On Monday evening Dr Beau Beza hosted a range of scholars, design practitioners and students in the A+B Gallery space to celebrate the anticipated launch of the book Urban Space: Experience and Reflections from the Global South.
Honorary Consul of Colombia, Mr Geoffrey R Widmer presented and officially launched the publication.
The objective of the book is to describe the production of urban space, from the perspective of the Global South; providing a range of different urban space constructs to those found in the West.
Professor Ralph Horne, Deputy Pro Vice Chancellor, Research and Innovation at RMIT University writes:
The structuring of Urban Space is as topical as ever in this era of climate change, hyper‐urbanisation, post‐digital labour markets, and geo‐political power shifts. Scholarship of the contemporary urban condition is dominated by studies and examples drawn from the global north. Yet, cities of the global south are distinctive from those of the global north. Socio‐political conditions structure patterns and practices of urban reproduction and, in turn, Urban Space reflects conditions in the Global South. The result is different space related outcomes. This is the central topic of this collection.
In this book, a unique collection of case study‐based accounts posits both English and Spanish academic literature to interpret and reinterpret the appropriation, negotiation and reconfiguration of Urban Space in cities, from Colombia to Namibia.
This collection will be of particular interest to urban scholars and others interested in contemporary urban change, especially those with an interest in the Global South. Readers will encounter new perspectives on the State’s enduring influence in urban land and territory reconfiguration and the contrasting wider rhetoric that affords and legitimises a key role for the private sector. The case studies also illuminate opportunities and possibilities for grassroots organising to challenge prevailing city actor hierarchies. They also highlight the political‐economic consequences of particular cases of bus rapid transport projects for spatial and social segregation. Across these and other topics, recurring themes of inequality, governance, and environment are investigated in contested urban terrains. The result is a unique collection of viewpoints, with a common, critical narrative on the present and future challenges facing cities of the Global South.
Both Schools of Architecture and Design at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Cali and Bogotá and the School of Architecture and Built Environment at Deakin University jointly published the book through a Colombia/Australia collaboration.
The book is co-edited by: Jaime Hernández García, Sabina Cárdenas-O´Byrne, Adolfo García-Jerez and Beau B. Beza. Published by Pontificia Unversidad Javeriana, Sello Editorial Javeriano Cali and available via Google Play and Libreia Lerner.
