Critique of Urban Violence: Bismarckian Transformations in Managua, Nicaragua

2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 85-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dennis Rodgers
Keyword(s):  
Social Processes ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Urban Violence ◽  
Urban Experience ◽  
Drug Dealer ◽  
History Of ◽  
Urban Contexts ◽  
Former Gang Member ◽  
Critique Of Violence ◽  
Poor Neighbourhood

Urban contexts are widely conceived as inherently violent due to their putatively disorderly nature. Such a conception of violence effectively conceives it as singular and fundamentally destructive, neither of which necessarily hold universally true. Drawing on Benjamin’s ‘Critique of Violence’ and the life history of Bismarck, a former gang member turned drug dealer turned property entrepreneur living in a poor neighbourhood in Managua, Nicaragua, this article highlights how different forms of urban violence interrelate with each other over time, and how they shape an individual’s urban experience and environment. In doing so, it underscores how urban violence is not a singular phenomenon, how it intertwines with a range of urban social processes, and how it is often socially constitutive rather than destructive. Seen from this perspective, the key question to ask is less to what extent violence is a hallmark of urban contexts but rather how different articulations of violence emerge in cities, and why it is that they can play such contrasting roles in the constitution of urban life.

scholarly journals Urban Life-Worlds in Motion: In Africa and Beyond

2010 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 115-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans Peter Hahn
Keyword(s):  
Urban Studies ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Theoretical Development ◽  
Urban Migration ◽  
History Of Anthropology ◽  
Cultural Dynamics ◽  
Rural Migrants ◽  
History Of ◽  
Rural Urban Migration ◽  
Urban Contexts

Although throughout the history of anthropology the ethnography of urban societies was never an important topic, investigations on cities in Africa contributed to the early theoretical development of urban studies in social sciences. As the ethnography of rural migrants in towns made clear, cultural diversity and creativity are foundational and permanent elements of urban cultures in Africa (and beyond). Currently, two new aspects complement these insights: 1) Different forms of mobility have received a new awareness through the concept of transnationalism. They are much more complex, including not only rural–urban migration, but also urban–urban migration, and migrations with a destination beyond the continent. 2) Urban life-worlds also include the appropriation of globally circulating images and lifestyles, which contribute substantially to the current cultural dynamics of cities in Africa. These two aspects are the reasons for the high complexity of urban contexts in Africa. Therefore, whether it is still appropriate to speak about the “locality” of these life-worlds has become questionable. At the same time, these new aspects explain the self-consciousness of members of urban cultures in Africa. They contribute to the expansive character of these societies and to the impression that cities in Africa host the most innovative and creative societies worldwide.

Introduction

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dora P. Crouch
Keyword(s):  
Economic History ◽  
Local Area ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Design History ◽  
Urban Experience ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Hanseatic League ◽  
Geological Information ◽  
History Of

Cities are a constant interplay between tangible and intangible, visible and invisible factors. Long-lived cities can provide data to compensate for the brevity of our modern urban experience (Croce 1985). To overcome these gaps in research, just beginning to close, the city is a most useful unit of study. Ancient cities can serve as four-dimensional models (length, width, height, and time) of how humans survived in their ecological niches. Yet comparative studies of groups of cities—such as Rorig’s (1967) of German medieval trading cities of the Hanseatic League, Andrews’s (1975) of the urban design history of Maya cities, and Hohenberg and Lee’s (1985) of the economic history of European cities—ignore the geological setting. The setting of our study is the Mediterranean periphery where cities are united by their Greco-Roman historical and cultural relationships. From the twenty-five Greco-Roman sites studied in Water Management in Ancient Greek Cities, we have selected for further study 10 sites with sufficient geological information to form a basis of comparison. Our comparisons are based on the physical aspects—both form and function—of the local area, not the particular object. There are exciting possibilities, both intellectual and practical, in such an approach. Until recently, ancient Mediterranean cities have been investigated mainly by ancient historians and classical archaeologists. Cities, however, are so complex as to require every possible sort of investigation. Because each model and methodology leaves out too much, the use of a single model from one discipline, whether archaeological, mathematical, engineering, or historic, has limited usefulness. The documents of the classicists and the physical remains located by archaeologists seem to an urban historian like myself to be useful but incomplete sources that take for granted the geographical base, assume a past social organization, and may ignore the technological and scientific aspects of ancient urban life. As classicist M. H. Jameson (1990) has written, “The surviving literature from Classical Greece sheds light only incidentally on practical matters such as patterns of settlement and domestic architecture . . . [yet] conceptions drawn from literature, sometimes with dubious justification, continue to prevail.”

