Lecture - Form and structure in the Gulf Cities 1

ARCHITECTURE DEPARTMENT Course Name: Livable Cities Course Code: ARCH4304 / Section: 1 Semester: Spring 19-20

Lecture: Form and structure in the Middle East and Gulf 1

Themes – – – – – – – – – – –

Geography vs. History Traditional vs. Contemporary Ethnic vs. Religion Colonialism vs. Independence Globalization vs. Localization Global + Local = “Glocal”!

Imitation vs. Authentication Formal vs. Informal Individuality vs. Collectivity Global  Regional  City  Urban  Architecture Identity!

The Middle East

Definitions The Middle East • The Middle East is a subcontinent with no clear boundaries, often used as a synonym to Near East, in opposition to Far East.

Definitions The Middle East • The term "Middle East" was popularized around 1900 in the United Kingdom; it has a loose definition traditionally encompassing countries or regions in Western Asia and parts of North Africa.

UK North America

Europe Asia Near East Middle East North Africa

India

Far East

South East Asia Africa South America

Definitions The Middle East Far East

Near East

Middle East

Definitions The Middle East Europe Persian Plateau The LevantIraq North Africa Arabian Peninsula

Sub-Saharan Africa Horn of Africa

Definitions The Middle East North

Middle

The Middle East Geography - Territories and regions 1. North: Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Palestinian Authority and Israel

2. East: Persian Plateau - Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan

3. South: Arabian Peninsula - Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, U.A.E., Oman, Yemen and Bahrain

4. West: North Africa - Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia

Definitions The Middle East

Confllict Oil Straits Traffic

The Middle East Geography

The Middle East History

The Middle East Traditional Architecture

The Middle East Contemporary

The Middle East Contemporary Culture

Is it Foreigner vs. Native, Modernity vs. Traditional, English vs. Arabic, ‌ or what?

Books

Books

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Introduction

• In his introductory chapter titled “The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World”, Elsheshtawy states the aim of the book as to enrich the study of urbanism and of globalization process as an accompaniment to the earlier book.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Introduction

• Do Arabs still exist?

– Doom and hopelessness – Colonialism – Symbols of Arab identity

• Negative stereotype: – Arabs not contributing to science, literature and the arts.

– Recipients, consumers, and proponents of extremist ideologies.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Introduction

• How is this related to cities?

• Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut: Sites of struggle and contestation.

• Dubai and Doha: “New Arab Metropolis” opening up to global capital adapting western models forms and planning models.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Introduction

• There is a divide in the region between newly emerging cities and the traditional centers.

• Gulfication!

• Dubaization!

• New centers are influencing and shaping the urban form of “traditional” cities.

Emaar Tunis - Cedar village

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Introduction

• The Struggle • Struggle for modernity: trying to ascertain one’s place in the 21st century.

• Determining the region’s direction.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Global City Theory

• Exclusion discussed by: – – – –

John Friedmann Gotez Wolff Saski Sassen Peter Marcuse

• Newtworking: – Cities are conceived as lying on a network – Level of connectivity Space of flows vs. Space of Places (Manuel Castells)

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Global City Theory

• Saki Sassen • Impact of network infrastructure on city form.

• Fragmentary nature of contemporary urban structure.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Global City Theory

• Marginalized Cities • Certain cities are offered as a model to which other cities must aspire to if they are to emerge from “off the map” or otherwise be marginalized!

Global City

Marginalized City

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Global City Theory

• “A New Middle East”!

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Concluding Thoughts

• The Great Divide in the Arab World!

– (Is there is still an “Arab World”?!)

• The poor are driven out to invisible labor camps.

• The city is designed for the rich and powerful.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Concluding Thoughts

• Dubaization!

• The increasing presence of Dubai’s real-estate companies in the Arab world’s major centers.

Emaar Middle East Jeddah Gate

Emaar Tunis - Cedar village

Emaar Misr Uptown Cairo

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Concluding Thoughts

• Inequality • The great rift in the Arab World and the extent to which this is negatively affecting socio-cultural sustainability among other things.

The Evolving Arab City Chapter 1: Introduction: The Great Divide: Struggling and Emerging Cities of the Arab World

► Concluding Thoughts

• Signs of new urbanity.

• The emergence of a ‘new Arab metropolis’.

• Growing presence of civic institutions which are effectively beginning to question authorities and planners.

Books

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• • • • •

Collection of chapters on …

Middle Eastern … Arab … Muslim !

Vague terms.

Presumptions and preconceptions.

Geographical designation subsumes ethnic, religious, and social groupings.

• Arab  Middle East

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• The city as a “text”.

• “Meanings and symbols are ascribed to the physical environment, and it becomes a ‘representation’, an ‘imagined environment’ construed from the particular vantage point of each observer.”

