NATIONALISM,COSMOPOLITANISM, AND GEOGRAPHICAL IMAGINATIONS

In this article I set nationalism and cosmopolitanism into sharp contrast with one another as inherently incompatible geographical imaginations. I begin by briefly denaturalizing nationalism and the nation‐state. I then turn to the philosophy and political agenda of cosmopolitanism, an ideology simultaneously very old and new, which offers a more inclusive and empathetic alternative to nationalist xenophobia. In the third section I argue that contemporary globalization has laid the ontological foundations of a cosmopolitan world order. Next, I explicate nationalism's and cosmopolitanism's competing visions of the definition and meaning of “community.” I summarize major objections to cosmopolitanism and offer a defense of it. In the following section I focus on the implications of cosmopolitanism for contemporary geography, including relational spatialities of empathy and caring. Finally, I suggest that contemporary globalization is gradually putting into place the legal and institutional apparatus for cosmopolitan global governance and democracy.     

EARLY MODERN EXPANSION AND THE POLITICIZATION OF OCEANIC SPACE*

ABSTRACT. The definition of oceans as international politicized space is an integral but little analyzed aspect of early modern European expansion, which took place between about 1450 and 1800. In this essay I explore the implications of thinking about the development of European imperialism and global dominance in oceanic terms. I argue that oceanic, rather than terrestrial, dominance characterized early modern European empires, particularly in relation to Africa and Asia, where indigenous political and economic control prevailed. The long apprenticeship in mastering oceanic space contributed to the ability of Europeans to build land-based empires in Asia and Africa in the nineteenth century. As well, the international relationships worked out by Europeans in the nonstate but militarized arena of the high seas contributed to an emergent global order.     

IDENTITY AND SPACE: THE CASE OF TURKISH AMERICANS*

ABSTRACT. Until recently, Muslim Americans have often been overlooked in studies on immigration, ethnicity, and race. Their loyalty to America and their integration into the larger culture have frequently been questioned by the media, and academia's interest has mostly been limited to establishing links between Muslims, fundamentalism, and terrorism. Muslim American experiences‐their social, political, and cultural institutions and spaces in the United States‐have drawn little attention from geographers. But stereotypes play an important role in intergroup relations and public‐policy making. Thus, it is important to understand Muslim ethnic‐group experiences of immigration and their place‐making activities in the United States. Based on research in the greater New York metropolitan area, this study explores one facet of the Muslim experience in the United States by investigating Turkish American identity‐construction spaces and their role in the preservation and reformation of Turkish American identity; that is, how these spaces emphasize and shape particular identities and discourage others.     

MAKING SUSTAINABLE CREATIVE/CULTURAL SPACE IN SHANGHAI AND SINGAPORE*

ABSTRACT. Shanghai and Singapore are two economically vibrant Asian cities that have recently adopted creative/cultural economy strategies. In this article I examine new spatial expressions of cultural and economic interests in the two cities: state‐vaunted cultural edifices and organically evolved cultural spaces. I discuss the simultaneous precariousness and sustainability of these spaces, focusing on Shanghai's Grand Theatre and Moganshan Lu and on Singapore's Esplanade—Theatres by the Bay and Wessex Estate. Their cultural sustainability is understood as their ability to support the development of indigenous content and local idioms in artistic work. Their social sustainability is examined in terms of the social inclusion and community bonds they engender; environmental sustainability refers to the articulation with the language of existing urban forms and the preservation of or improvements to the landscape. Although both Shanghai and Singapore demonstrate simultaneous precariousness and sustainability, Singapore's city‐state status places greater pressure on it to ensure sustainability than does Shanghai, within a much larger China in which Beijing serves as the cultural hearth while Shanghai remains essentially a commercial center.     

CREATIVE DESTRUCTION AND TRIAL BY SPACE IN A HISTORIC CANADIAN VILLAGE*

Since the 1970s, stakeholders have attempted to revitalize selected rural communities across the developed world. The resulting initiatives have contributed much to the growing multifunctionality of rural space. Geographers have conceptualized this transformation in at least two ways: as a process of creative destruction and as a process of trial by space. In this article we demonstrate the merit of uniting these concepts to enhance our understanding of the evolution of historic towns and villages. We illustrate this unification in a study of Creemore, a picturesque village in the province of Ontario, Canada. Our analysis reveals that the transformation of this locale, from rural service center to heritage‐scape, has been fraught with controversy as various stakeholders have struggled to establish a dominant identity. We conclude that unification of these concepts does provide a useful framework for unraveling the evolution of historic communities within rural space.     

