Hispanic Urban Studies book series launched [Palgrave Macmillan]

Hispanic Urban Studies

[Click here for *.pdf announcement: Hispanic Urban Studies]

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Edited by

Benjamin Fraser, East Carolina University, USA

Susan Larson, University of Kentucky, USA

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Hispanic Urban Studies is a series of scholarly monographs, edited volumes, and translations focusing on Spanish, Latin American and US Latino urban culture.

The humanities and the social sciences are closer in methodology than ever before. Hispanic Urban Studies serves a dual purpose: to introduce radically original humanities work to social science researchers while affirming the relevance of cultural production to discussions of the urban. This book series takes advantage of and further contributes to exciting interdisciplinary discussions between Hispanic Studies and Cultural Geography with the aim of bringing in new ideas about space, place, and culture from all parts of the Hispanic world. Monograph titles bring together analyses of the cultural production of the Hispanic world with urban and spatial theory from a range of disciplinary contexts. The series also welcomes proposals for edited volumes related to cities that contribute in creative ways to our understanding of the spatial turn in Hispanic Studies. Translations published in the series introduce English-language readers to the rich legacy of materials on urbanism, urban culture, and cultural geography originally published in Spanish.

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Advisory Board

Malcolm Compitello, University of Arizona, USA; Monica Degen, Brunel University, London, UK; Cecilia Enjuto Rangel, University of Oregon, USA; Amanda Holmes, McGill University, Canada; Marcy Schwartz, Rutgers University, USA; Álvaro Sevilla Buitrago, Polytechnic University of Madrid, Spain; Armando Silva, National University of Colombia, Bogotá; Michael Ugarte, University of Missouri, Columbia, USA; Víctor Valle, California Polytechnic State University, USA.

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If you would like to submit a proposal for the Hispanic Urban Studies Series please feel free to contact:

Farideh Koohi-Kamali

Palgrave Macmillan

Farideh.Koohi@palgrave-usa.com

 

[SLAS Panel] Imagining The neoliberal city: new Latin American cinema and urban space

The Society for Latin American Studies will hold their annual conference in 2014 at Birkbeck, University of London. This will be the 50th SLAS conference, and we are planning a vibrant programme that will reflect the diversity of Latin American studies today. We expect to welcome approximately 350 academics to the two-day event.

The conference arrivals desk will be open from the afternoon on the 2nd of April and a welcome reception will be held for early arrivals. The panels will run all day on the 3rd of April and 4th of April.

[SLAS PANEL] Imagining the neoliberal city: new Latin American cinema and urban space

Convenors

Fernando Sdrigotti (Royal Holloway) email
Santiago Oyarzabal (Warwick University) email

Short Abstract

This panel aims to look at the way in which many of the films of the last 20 years have represented and re-imagined Latin American urban space, many times affecting the way the Latin American city is perceived and experienced

Long Abstract

The last twenty years have seen a rebirth of Latin American cinema, both in terms of the production output in the area as well as with regards to the international recognition achieved by many of the names associated with this generation of filmmakers. This is an interesting phenomenon which overlaps with one of the most devastating economic crises the region has ever seen. The city, in its many forms from utopia to dystopia, has been one of the privileged settings during these years, many times becoming the centre through which these works articulate a dialogue with their present and their political and economic contexts. This panel aims to look at the way in which many of the films of this period have attempted both to represent and re-imagine Latin American urban space, many times affecting the way the Latin American city is perceived and experienced.

Call for Papers
The call for papers is now open and will close on 22 November. To propose a paper to an accepted panel, first read the information on the Call for papers page.

The Contemporary Latin American City: LASA 2014 – CALL FOR PAPERS

LASA 2014 – CALL FOR PAPERS

(Please see below a call for papers for the forthcoming Latin American Studies Association (LASA) Congress in Chicago, May 21-24, 2014)

Assembling the Contemporary Latin American City: South-South Circuits, Planning Exchanges, Policy Mobilities

In the wake of structural adjustment programs and region-wide reforms to democratize and decentralize central government authority, several Latin American cities became sites of increased experimentation and innovation in urban planning, urban development and public participation. Municipal authorities throughout the region reinvented land use, transportation, housing, and public space as planning tools to address a range of new and long-deferred infrastructural, social, and environmental issues. In this context, urban planning became a highly contentious and experimental arena where a range of actors –from public sector planners to NGOs to social movements to organized private actors- seized opportunities to push and legitimize new models of urban planning and development. Although North-South policy exchanges and circuits persisted, Latin Americans increasingly began to look at cities in the region as legitimate and alternative models beyond North-originated paradigms.

We think that the increased South-South urban exchanges in Latin America as well as the new ideological alignments and urban experiments in the region (Davis 2013, Goldfrank and Schrank 2009, Baiocchi 2005) offer a platform to explore and craft new concepts and approaches in Latin American urban studies and planning. In recent years, urban scholars in a variety of disciplines have highlighted the potential of

“Ways of being urban in Latin America”

For a brief intro of sorts to urbanculturalstudies and Latin American cities [in English, references to works in English translation as well as David Harvey, and Doreen Massey] see the article by Alejandra García Vargas (Department of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universidad de Jujuy, Argentina) and Patria Román Velázquez (Department of Sociology, City University, London) titled

Latin American Urban Cultural Studies: Unique Texts, Ordinary Cities

available online here.

[the post’s title is a phrase taken from the above essay]