30/09/2011

SEMINAR #1

city seminar therborn poster a41
Cities do not have much power in today’s world, and “global cities” are not moulding the world economy. But some cities, capitals in particular, are important sites of power. As such, they are strategic locations in the social structure of power, and they have crucial functions of representation. This CRASSH seminar will focus on how, in what variable forms, capital cities represent political power, which will take us to urban spatial forms and to urban political iconography and toponymy. Power entails (potential) resistance, and we shall pay attention to the cityscape of contestations of power.
Göran Therborn is Professor emeritus of Sociology at Cambridge, previously, co-Director of the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study in the Social Sciences. He is the author of a number of books and articles on a wide range of  topics, sometimes theoretical but mostly empirically macrosocial, comparative, and with a historical dimension. His latest book is a historical sociology of the world,  The World. A Beginner’s Guide (Polity 2011)
He has an ongoing global project on Cities of Power, which has resulted in a number of book and article publications. 

MICHAELMAS TERM 2011 PROGRAMME

city seminar in-flexible cities programme poster copy
 
All events will be held at 5pm in the CRASSH Seminar Room, 17 Mill Lane, Cambridge. A wine reception will follow.
 
11 October 2011
CITIES OF POWER
Professor Göran Therborn (University of Cambridge)
 
25 October 2011
Dr Romola Sanyal (University of Newcastle)
 
8 November 2011
Owen Hatherley (firebrand leftist architecture critic)
 
22 November 2011
Anique Hommels (University of Maastricht)