Postmodern City Texts &

Globalization

Introduction

Postmodern City Texts and Globalization

Starting Questions

What is a city?

What do you know about Postmodernism?

And postmodernity? Globalization?

How are they inter-related?

Course

The Postmodern

City Text

Globalization

Outline

Definitions and Connections

City

Postmodernity –

Fordism to post-Fordism

Post-Industrial Society

Disorganized capitalism

Service industry and Consumer Society

Globalization: Economic Issues; Taiwan as an example

City: Definition

Population

Administrative and Business Functions

Cultures

• Above 100,000 pers.City

• Above 300,000 ~ pers. Large City

• Above 1 million pers.Metropolis

• Above 10 million persMega-City

City: Definition by Population

• Jerusalem, Athens, Alexandria & Rome Ancient City

• Beijing, Taipei (1884~1920)Imperial City

• Factory social problems, urban constructions of road & water supply systems, education and medical system, etc.

Industrial City

• Transportation system, shopping arcades, rational organization of space, utopianismModern City

• multicultural capitalism, telecommunication and rapid transportation; gentrification; huge shopping mall

Postmodern/

Postcolonial City

• City in global economy and other types of

communication networkGlobal City

City: in History

source

Center of finance,

multinational

corporation, media

communication,

considerable

decision-making

power, etc.

Industrial City – Modern City –Postmodern

City – Global City

City: Concept City and Lived City; Visible City

and Invisible City

City: its System, Daily Life & Accidents;

The focus of our class:

Postmodernity & Globalization

Space and Place, Landscape, Flâneur and

Walking, Heterotopia

Risk & Everyday Rhythm

Other Related Terms

How do we read a

city?

Urban Culture

Methodology

Louis Wirth “Urbanism as a

Way of Life” (1938)

Definition of the city and urbanism (98)

Three Aspects: 1. Population (parallel with its functions;

segmentalization 99)

2. Density ( diversity, abrupt transition, loneliness despite the close physical contact)

3. Heterogeneity (mobility, depersonalization)

Consequences: Isolation and disorganization Urbanism in Ecological perspective (High

death rates and low birth rates)

As a social formation (secondary relation)

Collective behavior (voluntary but transitory groups)

Wirth’s Definition of

Urbanism –Summarized

1. Anonymity a shift away from primary relationships to secondary relationships. Urbanites interact with others not as individuals but with others in certain roles.

Personal relations become superficial and transitory.

2. Urban life is marked by collectivity, utilitarianism and efficiency.

3. Segmentation of urban life.

4. methodology: A. 3 variables:

“On the basis of the three variables, number, density of settlement, and degree of heterogenity, of the urban population, it appears possible to explain the characteristics of urban life and to account for the differences between cities of various sizes and types. ”

B. 3 structures (physical, social and mental)

Critique of Wirth’s Views

Urbanism as a way of life is not limited to the city. Urban problems are not limited to certain places (such as cities).

No definite ‘urban personality’; kinship can be maintained and made stronger.

There is a nostalgia or preference for the rural way of life

(Ref. 人文地理學詞典選讀 The Dictionary of Human Geography pp. 200-202)

(textbook_1) spatial determinism: city as a factor?

“community” in the city possible

subcultures

Wirth’s Views: Pros and Cons

Pros

Three major factors of urbanism and their “possible” consequences

Population schizoid or anomie?

Density mosaic of social world

Heterogeneity segregation, transitory groups and depersonlization

Modification

(101) Social structure – self-employment or home-ownership is possible nowadays?

Anonymity is not negative, and personal disintegration not an absolute outcome

Methodology

Of Studying Urban Culture?

Reading a City -WHAT & HOW

Perspective：Bird or Bug?

Targets：Sight & Sound, Place, Space, and Event, Signs & Texts

Method：Analytical or Experiential

Product: ppt or mp4; Photo Essay or Vignettes (+a Conclusion)

Bird’s-eye View: Urban

Semiotics

Path 街道

Node 節點; e.g. MRT station

Edge 邊界; bridges

District 區域

Landmark 里程碑

Chap 5: Perspectives on Urban Culture

Louis Wirth: generic definition of a city—with

limited success

We need more specific analytical categories

Chap 6: Modernity, Postmodernity and Urban

Culture

Architectural approach

Lefebvre: space as production

Benjamin: landscape and city as dreamscape

Jameson & Harvey on postmodern space

Gentrification and the vernacular as landscape

Textbook -1

Postmodernity &

Globalization

Interconnections,

Paradigms,

Debates & Approaches

Intersections of Theoretical

Discourses and Socio-Economic Systems

Postmoder

nity

Globalism Globality

Postmodernism

Feminism

Postcolonialism

Marxism

Multinational Capitalism

Telecommunication

Globalization: 3 paradigms

Definitions (1): Postmodernism

& Postmodernity postmodernity and postmodern conditions—

poststructuralist views of language, post-industrialism, multinational/global capitalism and over-all commodification globalization

Postmodernism –culture in music, literature, architecture, popular culture and politics Features：Depthlessness無深度, pastiche 拼貼、

metafictional (self-reflexive 後設)、ambiguity 模擬兩可、questioning meta-narrative 質疑大敘述／真理、eclectic 折衷、boundary-crossing 跨界、pluralistic 多元, etc.

e.g. Blade Runner (pastiche of urban culture, of high-tech and retro styles; futuristic language and Christian images, challenging human identity)

e.g. Matrix (reality as simulation)

Definitions (2): Postmodernism vs.

