The urban mind - Cultural and environmental dynamics
THE PROBLEMThe development of urbanism is a global phenomenon representing co-evolving human-environmental systems. These processes unfold over millennia and take radically different forms in different times and places – and with widely varying consequences. Today we face an array of problems where the challenge is to find solutions that enable a future which gives room for mental well-being in a functioning world. Even if the scope of this problem today is global, and without parallel in history, the problem as such is not new. Significant knowledge can be gained from time-depth analyses of societies facing similar situations. In urban studies today, however, this historical aspect is given a rather subordinate role in analyses of the problems and suggested solutions. This can similarly be stated for the mental structures of people who shape and are themselves reshaped by the societies and situations which threaten the world within which we live. HOW CAN THE PROJECT CONTRIBUTE TO A SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM?The main goal of the project is to provide a humanistic and historical perspective of relevance for the study of sustainable urban living environments. This is obtained by studies of town-dwellers’ mental landscapes and organization of physical space from the origins of urbanism over 10.000 years ago until the enormous changes of the last two centuries. This extended chronological scope comprises many shorter and longer periods of shifting societal well-being, societies have been through periods of expansion and recession, civilizations have emerged and collapsed and human populations the world over have shifted from predominantly rural to urban lifestyles. Climate and environment during the same period are characterized by the same variation and fluctuations of shifting scope and amplitude, on a global, regional and local level. This project therefore derives a new concept, the ‘Urban Mind’, from combined humanities and natural science studies of the development of urbanism and climate change. Fourteen exploratory investigations based on material from Africa, Eurasia and America (http://www.arkeologi.uu.se/UrbanMind/frames.htm), will analyse discontinuities and continuities over time in the composition of local, regional and global ‘urban minds’, with a primary focus on periods of heightened economic, climatological and environmental stress.WHO WILL BENEFIT FROM THE RESULTS?The project in its idea development stage, aims to create a basis for a fuller understanding of the dynamics in the people-environment interactions from a historical perspective, by presenting an initial analysis and evaluation of cultural and social flexibility and resilience in relation to urban development over time. The ‘Urban Mind’ concept adds a crucial cognitive dimension to our understanding the organization of modern urban complexes which currently house more than 50% of the world’s population. The project and its results therefore are directed towards all who are involved in formulating strategies for the creation of sustainable urban futures.
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