The Making of Cities

This iteration of 4.241 is structured around four key topics: 1) the city and the urban, 2) spatial forms of the political, 3) world systems and urban economies, and 4) environmentalism. We will analyze these topics both cross-historically and cross-geographically, consistently moving between historical and contemporary urban formations.

The class explores these four topics by examining the various artifacts and mechanisms that make up the urban environment (infrastructures, buildings, plans) and the spatial structures they generate. Throughout, we consider cities as part of broader processes of territorial structuring, investigating how cities depend on these processes for their functioning while also contributing to their shaping.

The class debates are complemented by an individual, semester-long design-research project, which is discussed through presentations and dedicated workshops.