Urban Narratives

Thoughts on City Literature, Urban Studies and Planning

Agency, crisis and possible worlds in city novels and urban planning

Posted on 29.4.2016 by Lieven Ameel

Speaking today at the Urban Studies Days (Helsinki) about the waterfront in crisis in literary fiction and urban planning, with a focus on Helsinki’s waterfront development and New York pre and post-Sandy.

What alternative worlds are visible, how are readers guided towards specific possible worlds, and what role is given to a sense of agency in describing possible turning points?

Amongst others, in addition to urban plannign documents, Nathaniel Rich’s Odds against tomorrow, Ben Lerner’s 10:04, Antti Tuomainen’s Parantja (The Healer), Annika Luther De hemlösas stad (City of the Homeless).

http://www.kaupunkitutkimuksenpaivat.net/tyoryhmat/narraatiot-ja-nimeaminen-arjen-toimijuutena/

http://www.kaupunkitutkimuksenpaivat.net/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Kaupunkitutkimuksen-p%C3%A4iv%C3%A4t-2016_OHJELMA_valmis1.pdf

“Ecological” City Novel and “Urban Pastoral” in New York literature

Posted on 21.3.2016 by Lieven Ameel

Teaching today on the “ecological” city novel (following Gelfant) and the “urban pastoral” (following, a.o. Alter) in New York literature – Paule Marshall’s Brown Girl, Brownstones (1959), Betty Smith’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1943), and Teju Cole’s Open City (2011). Dealing with questions of belonging and alienation, authenticity and ethnicity, being in harmony with one’s surroundings – and the lack of it in urban environments.

And at the background: the importance of such ecological novels in cultural heritage – see e.g. Laura Tanenbaum’s article on Brooklyn here.

urban pastoral

“The term “urban pastoral” has been used to describe a variety of approaches to the city in literature, referring, inter alia, to Wordsworth’s poetry (Steinman 2012), to a movement of New York poetry (Gray 2010), and to the experience of London in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway (Alter 2005: 103–121). […] my use of the term urban pastoral closely resembles Robert Alter’s use of the term in his reading of Mrs. Dalloway (1925), in which he notes that instances of urban pastoral appear when the “urban experience, seen quite vividly in its abundant particularities, can provide the sense of invigoration, harmony with one’s surroundings, and enrapturing aesthetic revelation that is traditionally associated with the green world of pastoral” (Alter 2005: 105).” (quoted from Ameel 2014: 142)

Ameel, Lieven 2014: Helsinki in Early Twentieth-Century Literature. Helsinki: SKS.

Gelfant, Blanche Housman 1954: The American City Novel. Norma: University of Oklahoma Press

Climate fiction & urban utopias/dystopias

Posted on 1.3.2016 by Lieven Ameel

Interesting article by Astrid Bracke here concerning British climate fiction. To what extent are moral or ethical questions involved in contemporary climate fiction? This struck me as a particularly timely post, since I’m just today finalizing abstracts on crisis narratives of the waterfront in Northern American, Finnish and Dutch/Flemish contemporary fiction. What do such fictional narratives teach us – if anything at all? At least, they tend to provide narrative structures for couching our uneasiness about possible (and possibly undesirable) futures.

On the City Novel as Genre

Posted on 15.1.2016 by Lieven Ameel

Finalizing a chapter on the city novel as genre – what distinguishes the city novel?

Drawing on Daniel Acke, Burton Pike, Hana Wirth-Nesher, Bart Keunen, and others – one important reference point is also the preface to Rodenbach’s Bruges-la-morte:

“Voilà ce que nous avons souhaité de suggérer: la Ville orientant une action; ses paysages urbains, non plus seulement comme des toiles de fond, comme des thèmes descriptifs un peu arbitrairement choisis, mais liés à l’événement même du livre.”

“The conception to which I have striven to give a certain embodiment is that of the influence exerted by a town in the whole character of its details, which are therefore indefinably linked to all the incidents contained in the narrative.”

Rodenbach, Georges 1892/1903: Bruges-la-Morte. Translated by Thomas Duncan. London: Swan Sonnenschein & co.

Not the city as character, then (although Rodenbach refers to that, too), but the city as presence and influence.

Rodenbach_-_Bruges-la-Morte,_Flammarion,_page_0005

NORNA 46 & place names as indicators of meaning in Helsinki novels

Posted on 22.10.2015 by Lieven Ameel

Today (22.10.2015) at NORNAs 46th symposium “Namn och identitet” (University of Tampere), Terhi Ainiala presents our joint research on place names as indicators of meaning in Helsinki novels. Research on the intersection between toponyms, presencing place, literary geography, and onomastics.

Ainiala Terhi & Ameel Lieven: Ortnamn som indikatorer för ortens anda: namn i Helsingfors-romaner. NORNA:s 46:e symposium: Namn och identitet 22.10.2015. Tampere.

Sybaris and Other Homes (1869) and the appeal of utopian suburbia

Posted on 12.10.2015 by Lieven Ameel

Looking forward to the 5th HLCN symposium, where I’ll present on Edward E. Hale’s Sybaris and Other Homes (1869) and the appeal of utopian suburbia. Other presentations by Jason Finch and Anni Lappela, and readings in urban cultural studies and literary geographies.

Full program below:

5th HLCN symposium, 13.10.2015

5th HLCN SYMPOSIUM
University of Tampere
Time and place: 11h-16h
B4075 (English corridor) from 11 to 14
B3112 (by the main stairs, 3rd floor) from 14 to 16.
Pinni B / Kanslerinrinne 1 / University of Tampere

Program
11.00-12.00    Literary Second Cities editorial board meeting (closed)
12.00-13.00   Network meeting: developments in HLCN, possible name change, tasks ahead (open, registration required)
13.00 -14.00   Lunch break

14.00-15.00 Presentations
Anni Lappela (University of Helsinki): “Provincial City and Local, National and Transnational Identities in Russian Realistic Prose Fiction in the 2000s.” Research Plan Presentation.
Jason Finch (Åbo Akademi University): “Everyday Stories: Textual and Visual Cultures of Public Housing in Post-Slum Britain, 1920-2020”
Lieven Ameel (University of Tampere): “Edward E. Hale’s Sybaris and Other Homes (1869) and the appeal of utopian suburbia.”