Saving the Nation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas H. Reilly
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Social Reform ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
Social Revolution ◽  
Social Christianity ◽  
History Of ◽  
Urban Elite ◽  
Justice And Mercy

This book is a history of the Chinese Protestant elite and their contribution to building a new China in the years from 1922 to 1952. While a small percentage of China’s overall population, China’s Protestants constituted a large and influential segment of the urban elite. They exercised that influence through their churches, hospitals, and schools, especially the universities, and also through institutions such as the YMCA and the YWCA, whose membership was drawn from the modern sectors of urban life. These Protestant elites believed that they could best contribute to the building of a new China through their message of social Christianity, believing that Christianity could help make Chinese society strong, modern, and prosperous, but also characterized by justice and mercy. More than preaching a message, the Protestant elite also played a critical social role, through their institutions, broadening the appeal and impact of social movements, and imparting to them a greater sense of legitimacy. This history begins with the elite’s participation in social reform campaigns in the early twentieth century, continues with their efforts in resisting imperialism, and ends with their support for the Communist-led social revolution.

Architecture, Modernism and Nation-Building in Kemalist Turkey

1994 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 37-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sibel Bozdoğan
Keyword(s):  
Nation Building ◽  
Critical Force ◽  
Modern Architecture ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
The West ◽  
Industrial City ◽  
The Social ◽  
Great Transformation ◽  
History Of ◽  
The 19Th Century

Deeply rooted in “the great transformation” brought about by capitalism, industrialization and urban life, the history of modern architecture in the West is intricately intertwined with the rise of the bourgeoisie. Modernism in architecture, before anything else, is a reaction to the social and environmental ills of the industrial city, and to the bourgeois aesthetic of the 19th century. It emerged first as a series of critical, utopian and radical movements in the first decades of the twentieth century, eventually consolidating itself into an architectural establishment by the 1930s. The dissemination of the so-called “modern movement” outside Europe coincides with the eclipse of the plurality and critical force of early modernist currents and their reduction to a unified, formalist and doctrinaire position.

Visions in conflict: a city of possibilities

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sharon Howell ◽  
Richard Feldman
Keyword(s):  
Emergency Management ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Local Production ◽  
African American Culture ◽  
Industrial Economy ◽  
Social Struggle ◽  
Alternative Means ◽  
History Of ◽  
The City ◽  
Land Water

This chapter casts the deindustrialization of Detroit as part of a larger transition providing new dangers and opportunities. The disappearance of industrial economy has created opportunities for the emergence of alternative means of creating new, sustainable and vibrant urban life. The resources of African American culture and imagination provide a perspective on developing innovative ways of making a living that nurture our capacities for cooperation and care. Rooted in Detroit’s long history of social struggle, a vision of self-determining urban life based, on local production for local needs is emerging. Mainstream elites and media generally ignore or deride these efforts. This chapter explores specific examples of the practices and programs emerging from the community. New forms of resisting dehumanization, especially since the takeover of the city by emergency management, are combined with creation of concrete alternatives to questions of land, water new ways of thinking.

scholarly journals "COMPANY OF MUTUAL AID OF PRIVATE CUSTOMERS" OF GALICIA: ANALYSIS OF THE STATUTE AND ACTIVITY

2017 ◽  
pp. 72-77
Author(s):  
Ihor Berest
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Present State ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Mutual Aid ◽  
Trade Union Movement ◽  
Mutual Assistance ◽  
Union Movement ◽  
History Of ◽  
Scientific Significance

On the basis of trade union periodicals, the principle of historicism, scientific and objective approach, the article analyzes and shows the statute and activities of the trade union of private servants of Eastern Galicia. The present state and development of the historiography of the problems, the history of the trade union movement was investigated, it was proved that the main event in the trade union movement of the middle of the ХІХ century became social processes in Eastern Galicia, which created a new working-class movement on the material and moral protection of workers. The study of this problem has an important scientific significance, since it enables to show the work of the first professional union of private employees, to analyze their program document and to show the evolution of trade union movement until the adoption of the Constitution of 1867. Among the works devoted to this topic, unfortunately, there are no monographs or scientific researches by Ukrainian scholars, therefore, in the article we rely on the study of Polish scholars: Bali Stanislav, Kishchinsky Lucian, and trade union periodicals, where there is an attempt to present the history of trade union movement in a new course of events. Thus, we can conclude that the Society for the Mutual Assistance of Private Servants was formed, the founding of which was sought or projected by employees from 1846. And, despite for political blockages, or attacks by employers and many other reasons, the suspension of the creation of a basic document, however, achieved the goal of 1867 - the Society began its activities.

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