We combine classic and contemporary articles from a variety of perspectives, including literature and cultural studies, anthropology, sociology, history and architecture. Participants from all disciplines are invited to join and suggest texts for discussion. We read texts circulated by the session moderator two weeks in advance of the Zoom meeting. Sessions are moderated on a rotating basis to ensure the inclusion of various perspectives.​

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The Reading Group welcomes academics at all stages of their career and all disciplines as well as artists and members of the public interested in the urban. To join us, contact: Olga Springer.

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2022-2023:

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Tue 4 Oct 2022 (5pm CET)

Straw, W. “Urban Labor and the Cinematic Nocturne”, The Routledge Companion to Media and the City, 2022, pp. 100-107.

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Tue 15 Nov 2022  (5pm CET) 

Tânia Cardoso on illustrating contemporary cities - drawing, storytelling and response-ability. Reading: Davies, D. 'Introduction'. In: Urban Comics: Infrastructure and the Global City in Contemporary Graphic Narratives. Routledge, 2018. Core reading for the discussion: 18-35.

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Tue 13 Dec 2022 (5pm CET) 

Deniz Başar on “From Repertoires of Resistance to Monuments of Absence”, European Journal of Theatre and Performance 4 (June 2022): 160-197. Core reading for the discussion: 181-193.

 

Tue 24 Jan 2023 (5pm CET) CANCELLED

Tue 7 March 2023 (5pm CET) 

Valentina Barnabei on writings from creative-writing projects based in Delhi: the Cybermohalla Project Cybermohalla | s a r a i

 

Tue 18 April 2023 (5pm CET) 

María José Gonzálvez on feeling the city and migration

"Feeling the city: migrant narratives and urban space" (Györke and Timár, 2021)

"Light, energy and gendered oil gluttony: Juan Tomás Ávila Laurel’s challenges to
petrocapitalism" (Allan, 2020).

Trailer: The Writer From a Country Without Bookstores

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6 June 2023 (5pm CET) Selected literary text 

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2021-2022:

• Tue 28 Sept (5pm CET) 

• Article: Stavrides, Stavros. “Navigating the Metropolitan Space: Walking as a form of negotiation with otherness”, Journal of Psychogeography and Urban Research, Vol. 1.1., 2001. & Article: Stavrides, Stavros. “Commoning the city. Reinventing togetherness”, Eurozine, May 2020.

• Tue 9 Nov (5pm CET). Chapter 5. City of Fear, from: Kern, Leslie. Feminist City: Claiming Space in a Man-Made World. London: Verso, 2020.

• Tue 7 Dec (5pm CET). A section TBA from: Ameel, L.; Finch, J.; Salmela, M. Literary Second Cities, Palgrave MacMillan, 2017.

• Tue 1 Feb (5pm CET).Article: Hayden, Dolores. “What would a Non-sexist City be Like: Speculations on Housing, Urban Design, and Human Work”, Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 1980. 

• Tue 15 March (5pm CET). Essay: Cole, Teju. "Black Body", from Known and Strange Things, 2016.

• Tue 26 April (5pm CET). A section from: Mernissi, Fatima. Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood, 1994. 

• Tue 7 June (5pm CET). Short story:  Evaristo, Bernardine. "Carole", Girl, Woman Other, 2019.

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2020-2021:

• Wed 10 March (5pm CET). Article: “Cities and Sexualities” (Hubbard et. al., 2015)​

• Wed 21 April (5pm CET). Article: “The Invisible Flâneuse” (Janet Wolff, 1985)​

• Wed 2 June (5pm CET). A section on social class and the urban from The Worst Street in North London (Jerry White, 1986)