[Reader-list] Urbanbody:Mumbai - Studio with TU Delft: UPDATED

[chintan gohil]

Hello,

Thank you all for your responses.

Here is a brief description of the
issues/aims/process/partners which might clarify
further as to what the intention of the studio is.

Feel free to contact me for further clarification and
ofcourse for any potential collaboration interests.

Cheerio for now
C


Mapping Dharavi

Urban Body Research Studio on Mumbai

The studio aims at exploring and mapping the
complexity of elements, which constitute the urban,
social and cultural texture of squatter settlements in
the city of Mumbai.  Considering these areas within
the broader framework of urban transformations and
redevelopment projects, the studio looks at the slums
as forms of ‘emergent’ urbanities, which function with
a multiple logic and structure of relations both
within itself and with the outside.

Strategically, the studio questions both binary logics
of opposition and problem-solving attitudes.
Polarities such as formal/informal, legal/illegal will
be put under scrutiny in order to understand the
intertwining and shades of meanings that operate
within a multi-faceted context.  An explorative and
analytical attitude will be therefore encouraged as a
device to understand unfamiliar urban mechanisms in a
non-judgemental way. 

Questions of self-organisation, informal
micro-economies, gender roles, private and public
spheres will be addressed in relation to both their
impact on the actual definition of the slums and to
their relation to the broader network of power and
political structures of the city.
The main focus of the studio will be the slum of
Dharavi; being the largest squatter settlement of Asia
it allows for a deep and privileged understanding of
the multiplicity of layers – on the local, regional
and international level – that operate in the
constitution and definition of these urban emergences.

Streets will be addressed as the crucial element of
analysis. They represent the physical realm of
interaction and social experimentation while also
being the membrane through which different types of
spaces mingle and transform. They will be the
“laboratory” to understand relationships between flows
of capital, labour forces and patterns of dwelling and
inhabitation.

Throughout the nine weeks of its program, the studio
will propose and interdisciplinary approach that will
be developed through a variety of devices.  An
“action-learning” approach would foster students to
embrace an experiential understanding of knowledge
production.

The first four weeks will be dedicated to getting
“acquainted” with the urban, social, political and
cultural context of Mumbai in general and Dharavi in
particular.  Seminars, guest lectures, video
screenings will be part of the program.  Students will
be also provided with a basic methodological tool-kit
that will allow them to relate in a morally and
professionally sober way to a non-western and
unfamiliar context. 
The studio will then propose a three-weeks research
and mapping field work in Mumbai, which will be
followed by two more weeks for elaboration and
post-production of the collected material.

The “results” of the studio will be presented in a
public exhibition at TU Delft and NAi and will be the
core material for a forthcoming publication.  There
will also be a follow up of the research that will be
presented at the CCA, Canadian Centre for
Architecture, in Montreal in the Fall of 2009.


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