard University

Daniel Silver, University of Toronto

Patrick Sharkey, New York University

This event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. We ask that registered participants plan to stay for the entire event, as space is very limited. Click here to register.

Questions? Please contact Caroline Ouwerkerk, Project Manager, the University of Chicago Urban Network at 773-702-5116 or CRO@UChicago.edu.

This conference is sponsored by the University of Chicago Urban Network, the University of Chicago Population Research Center, and the University of Chicago Center for Cognitive and Social Neuroscience.

Greater and Greener: Re-imagining Parks for the 21st Century Jul. 14

2012-04-10T20:27+00:00

Exploring the New Green City
How should we re-imagine parks for the 21st century city? Greater & Greener kicks off its first plenary discussion with leaders outside the parks profession examining the future role of parks and green space in helping cities realize their full potential in the face of new trends in demographics, public health and urban planning.

A World of Cities? Comparison Across the Disciplines May. 17

2012-04-10T18:24+00:00

Across the humanities and the social sciences there is a long tradition of comparative studies of cities. In disciplines such as anthropology, history, human geography, languages, linguistics, political science and sociology much work has been done comparing the differences and similarities between cities, with often one city often emerging as being the ‘norm’ against which others are compared. In urban studies, for example, think of the Chicago School of the 1920s, and the LA school of the 1980s as the most extreme and obvious examples of this phenomenon. In both cases theories were built on the experiences of particular cities at specific historical junctures. This in turn has shaped how scholars have understood and labelled other cities. For example, studies have compared cities across the world, positioning them as either more or less ‘developed’ on the basis of urban theories generated in a small number of cities in the global north. Likewise, cities have become understood as more of less ‘global’, often paying little attention to historical trends. Most recently there has been an intellectual drive to move beyond these distinctions and instead to consider a world of cities, moving beyond both simple categories and past assumptions in the constructions of urban theories. What thinking about comparison in this way means for a comparative study of cities in the twentieth first century remains unclear. This is the intellectual context for this two day workshop, which will draw on leadings scholars from across the humanities and the social science.

2012 Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland Policy Summit on Housing, Human Capital, and Inequality Jun. 28

2012-04-10T15:42+00:00

The 10th annual Cleveland Fed Policy Summit will focus on effective strategies to strengthen and rebuild communities. With neighborhoods and entire regions struggling to regain their footing in the wake of a housing crisis and economic recession, now is a critical time to implement rebuilding strategies that work. What are the most effective strategies, particularly in older industrial cities and the weaker-market regions that surround them? How is the impact of programs best measured? And where should community leaders direct ever-scarcer funds to gain the greatest effect?

This year's conference also features Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President and CEO Sandra Pianalto as the opening keynote speaker. In 2012, President Pianalto again became a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee.

Join elected officials, researchers, practitioners, bankers, funders, and policymakers from across the Midwest, to discuss the latest research on and promising practices in economic policy and development in low- and moderate-income communities including:

 Analyses of programs and policies focused on current conditions in labor and housing markets
 Education policy
 Entrepreneurship
 Financial and human capital asset building
 Labor and housing issues in older industrial cities
 Long-term unemployment
 Loss-mitigation strategies for borrowers
 Low-income housing
 Program implementation, evaluation, and scalability
 Reduced local government and community development budgets
 Workforce development

The Social Determinants of Urban Mental Health Sep. 19

2012-03-29T18:01+00:00

The Social Determinants of Urban Mental Health

Paving the Way Forward

Hosted by the Adler School of Professional Psychology

Featuring keynote presenter Professor Sir Michael G. Marmot MBBS, MPH, PhD
Director, UCL Institute of Health Equity (Marmot Institute
Chair, European Review on the Social Determinants of Health and the Health Divide
Director, International Institute for Society and Health

Today, more than half of all global humanity lives in urban areas. That figure is projected to grow to more than 60 percent by 2050. Although cities possess conditions that promote good mental health, they also possess conditions—poverty, conflict, and social isolation—that are harmful to mental health. In fact, research demonstrates that city living is linked to increased risk for mental health problems.

Join government officials, scholars, and philanthropists in discussions about how to create cities that promote the mental health and well-being of their residents.

Urban Violence in the Middle East Feb. 13

2012-03-29T17:50+00:00

As part of an AHRC/DFG-funded Anglo-German research project on the
history of urban violence in the modern Middle East, this
international conference seeks to develop new discussions on the
relationship between public violence and urban politics, societies and
cultures – a topic that despite its importance and relevance to
contemporary events has not yet been the subject of systematic
academic interest. For this conference, we wish to bring together a
core of established and young historians working on the Middle East,
and invite a number of academics specialising on other regions and
disciplines, including the social sciences, urban studies and
philosophy. The aim is to foster innovative understandings of urban
violence informed by comparative and interdisciplinary approaches.

The 7th World Congress of Environmental Education: The Rural-Urban Relationship Jun. 9

2012-03-19T16:02+00:00

The proposal to host for the first time a world congress in a country of Arab and Muslim culture was put forward by the Fondation Mohammed VI Pour la Protection de L’Environnement. This is undoubtedly the most interesting aspect of the next edition of WEEC.

Morocco, among other things, is in a state of flux. A new constitution bringing political change has been in force since the end of 2011. A country with a long history and great artistic and natural assets, Morocco has in Marrakech a pearl of international fame.

Another interesting aspect is the theme: the rural-urban relationship, a particularly sensitive issue in Morocco where, like many other countries, an exodus from the countryside and a strong process of urban migration is being witnessed. In addition, climactic changes are bound to exacerbate the problem of water shortage, strongly felt in Morocco as in many other countries.

In short, this is a very interesting transverse theme, because the urban/rural relationship has an enormous social and environmental impact and is totally dependent on relationships of power (urban classes as opposed to rural classes, the north and south in the world, division of economic power groups) and on the model of production and consumption.

This theme also brings into play town planning, life styles, the relationship between man and nature, etc. Finally, this theme lends itself to involving new subjects in WEEC (international NGOs, agricultural organizations, farmers’ movements, movements for responsible consumerism and fair trade), new disciplines and new institutions.

As always, along with the title theme of the congress, various other arguments relevant to environmental education (divided into a number of thematic niches) will be dealt with.

Urban Futures Conference Jan. 16

2012-03-19T15:11+00:00

The Urban Futures inaugural international conference will focus on four core cross-disciplinary areas of research that the federation is committed to developing.

Assessing innovative approaches which accompany the intertwined processes of globalization and metropolisation is crucial. The rationale behind territorial development and the circulation of knowledge brings into play complex interactions between economic trends and social transformations. More generally, it involves changes in the means of projecting, planning and producing the physical aspects of cities (buildings, infrastructure, neighborhoods, public spaces, etc.). Approaches and practices are changing scale and becoming more transversal.