THEIR SPACE: SECURITY AND SERVICE WORKERS IN A BRAZILIAN GATED COMMUNITY*

ABSTRACT. This study examines the role of service workers in creating a secure landscape in a zone of gated communities near Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Most research on gated communities emphasizes their segregation and formal security apparatuses. In fact, gated communities interact with surrounding rural settlements because they draw their service employees from them. Security emerges from informal relationships of trust that property owners establish with service workers. Gardeners, especially, enable homeowners to project their property investment to others through landscaping. Equally of importance, a manicured garden conveys the message that a home is receiving daily attention—and is secure—even if the owner is not present. The study probes this interdependence from the point of view of gardeners in the context of one gated community in an area south of Belo Horizonte and the attempts by members of its homeowners association to minimize the sense of fear they associate with the Brazilian city.     

大连广场空间布局合理性及空间辐射

广场是城市文化活动的重要载体和城市中重要的文化生产空间.在甄别广场概念的基础上,给出了广场的新定义,之后选择大连市市内4区广场作为研究对象,对市内4区广场进行逐一调查,概括出大连城区广场的分布状况,并结合人口分布对广场布局进行了评价;详细调查了大连市内4区典型的5个广场,共发放1 800份问卷对广场活动者进行了调查,进而确定了每个广场的空间辐射范围的平面形态;最后对广场的使用频率和广场的社会文化意义进行了一些探讨,并根据实际情况提出建议,以供相关研究决策参考.     

COSMOPOLITANISM: THE MEDITERRANEAN ARCHIVES†

The existing postcolonial literature privileges the British and French imperial/colonial history that mirrors the ongoing debate on the relationship among cosmopolitanism, universalism, and imperialism. These debates take for granted the Kantian and Hegelian hierarchy of European civilizations, hence marginalizing the southern shores of Europe and the broader Mediterranean space. Drawing on Mignolo's notion of “border thinking” and on Isin's account of the city as a “difference machine,” I address the issue of how imperialism, colonialism, and cosmopolitanism come together and relate to each other in the context of the Mediterranean (allegedly) cosmopolitan cities. In particular, cosmopolitanism is read as the outcome of the reciprocal adjustment of interior and exterior borders in the making of modernity/coloniality in the Mediterranean. Focusing on the Ottoman millet system, my main claim in this article is that cosmopolitanism worked as a peculiar dispositif within the urban difference machine, enabling the city to sustain the tension between different accounts of citizenship.     

WARPED SPACE: A GEOGRAPHY OF DISTANCE DECAY*

Distance decay is one of geography's core concepts, yet its own spatial properties have been largely neglected. We illustrate the use of the expansion method in assessing the spatial variation of distance-decay parameters within the general context of gravity models. The approach enables the portrayal of “space warping,” said to occur when equivalent distances have spatially uneven effects on interaction. The concepts are examined empirically through the estimation of a competing destination model for out-migration from five State Economic Areas over the 1965–70 period. Four of the five origins are found to have spatially unstable frictions of distance. We conclude by suggesting that distance decay is a contextual, rather than a universal, effect.     

THE PHOTOGRAPHIC CONSTRUCTION OF TOURIST SPACE IN VICTORIAN AMERICA*

ABSTRACT. Tensions and contradictions surround photographic representations of landscape—and the practices that created those representations—during the medium's so-called golden age in the late nineteenth century. These are examined by focusing on the landscape views of H. H. Bennett, a photographer of considerable renown whose stereographs and oversized panoramas of the Wisconsin Dells transformed a working river into a picturesque landscape. Such a construction of genteel tourist space in Victorian America suggests a post-frontier aesthetic in which nature is valued less as an opportunity for progress or an occasion for terror than as pleasing scenery.     

CONSTRUCTING AFRICAN AMERICAN URBAN SPACE IN ATLANTA,GEORGIA*

Recognizing the connections between the construction of urban space and racial identity, this article explores an urban redevelopment scheme launched in 2004 by Big Bethel ame Church in Atlanta, Georgia. Known as the “Renaissance Walk,” Big Bethel's project is a $45 million dollar redevelopment plan to turn an adjacent city block into a mixed‐use development. By looking at the racialization of place from the perspective of those who live, work, and organize along Auburn Avenue, one of the most historically significant African American business corridors in the United States, I contend that Big Bethel's redevelopment project is emblematic of contemporary black counterpublic spaces and links the redevelopment project undertaken by Big Bethel with African American identity positions.     

GENDER,CLASS, AND URBAN SPACE: PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SPACE IN CONTEMPORARY URBAN LANDSCAPES

Informed by feminist debates about the distinction between public and private in western urban societies, this article examines some urban landscapes created or transformed in recent decades with a view to assessing the extent to which emancipatory conceptions of gender are apparent. Evidence drawn from the city of Edinburgh shows how divisions between public space and private space operate at different scales and take different forms in different neighborhoods. These forms illustrate how gender and class are interwoven in demarcations between and connotations of public and private spaces. In one of the neighborhoods examined, some breaking down of traditional gender connotations of public and private spaces is detected, a process that is closely associated with privileged middle-class lifestyles.