The Kind of Problem a City Will Always Be: A Study of the Epistemological State of Urbanism and the Kind of Problem a City is

<p>Jane Jacobs in her seminal work Death and Life of Great American Cities (1993) titled a chapter of her book, The Kind of Problem a City is, and in it, discussed how a city should be understood as a situation of a complex nature. Observers of cities have, from as early as the Renaissance, attempted to identify the kind of problem cities are by comparing them analogically to a variety of subjects and artefacts. This has been done to discuss and extrapolate the issues surrounding what a city is in a multitude of ways and to better grapple the complex issue that the subject of cities pose. However a single explanation or analogy will likely ever satisfy the discourse as a fundamental framework. The difficulty in reaching a single framework is twofold. Firstly cities and the way cities are inhabited, changes and evolves over time. And, secondly, and perhaps more problematically the way we think about them and come to know them also changes and evolves. To put simply, there are epistemological struggles in urbanism that require attending if the complex issue of a city is to ever be reconciled. Empirical observation and interpretation of the city – an alternative technique at the time of Jane Jacobs writing of Death and Life of Great American Cities, is the recording of events and occurrences and looking at how and why these might arise. This is what separated Jane Jacobs from the common school of thought at the time. It was a departure from the overly simplified rational logic of the Modernists – a school of thought made widespread by its success but had extended passed its limitations. Jacobs had observed an underlying and intricately delicate balance that had evolved out of the complex connections in the diversity of the people and their spatial conditions within a city; a balance she called a "ballet of the street". To Jacobs the Modernists obsession of order through ‘orthodox’ planning and zoning that had sought to impose homogeneity over populations and areas simply did not observe or appreciate the complexity of cities and streets that created the very emergent qualities of healthy urbanity. Qualities that Jacobs had noted “ought to be cherished and celebrated”. This thesis therefore delves into contemporary techniques of understanding and observing cities particularly by digitally modelling and dissecting areas to better interpret and come to know the existing urban condition so that we may build better knowledge foundations for urban discourse. It will identify that through changing and diversifying paradigms and epistemologies of knowledge, our perception and our a posteriori ability to identify the kind of problem that cities are, is not static and that it develops and evolves from generation to generation. This is a necessary change that occurs in order to revaluate and solve certain kinds of problems and puzzles that pertain to the generation taking place. The significant point that I argue is that such change, at an epistemological level, is inevitable and necessary. And as these evolving epistemic foundations can dramatically alter the significance and legitimation of the entire body of urban knowledge, then a continuing critical discussion of the contemporary state of epistemic urbanism or a philosophy of urbanism is a necessary task for identifying and framing the kind of problem a city is. Furthermore, this thesis will outline methods of (re-)framing those foundations to better carry over constructive and applicable knowledge that will help build new and contemporary understanding of cities and urbanism. These frameworks and methods will be tested through hypothetical re-design of existing city fabric in order to help realise the applicability of new research techniques.</p>

The Kind of Problem a City Will Always Be: A Study of the Epistemological State of Urbanism and the Kind of Problem a City is