15.00-16.00   Theory Reading
•   Fraser, Benjamin 2015: “Urban cultural studies – a manifesto (Part 1)” Journal for Urban Cultural Studies 2014: 1, pp. 3-17(15).
•   Neal Alexander: “On Literary Geographies.” Available at: http://www.literarygeographies.net/index.php/LitGeogs/article/view/1-2.

The general meeting at 12.00 will include a discussion about the statutes (see the provisional statutes here.)

(Em)plotting planning at ISUF 2015 – City as Organism

Posted on 22.9.2015 by Lieven Ameel

This week, Rome hosts the 22nd ISUF conference, with as title “City as Organism – New visions for urban life”. I’m not entirely sure what to expect from the wide range of interesting-looking papers that relate in broad terms to the issue of urban form and morphology – urban morphology as a separate field of study being somewhat of a mystery to me. But I’m very much looking forward to being inspired at La Sapienza by the conference’s academic input, as much as by that city that defies words as much as it inspired them. Reminds me of the fact that even the saints Jerome and Augustine confessed to have been “allured and teased by sensuous images of Rome” (Mumford 1961: 246).

I’ll be presenting my research on (em)plotting urban planning on Wednesday.

“Narrating Helsinkis Kalasatama – Narrative Plotting, Genre and Metaphor in Planning New Urban Morphologies”.

Full programme here.

My last experience of Rome was watching La Grande Bellezza – I wrote a small piece of the way it depicts the “vortex” of urban life here.

I’ll try to get hold of some novels (hopefully in English translation) by the Neapolitan author Raffaele La Capria, who acted as one of the inspirations for the figure of Jep Gambardella in La Grande Bellezza.

Narratives in Urban Planning: interview in Helsingin Sanomat

Posted on 18.9.2015 by Lieven Ameel

Today (18.9.), the Finnish major daily newspaper Helsingin Sanomat, featured a large article, including interview, about my research in Narratives in Urban Planning.

The article (in Finnish) can be found here. Link to another, free version of the article can be found here: http://www.hs.fi/ihmiset/a1442459770179

(source: Sirpa Räihä / HS)

Literary City and Marketing at Morning Coffee Sessions, Kaupunkiakatemia

Posted on 17.9.2015 by Lieven Ameel

Speaking tomorrow, Friday 18.9.2015, on the subject of literary perspectives on city marketing and branding (in Finnish).

Kaupunkiakatemian aamukahvit perjantaina 18.9.

My talk is part of a series of morning coffee sessions, organized by the Urban Academy / Kaupunkiakatemia.

The venue is Laituri, the Helsinki City Planning Department’s information and exhibition space on Narinkka Square, Helsinki.

Programme:

klo 8.15 Tervetulotoivotus ja teeman esittely

klo 8.30 Kuvat Helsingin matkailumarkkinoinnissa: tutkijatohtori Salla Jokela, Helsingin yliopisto

klo 9.00 Paikan mielenmaisemat – kaunokirjallisuudesta markkinointiin: tutkijatohtori Lieven Ameel, Helsingin yliopisto

klo 9.20 Kaupungin kommenttipuheenvuoro ja ajankohtaista kaupunkimarkkinoinnista: asiantuntija Tia Hallanoro, Helsingin kaupunki, Kaupunkimarkkinointi

Kaupunkiakatemia on Helsingin yliopiston, Aalto-yliopiston ja Helsingin kaupungin uudenlainen yhteistyömuoto ja -verkosto, joka yhdistää monitieteisen tutkimuksen, opetuksen ja yhteiskunnallisen vaikuttavuuden kaupunkitutkimuksen alalla.

New Spatial Humanities

Posted on 14.9.2015 by Lieven Ameel

Fascinating series at Indiana University Press: The Spatial Humanities.

“The spatial humanities is a new interdisciplinary field resulting from the recent surge of scholarly interest in space. It prospects a ground upon which humanities scholars can collaborate with investigators engaged in scientific and quantitatively-oriented research. This spatial turn invites an initiative focused on geographic and conceptual space and is poised to exploit an assortment of technologies, especially in the area of the digital humanities. Framed by perspectives drawn from Geographic Information Science, and attentive to cutting-edge developments in data mining, the geo-semantic Web, and the visual display of cultural data, the agenda of the spatial humanities includes the pursuit of theory, methods, case studies, applied technology, broad narratives, persuasive strategies, and the bridging of research fields.”

Seems the “spatial turn” has not run out of steam, indeed.

The series fits in particularly well within the larger conglomeration of publications working with space and the humanities, such as Palgrave’s series on Geocriticism and Spatial Literary Studies and recently appeared journals such as Literary Geographies and Cultural Urban Studies. Exciting to be part of a dynamic and multidisciplinary field of study!

—

Update: and just as I ponder the return of the spatial turn, I bump into this:

cfp for the “spatial turn/return” at the ACLA, Harvard, 17-20.3.2016.

“With the theme “Spatial Turn/Return,” we hope to explore space in its multiple, simultaneous, and plural manifestations–histories of practices and encounters of/with/in space and the theoretical and aesthetic articulations, disillusioned and empowering, that are constructed and mobilized around space. We also welcome papers that explore the many ways in which works of literature and popular culture reflect changing perceptions and definitions of space.”