Pelin Tan: Conflict and Hospitality

Sociologist and Art Historian Pelin Tan discuss features of urbanization in Istanbul. How to create strong oppositional urban movements on common claim? (property, ecology, claiming the common...)What kind of tool can we use? what is the role of arts?

map of Istanbul

Istanbul

According to urban myths surrounding Istanbul’s Tophane district, murder and robbery are common, walking around in the evening is unsafe, and prostitution and drugs are rampant. This neighborhood, where I happen to live, is an area of the city near the main cosmopolitan cultural centers of Taksim and Galata; its residents are primarily Gypsies, Arabs from Anatolia and Kurds. Tophane represents the “Other” in the urban conscious of Istanbul’s residents; it is both uncanny and dangerous, a place to which urban cliches and notions of insecurity are readily attached. [...] Read more 


http://www.ekumenopolis.net/

The Third Bosphorus Bridge is a planned suspension bridge located at the northern end of the Bosphorus, north of the other two bridges, in Istanbul. The bridge will be located between Garipçe (on the European side) and Poyrazköy (on the Asian side). Land prices in the northern, less urbanized spaces on both sides of the Bosphorus are already soaring in expectation of an urbanization boom thanks to the new cross river connection, according to Ekumenopolis, a documentary film of 2010 about the area. The green areas and wetlands in question are considered by some to be essential to the Metropolis' ecologic and economic sustainability.