(Donald, 1996)

Ross Von Rosenberg - I am The City

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• This trend is exacerbated and amplified through the current universalization (or globalization) discourse.

• Traditional readings of the ME city: – Isolated entity – Disconnected from developments occurring elsewhere in the ‘civilized’ world.

– Heritage – Tradition – Culture – Divorced from the surrounding reality.

– The “ISLAMIC” perspective.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• The “ISLAMIC” perspective.

• Framework through which the “Moslem” city emerged and developed.

• Religious text.

• 1980’s and 1990’s conferences legitimized this approach.

• The revival of the “Arab” city “glory” by tying it to its cultural/religious roots.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Colonialism • Studying the Middle East city in relation to colonialism should be seen in the context of a “larger colonial narrative.”

• Colonialization may not be the sole factor responsible for the underdevelopment of the Middle East city.

Mumbai Colonial Architecture

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Orientalism • Edward Said • Said makes the claim that the whole of Western European and American scholarship, literature, and cultural representation and stereotype creates and reinforces prejudice against non-Western cultures, putting them in the classification of Oriental (or "Others").

• Understanding Orientalism as a power relationship and how the Occident has used and continues to use and understand the Orient on its own terms.

Edward Said

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Gulf region calls for a comparative perspective both grounding urban settlements within their regional contexts and studying the ‘specificity’ of each – thus moving away from the ‘static ideal type’ of the ‘Islamic city.’

• There is an emerging body of research which examines Gulf cities from socio-political perspective, showing that the urban forms developed in response to unique contemporary conditions.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization: • 1- Globalization refers to the spread throughout the globe of ideas, customs, institutions, and attitudes originated in one part of the world. At present these are usually Western in origin.

• Globalization is seen as largely equivalent to Westernization.

Nationalism comes dramatically into play when certain aspects of Westernization are seen as challenges to a nation's ethos.

• (Regions like North and South America, Europe and Africa, and even Asia to a lesser extent are more open to Westernization and globalization, in part because they have considerable Western components already.)

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization: • 2- Globalization and modernization, a set of behaviors and beliefs that challenge traditional society.

• A major threat to tradition, religion is far more traditional in its practice, the defense of religion also conflicts with the acceptance of modernization.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization: • 3- Benefits: makes life better, raises living standards, strengthens the society, and stabilizes the existing order.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization: • The society is also selective in choosing what it wants to accept and reject, with those values or institutions most destructive of tradition being blocked.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization: • Ultimately, then, globalization is accepted if and when it is perceived not as destroying the local society but helping it to survive and flourish in a partly new form.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization • 4- Even the most extreme explicit rejection of globalization does not mean that globalization fails to infiltrate into the society.

• These concepts have been taken up by an opposition enjoying support from a majority of the population.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Arab cities have been part of modernization efforts from the nineteenth century to the present.

• While being subjected to colonialism, they nevertheless were able to grow, develop and contribute to architecture/urban design.

• Urban forms, unique to each city were developed, responding to larger ‘global’ issues.

– Ex. Ebenezer Howard “Garden City” – Cairo, Kuwait – French architecture – Tunis

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: Moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• The exclusive “Islamic” reading of such cities is outdated and counterproductive.

• Heritage and culture are visual issues, but they should not be the sole, or dominant, factors through which the middle Eastern city is studied and analyzed.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization, Cultural Hybridity and Polarization – – – –

End of 20th century and the beginning of 21st century Loss of place Identity and character “Universalization”

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Globalization does not in and of itself lead to loss of identity/heritage.

“Globalization does not signal the erasure of difference but a reconstitution and revalidation of place, locality, difference.”

(Jacobs, 1996) “The history of the world demonstrates a movement toward cultural differentiation and not homogenization and urbanism will continue to be an area where one can observe the specificity of local cultures and their attempt to mediate global domination.” (AlSayyad, 2001)

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• New Trend – The relevance of the nation-state is questioned.

– City governments are emerging as the new centers of the ‘new’ global economy.

– Transactions between multi-national corporations, financial centers, and cities.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• New Trend – Cities are assuming a powerful role.

– Cities are viewed as a “product” that needs to be marked.

– Attracting headquarters or regional branches of international companies and staging of ‘mega-events’.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• New Trend – Luxury housing, dining establishments and entertainment amenities to attract professional personnel required to operate these global activities.

– Urban projects: trade centers, conference centers and hotels to encourage investment and tourism.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• New Trend and Architecture – Architecture is used as a “tool” to create ‘eye-catching’ impressions.

– The Bilbao effect: • The Guggenheim museum in Bilbao was used to revitalize a ‘stagnant’ city.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• The “dual-city” – Social polarization - Saskia Sassen – Due to the presence of these high-profile projects there is an influx of a highly skilled, and paid, workforce.