Postcolonialism

Similarity -- De-centering, Questioning Master Narratives and other

Authorities

multiplicity in language and culture parody, ambiguity and contamination.

Contradictions -- History: e.g. Foucault -- The death of History Re-

Writing histories (To be colonized is to be ‘removed from history’ Albert Memmi ）

Subjectivity: pastiche 拼貼、contingent 臨時性

constructing subjectivities

Aestheticized politics vs. counter discourse for social change

Global capitalism vs. the only true counter-discourse?

“past the last post”: both related to or subsumed by issues of globalization

Definitions (3): Globalization

Definition: the product of processes through which goods, services, capital, people, information, and ideas flow across borders and lead to greaterintegration of economies and societies.

Cultural globalization –caused by the spreading of English language (as a “global language” or world englishes), media culture, telecommunication, migrating people, colonialism, international capitalism and international organizations.

Economic globalization – also caused by organization such as World Bank, free trade unions --such as NAFTA (北美貿易協定), GATT (關稅暨貿易總協定) and WTO (世界貿易組織), which support open and expanded market. ECFA

Issues: Global Empire and biopolitics? How are local cultures retained and/or transformed.

Fordism to Post-Fordism Keynesianism (State

economy)

Fordism –

1. Standardization (large-scale production of standardized good)

2. Rational Organization --assembly line; full employment and centralized management

3. scientific management; industrial prosperity

4. (rigidity of Fordism in investment, labor organization and in social welfare).

Post-Fordism

Investment in the “emerging countries”

Flexible, variable production (e.g. cell phone faceplate)

Just-in-Time stock management

Sub-contracting to horizontally related ‘independent’ companies.(e.g. Nike, Taiwan’s textile industry, China in Africa & everywhere;《世界是平的》(Outsourced)

Reorganization of labor

Alienation of laborers;

reification of human relations

(3) Post-Industrial Society

(Barker chap 5 104)

A shift from industrial manufacturing to service industry

A shift of emphasis from production to consumption

Capital – information or knowledge

the dominance of 1) 電腦新貴 or techno-PMC --Professorial-managerial class; 2) service workers

Disorganized Capitalism &

Consumer Culture

(106-107)

Concentration and centralization of industrial,

banking and commerical capital;

Flexible forms of work organization

Lifestyle: Communal values (external

validation) replaced by personal lifestyles

(assemblage of goods, clothes, practices,

experiences, appearance, etc.)

Please see this page.

Globalization: Different

Perspectives

• Post-modernism

• Femi-nism

• Eclecti-cism

• Political Realism

LiberalismTrans-forma-

tionalism

Constructivism

Marxism

(the underlined parts are related to Globalization) Urban Identity, Postmodernity & Globalization: How are we shaped by the

urban environment we live in? How have postmodernity and globalization

impacted on our sense of identities, time, place and urban space?

Reading Postmodern and Globalizing City: How do we—as flâneur, city-

dweller or tourist—read a city (and city texts)? How do we read its history,

landscape, streets, homes, and heterotopia as gendered spaces, places or non-

places presented in the chosen city texts? How do urban cultures (such as

films, literature, installation arts) respond to the increasing globalization of

postmodern cities?

Global City, Strangeness and Daily Life: How do the global forces of flows

come into play in our daily lives and urban cultural works? How are they related

to postmodernity, which has already turned cities into virtual spaces and huge

shopping malls? In what forms do glocality and strangeness co-exist in today’s

cities? More specifically, how do urban cultures deal with the risk factors and

global connectivity so prevalent in today’s urban society?

The Course’s Main Focuses:

Postmodernity

GlobalizationCity Text

In Sum…

Globalization: Controversial

Issues –economy

Increasing discrepancy between the rich and the poor

plutocracy (government by the wealthy few)– “The

Commanding Heights”

National sovereignty questioned, the farmers suffer.

Instability in employment (e.g. The newly poor in Taiwan)

exploitation of third-world laborers (e.g. Nike, Disney, clip)

The need to meet the global trends and face its crises

(e.g. global brand, culture industry, the pulling forces

from mainland China, Europe's debt crisis).

De-globalization?

Globalization: Controversial

Issues –culture

Three Paradigms:

1. Clash of Civilization –lasting and immutable

culture

2. McDonaldization – erasable or erased

cultures

3. Cultural Mixing or Hybridization – mixing and

generating new translocal forms of

difference

Globalization: Our Focus

References Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice. Christopher Barker. Sage:

2000.

Globalization defined

http://progressiveliving.org/globalization_defined.htm

COMMANDING HEIGHTS The Battle for the World Economy Daniel

Yergin

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights/ (traces the battle

between State economy and market economy to two economists:

John Maynard Keynes and Friedrich von Hayek )

Related Clips: 1) Globalization and terrorism;

2) economic revolutions in 1990’s;

3) Fall of Communism: China’s Opening their market;

4) Mexico case (interconnection of politics and economy);

5) flows

6) capitalism; 7) the poor (e.g. snake kids)

8) For and against economic globalization