Learning from the Utopian City: An international network on alternative histories of India's urban futures

这个项目交织了社会历史，后殖民和城市研究，从乌托邦城市的其他历史中学习，以塑造印度的城市未来。它认为，乌托邦既是社会包容性城市和公民身份的基层表达，也是自上而下的城市规划愿景。该项目建立在英国和印度研究人员之间现有合作伙伴关系建立的坚实基础上，旨在探索乌托邦城市规划的替代历史如何为印度未来城市和城市化的轨迹提供信息。它由来自英国的城市地理学家（Datta）和来自印度的建筑师和女权主义地理学家（Sabhlok）领导。这是由英国Co-Is - Indian历史学家（古尔德）和城市历史和发展学者（Madgin）支持的。该网络的目的是揭示这个乌托邦城市的平行历史，这些历史迄今为止已经被印度城市规划的自上而下的愿景所改变，主导或占用。它将研究城市历史，因为它是由各种相互作用，有时相互竞争的乌托邦愿景组成的。这些愿景还以不同而非普遍的方式界定公民身份，与背景、物质条件和政治活动密切相关。该网络将通过与印度当地学者、城市规划者和基层组织举行的一系列相互联系的城市研讨会以及在英国举行的项目研讨会，分析和分享这些交替历史的知识。该网络旨在回答以下关键问题：-印度城市乌托邦的历史和文化条件如何？这里的目的是描绘和分析一种新的社会和政治秩序的乌托邦愿景如何与控制和遏制制度有特殊的联系。这将研究如何在新独立的印度（20世纪50年代）设想的乌托邦连接到20世纪60年代或后自由化印度（21世纪初）的乌托邦愿景。我们将确定城市蓝图中的共同点和分歧，创建这些城市的参数及其对印度城市未来的贡献。我们还将探讨城市乌托邦愿景在多大程度上受到竞争愿望的制约，并为外部受众而发展。- 乌托邦城市如何不仅考虑到其公民的多样性，而且考虑到他们对理想城市的看法的多样性？这试图解决乌托邦城市的矛盾性质-作为秩序的规则和作为转型的生产空间。换句话说，我们将寻求质疑下层公民如何体现和产生乌托邦，以维持和挑战政治监管。利用口述历史、日记、照片、信件和其他形式的非正式手工艺品，这将试图动摇城市乌托邦的终结，以暗示乌托邦印度城市的持续模式。- 乌托邦城市的历史如何为印度城市化的未来提供信息？这旨在研究一个双重乌托邦愿景，只有通过学习城市乌托邦的历史，才有可能想象一个乌托邦的未来。在这样做的时候，我们接近印度的城市未来，因为它已经通过城市历史写出来了，因此只有通过了解它的历史，我们才能接近它。此外，由于未来尚未实现，我们认为，它的轨迹可以通过纳入下层乌托邦的历史转向更包容的结果。会议的进一步目的是将该项目扩展到a）其他南亚城市; B）探索从事城市社会和文化研究的学者可以与规划师，第三部门组织和建筑师互动的方式;（c）探讨开展进一步项目的可能性，研究全球南方和全球北方城市乌托邦之间的关系。

This project interweaves social history, postcolonial and urban studies to learn from alternative histories of the utopian city in order to shape India's urban future. It does this by taking the view that utopias are as much of grassroots articulations of socially inclusive cities and citizenship as they are top-down visions of urban planning. Building upon the strong foundations established through existing partnerships between UK and Indian researchers, this project aims to explore how an alternate history of utopian urban planning can inform the trajectories of future cities and urbanization in India. It is led by urban geographer (Datta) from UK and architect and feminist geographer (Sabhlok) from India. This is supported by UK Co-Is - Indian historian (Gould) and Urban History and development scholar (Madgin). The aim of the network is to uncover parallel histories of the utopian city that have so far been changed, dominated or appropriated by top down visions of Indian urban planning. It will examine urban histories as being made up of a variety of interacting and sometimes competing utopian visions. These visions also define citizenship in differentiated rather than universal ways, strongly linked to context, material conditions and political activism. The network will analyse and share knowledge of these alternate histories through a series of inter-connected city workshops with local academics, urban planners and grassroots organisations in India and an end of project symposium in the UK.The network aims to answer the following key questions:- How are urban utopias historically and culturally conditioned in India? The aim here will be to map and analyse how utopian visions of a new kind of social and political order have particular associations with regimes of control and containment. This will examine how utopias envisioned in newly independent India (1950s) are connected to utopian visions of the 1960s or post liberalization India (2000s). We will identify common threads and divergences in city blueprints, the parameters of creating these cities and their current contribution to India's urban future. We will also explore how far urban utopian visions are conditioned by competitive aspirations and developed for external audiences. - How can the utopian city take account not just of the diversity of its citizens but also the diversity of their visions of the ideal city? This seeks to address the paradoxical nature of the utopian city - as a rule of order and as a productive space of transformation. In other words, we will seek to question how utopias are embodied and engendered by subaltern citizens to sustain as well as challenge political regulation. Drawing upon oral histories, diaries, photographs, letters and other forms of informal artefacts brought to the workshops, this will seek to unsettle the finality of the urban utopia to suggest the continuous mode of becoming of the utopian Indian city. - How can a history of the utopian city inform the future of India's urbanization? This aims to examine a dual utopian visioning whereby it is only possible to imagine a utopian future by learning from the history of urban utopias. In so doing, we approach India's urban futures as already written through its urban histories and therefore accessible to us only through an understanding of its histories. Moreover, as the future is yet to materialise, we argue that its trajectory can be shifted towards more inclusive outcomes through the inclusion of a history of subaltern utopias.The further purpose of the meetings is to extend the project to a) other South Asian cities; b) explore the means by which academics working on urban society and culture can interact with planners, third sector organisations and architects; c) explore the possibilities for further projects examining the relationship between urban utopias in the Global South and global north.