– Low-wage employees are needed who form the backbone of corporate and financial activities.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Geographical/Spatial division – Areas with a high concentration of poor labor – Enclaves housing the very rich

• Resentment, Social instability and conflict • Mega projects don’t necessarily lead to happiness of the cities

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Visible aspect of globalizing cities is the ‘quartering of urban space” – Sharper division between rich and poor – Distinct residential cities – Protected enclaves of the rich

?

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• Gated communities, private, high rise condominiums with heavy security • Expensive apartments in favorable locations • “Wall some in and keep others out.”

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• These are strong similarities to the political climate present today.

– “Colonialization” has been replaced by “Globalization”!

– Globalization: Free flow of goods, people, and information – Domination: political, social and cultural

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

• A paradigm shift • A ‘New Architecture’ and ‘Urbanism’ – Contemporary advances in information technology – Global communications – Technological and artistic advances at the beginning of the 21st century revolutionized people’s sense of space and movement.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

â–ş Concluding Remarks

• The prevalent view of globalization is that it is a phenomenon externally imposed upon nations, which are helpless witnessing their cities and countries taken over by multinational corporations.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

► Concluding Remarks

• Globalization is not simply something that is exogeneous*.

While some processes may seem to come from outside yet these are processes which are activated from the inside by local actors.

–

(*refers to an action or object coming from outside a system)

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

â–ş Concluding Remarks

• The global city represents the endogenizing of key dynamics and conditionalities of the global economy.

Planning Middle Eastern Cities Chapter 1: The Middle East City: moving Beyond the Narrative of Loss

â–ş Concluding Remarks

• The sacred and the secular can coexist, and the perceived conflict between them should only help to enrich urban studies in our region.

Kuwait

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‫فييمنتصف ييقنن اييشرنن وعييشيرنواايي ننكفعيي قن‬ ‫ن بفشولنبكتي تنفج شيةنبدأننالفج هن فطويشنن تصطاةن‬ ‫اتشنصييييي ناييييرنطشيييييننفاطيييييطنن تييييدرنون تصيييي طنن‬ ‫ن سكصيةنون طشننن سشيوةنون ادت ت‪.‬‬ ‫وقييدنت ييتناييعهنن تو ي ننن وتشنصيييةنن جديييد نتتييلن‬ ‫نألتي ءنون تس كرنن فا يدييةنوطيشننن تعي نن ةيياة ن‬ ‫وكيييع لنت يييتنن لييييلتنن تصل ييي ةنتفويييدد ننألدونشن‬ ‫ون تبصيةنب سفادنننتوندنن بص ءنن تديثةنتثلنن اشس صةن‬ ‫ن تسيييييي تةنتتييييييلنن بيييييييوتنن فا يديييييييةنن تفل يييييياةن‬ ‫ن ت صواةنترنن تجشنون طير‪.‬‬ ‫وكي رنتييرنأاييننن وونتييلنن فييمنأكييدتناييعننن فتييولن‬ ‫تييرنن بي ييةنن وتشنصيييةنن فا يديييةنئ ييلنن بي ييةنن وتشنصيييةن‬ ‫ن تديثةنفبصلنصظشي تنن فاطيطنوصظيننقيونصيرنن بصي ءن‬ ‫ن توتولنبه نفمنن دولننألاشى‪.‬‬

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Introduction There are several sets of problems that are related to the current urban environment in Kuwait city. They include: – Problems related to the dependency on cars for transportation.

– Problems related to the absence of the human dimension in the design of streets and urban areas.

– Problems related to the design of the governmental and private neighborhoods.

– Problems related to the quality of life in the downtown area as it is occupied by foreigners and not citizens.

– Problems related to the zoning and land use of the downtown area.

Introduction • The hypothesis of this paper is that current problems observed in Kuwait city are the result of early planning decisions and subsequent developments during the second half of the 20th century that focused on environmental and economic considerations and not on social and cultural considerations.

Background • The built environment found in Kuwait today is a product of decisions made during its early stages of planning and construction.

Kuwait was mostly isolated from external influences until the discovery of oil during the 1940's.

Background • The fast speed of transformation that Kuwait went through from fishing and trading vernacular settlement to a modern, planned metropolis was the result of efforts made by the Kuwaiti’s to utilize the wealth generated by the discovery of oil to improve their living conditions and join the developed, modern world.

Background • Prior to 1952, Kuwait was a vernacular settlement overlooking the Arabian Gulf and composed of courtyard houses built using mud brick along narrow alleys. • Traditional houses lined along narrow streets, looking inward into courtyards suitable for climatic conditions and social needs.

Kuwait Before 1950

Background The city was surrounded by semi-circular defensive wall constructed in 1920, in two months, to protect it from the tribal attacks.

End