<p>Jane Jacobs in her seminal work Death and Life of Great American Cities (1993) titled a chapter of her book, The Kind of Problem a City is, and in it, discussed how a city should be understood as a situation of a complex nature. Observers of cities have, from as early as the Renaissance, attempted to identify the kind of problem cities are by comparing them analogically to a variety of subjects and artefacts. This has been done to discuss and extrapolate the issues surrounding what a city is in a multitude of ways and to better grapple the complex issue that the subject of cities pose. However a single explanation or analogy will likely ever satisfy the discourse as a fundamental framework. The difficulty in reaching a single framework is twofold. Firstly cities and the way cities are inhabited, changes and evolves over time. And, secondly, and perhaps more problematically the way we think about them and come to know them also changes and evolves. To put simply, there are epistemological struggles in urbanism that require attending if the complex issue of a city is to ever be reconciled. Empirical observation and interpretation of the city – an alternative technique at the time of Jane Jacobs writing of Death and Life of Great American Cities, is the recording of events and occurrences and looking at how and why these might arise. This is what separated Jane Jacobs from the common school of thought at the time. It was a departure from the overly simplified rational logic of the Modernists – a school of thought made widespread by its success but had extended passed its limitations. Jacobs had observed an underlying and intricately delicate balance that had evolved out of the complex connections in the diversity of the people and their spatial conditions within a city; a balance she called a "ballet of the street". To Jacobs the Modernists obsession of order through ‘orthodox’ planning and zoning that had sought to impose homogeneity over populations and areas simply did not observe or appreciate the complexity of cities and streets that created the very emergent qualities of healthy urbanity. Qualities that Jacobs had noted “ought to be cherished and celebrated”. This thesis therefore delves into contemporary techniques of understanding and observing cities particularly by digitally modelling and dissecting areas to better interpret and come to know the existing urban condition so that we may build better knowledge foundations for urban discourse. It will identify that through changing and diversifying paradigms and epistemologies of knowledge, our perception and our a posteriori ability to identify the kind of problem that cities are, is not static and that it develops and evolves from generation to generation. This is a necessary change that occurs in order to revaluate and solve certain kinds of problems and puzzles that pertain to the generation taking place. The significant point that I argue is that such change, at an epistemological level, is inevitable and necessary. And as these evolving epistemic foundations can dramatically alter the significance and legitimation of the entire body of urban knowledge, then a continuing critical discussion of the contemporary state of epistemic urbanism or a philosophy of urbanism is a necessary task for identifying and framing the kind of problem a city is. Furthermore, this thesis will outline methods of (re-)framing those foundations to better carry over constructive and applicable knowledge that will help build new and contemporary understanding of cities and urbanism. These frameworks and methods will be tested through hypothetical re-design of existing city fabric in order to help realise the applicability of new research techniques.</p>

The banality of education policy: Discipline as extensive evil in the neoliberal era

Education is usually considered a force for good, associated with hope and optimism about better individual and social futures. Yet a case can be made that education and education policy in recent decades, far from being a force for good, has had nefarious effects at multiple levels. This can be seen in the growing alienation of significant numbers of teachers and students in disparate global contexts and in the growth of authoritarian models of schooling, involving ‘zero-tolerance’, ‘no excuses’ disciplinary approaches, that have undermined notions of the common school as a public good. Against this background, and drawing on philosophical literature and our own empirical research, this study interrogates the practice in schools in England of placing students in ‘isolation’. In considering this practice as an instance of banal education policy, our study makes obvious reference to Hannah Arendt’s characterization of evil in her account of Adolf Eichmann’s trial. But it also draws on the work of moral philosophers, Elizabeth Minnich and Simona Forti, in relation to the distinction between intensive and extensive evil, in order to analyse the nature and effects of school discipline policies and practices such as isolation in the neoliberal era as a contemporary form of evil.

Introduction

In 1944, Gunnar Myrdal famously identified the “American Dilemma,” an inherent tension between widespread faith in equal opportunity on one hand and discrimination against African Americans on the other. This book traces a similar phenomenon in northern public schools, which promised an equal education for all and then consigned Black children to second-class facilities. This paradox generated the African American dilemma, or the question of whether school integration or separate, Black-controlled schools in a legally desegregated system would more effectively advance the Black freedom struggle. This book offers a social history of northern Black debates over school integration in the North. It chronicles an extraordinary range of Black educational activism in the North stretching from the common school era to the present, and analyzes how this work—much of it carried out by women and youth—inspired the larger civil rights movement and created substantially more equal public schools.

The canned food drive: What do students learn?

PurposeNumerous studies have shown that community service during adolescence is associated with positive youth outcomes and future civic engagement (Reinders and Youniss, 2006; Yates and Youniss, 1996). However, less is known about the ways in which students participate in and perceive intermittent, noncurricular community service. The purpose of this study is to examine seventh and eighth grade students' (N = 22) experiences during a common school-wide community service event: the canned food drive.Design/methodology/approachData include students' journal responses to questions about the food drive including their feelings about the event, learning that took place, positive parts of the drive and challenges. An inductive qualitative analysis was used.FindingsAnalysis of students' responses revealed that most students perceived themselves and their classmates as being very helpful to the community and described feeling happiness and pride from the event, even when participation was minimal or nonexistent. While some students reported awareness of poverty and inequality after the food drive, many of their comments about those receiving the donations included deficit-oriented terminology and cognitive distancing by positioning those experiencing food insecurity as “the other” and different from themselves.Practical implicationsFindings highlight the benefits and shortcomings of community service, as class biases and surface-level ideas about helping may be unintentionally reinforced. Recommendations to address these issues are discussed.Originality/valueGiven the prevalence of community service in schools, qualitative research is needed to understand firsthand how students experience these events.