Reading Notes: Grosz, "Futures, Cities, Architecture"

[rax]

Comments

[lilairen]

This reminds me a great deal of the Egyptian structure of embodiment and identity, in weird ways that aren't just because I am hip-deep in theology.

[eredien]

I am tempted to write a city-prosthesis story now: "The cities of the future will almost certainly resemble cities as we know them today only to the extent that bodies will resemble our own and function according to their various modalities." So if the city is a prosthesis for the body, the way that we use and inhabit our bodies will naturally delineate the way that we use and inhabit our cities. OK, I can buy that.

This idea of bodies-as-cities, cities-as-bodies isn't a new one, but the way in which that idea has changed over the years is fascinating: check out "The City of Ladies," Christine de Pizan for some Aristotelan/early Christian takes, or Howard's idea of healthful utopian planning as a kind of pre-eugenics take on it, or the absolutely amazing "Spaces of Hope," for a modern critical theory of city-as-mind-extension.

[krinndnz]

Bother, now I'm going to have to listen to Cities Of The Future on loop while I think about this.