28 May Invited paper on the International Symposium ‘City and Nation: Changing Relations, New Perspectives in Urban and Cultural Studies’ at University of Bristol (13/06/2019, UK)

Dr Calzada presents his invited paper on City and Nation: Blending Metropolitanism and Nationalism, which revolves around the journal article published in Space and Polity, in the International Symposium: City and Nation: Blending Metropolitanism and Nationalism held by the University of Bristol (UK).

To cite this conference paper:

Calzada, I. (2019), Invited speaker on the ‘City and Nation: Blending Metropolitanism and Nationalism?’, in City and Nation: Changing Relations, New Perspectives in Urban and Cultural Studies, University of Bristol (UK), June 13.

The relationship between city and nation has been subject to change in recent decades, following devolution of powers world-wide and the growing freedom of cities to build, brand and promote themselves, independent of the nation-state. Scholarship in the field of urban studies has focused primarily on the political, social and economic implications of the changing relationship between city and nation. It has also emphasised the potential of ‘world cities’ to displace the hegemony of the nation-state in the context of an increasingly globalised political order (Massey, 2007; Curtis 2014; Clark and Moonen 2016). Rather less attention has been paid to sub-national inflections of the changing relationship between city and nation and to the role played by cultural practice and production in articulating, negotiating and reshaping understandings of both city and nation.

This symposium brings together scholars working in the fields of urban studies and cultural studies (broadly conceived) to explore how cultural factors, practices and productions influence or are affected by the changing relationship between city and nation. It seeks to extend the scholarship on city, nation and culture beyond cities traditionally aligned with the nation-state by encouraging papers on cites often excluded from discourses relating to national culture. It further asks how cultural practices and production shape understandings of the relationship between city and nation; how national identities and discourses play out in the context of distinct urban contexts – how they are negotiated, refracted, challenged or made concrete in the microcosm of the city, its cultural practices and its cultural representation; how practices of identity-building and the branding of cities relate to wider national identities and cultural imaginaries; and what the changing relationship between city and nation reveals about the nation-state, its workings and its discourses. Theoretical tools for understanding emerging relations between city and nation and new methodologies for the study of the same are particularly welcome. These will be complemented by case studies dedicated to distinct city-nation contexts.

Venue: G113, 21 Woodland Rd., University of Bristol, BS8 1TE

9.30-10.00: Welcome/Coffee

10.00-11.30: Conceptualizing City and Nation

Ed Welch, University of Aberdeen, ‘Build the Imaginary: New Towns and Urban Futures in Post-war French Spatial Planning’

Susan Parnell, University of Bristol, ‘The Janus-face of National Urban Policies in an Age of Multi Scale Governance’

Igor Calzada, University of Oxford, ‘City and Nation: Blending Metropolitanism and Nationalism’

11.30-11.45 Break

11.45-12.45 Keynote Presentation

Karen Till, Maynooth University, ‘Challenging the Promise of the Nation: Witnessing through the Irish Female Body with ANU Productions’

12.45-1.45 Lunch

1.45-3.15 Representations & Discourses

Cara Claasen, University of Bristol, ‘Multiple Ways of Knowing, Seeing and Writing the City: Cape Town’

Ruth Glynn, University of Bristol, ‘Naples and the Nation: Critical Perspectives and Problems’

Erika Hanna, University of Bristol, ‘Broken Televisions and Delayed Buses: City and Nation in Tony O’Shea’s Dublin Photographs (1980-1990)’

3.15-3.30 Break

3.30-5.00 Aesthetics and Practices

Tijen Tunali, University of Tours, ‘Urban Aesthetics and the Right to the City’

Ulrike Zitlsperger, University of Exeter, ‘Berlin is not Germany: Topography Matters’

Nile Davies, Columbia University, ‘Seeing the Creole City: Places and Persons’

5.00-5.30 Concluding Discussion