Urban Duality

Samayeen, Nubras

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/95927 Copy

Description

Title

Urban Duality

Author(s)

Samayeen, Nubras

Issue Date

2017

Keyword(s)

Landscape Architecture

Abstract

In this globalizing age, every city thrives to achieve a postcard perfect image. The city of concrete and mortar is constructed through strict planning and design. This city, as we can call the “hard city” consists of authoritative, permanent edifices and infrastructure. However, other co-existing cities also grow in parallel to the hard city. The commonly known favelas, slums, squatters or in this case, bastees encroaching water-land are a ubiquitous urban phenomenon of the global south. With rapid urbanization, the urban poor reclaims their rights in the nooks and corners of vague, untaken lands. While, these squatter cities are crucial for a city’s sustenance, they remain invisible and often perceived as cancerous to the larger society. Built with temporary materials, we can call these malleable and fluid cities- the “soft cities”. While the “hard cities” remain static, the ephemeral ‘soft cities’ keep changing, adjusting to the urban forces every day. These two cities of hard and soft, permanence and temporary constantly negotiate and cushion each other for their very existence, creating a dialectic urban landscape. This urban duality is an essential component that catalyzes urban metabolism, yet is not accepted as the image of a city that we aspire to.

Type of Resource

• text
• image

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/95927

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2017 Nubras Samayeen

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