K6ET 2190 - Urban Crises & Transformations

This course develops critical perspectives on urban transformation, using examples from the Arab world, like Amman and Kuwait City, for the purpose of gaining a global understanding of these processes within global patterns of urban expansion. It foregrounds crisis, destruction, and reconstruction as continuous, historically embedded processes shaped by colonial legacies, authoritarianism, and intervention, rather than isolated events. Urban space is examined as a dynamic negotiation among state power, social agencies, and environmental limits. Tracing developments from precolonial societies to postcolonial state-building, the course explores identity, conflict, and neoliberal change. Through archives, objects, and everyday practices, students analyze how history and memory shape contemporary urban life and futures.

+ In-class participation (10%): Required readings will be discussed in class.

+ Presentation (40%): 10-minute presentation during the last 3 sessions, topics communicated beginning of semester, delivered mid semester, presented end of semester.

+ City-Memory narrative (50%): Students will search personal archives for objects related to their cities and city-experience to produce a “narrative” in the form of a creative exhibition item, with research as a key element. Deliverables: Exhibition item, didactic panel, 2,000-word article. Objects decided by midsemester, projects delivered end of semester.