Blog | Urban Research

Das Reallabor „Campus as Commons“ erprobt, wie leerstehende Universitätsgebäude zu gemeinwohlorientiertem studentischem Wohnraum umgebaut werden können. Zwischen 1:1-Mock-ups im ehemaligen Mathematikgebäude der TU Berlin, internationaler Zusammenarbeit und Gesprächen mit Politik und Verwaltung wird sichtbar, welches Potenzial im Format der Projektwerkstätten steckt – und warum Hochschulen selbst Teil der Infrastruktur des Wohnens sind.

How does socio-spatial segregation shape the experience of urban space? In this blog post, Nicolas Zehner reflects on a recent research trip to Cape Town by taking a closer look at the intricate relationships between queer dating, Pokémon Go, and urban transportation. Although seemingly unrelated, these forms of urban sociality are all intimately linked through structural inequality.

Care can be understood in different ways depending on the social-political context in question. What for some may seem like a lack of care, for others is just a different way of caring. By researching environmental/urban education activities with children, the author seeks to relate children´s autonomy regarding urban issues in Berlin to care practices. This blog article shows some of the first reflections of Joana Martins' field work in Berlin as a visiting fellow at CRC.

This blogpost reveals how Ukrainian cities under occupation have become unexpected battlegrounds of non-violent resistance. Amidst surveillance and oppression, civilians employ ingenious tactics to defy the occupying forces, reclaiming urban spaces with symbols of hope and resilience. This exploration delves into the strategies of silent protest and civic defiance that transform everyday streets into arenas of courage and solidarity.

In digital media, places are often invoked in political debates. Over time, these conjunctions of locations and issues can shape our understanding of where pressing public concerns, like the housing crisis, are truly located and must be addressed. Daniela Stoltenberg dives into this dynamic in her new book, exploring how Twitter users locate the housing crisis. She shows how housing is constructed as an issue that arises in the urban center, but can be solved in the periphery.

By Magdalena Moreno The workshop “Space and Power from a Gender and Intersectional Perspective” was part of the International Participatory Summer School on “Power and Space”, which took place from […]

A thin line between ethics and aesthetics haunts these reflections on field research in an African city, approached through the positionality of a researcher from a European context. Based on some visual impressions encountered during the fieldwork, the researcher Francesca Ceola retraces the process of reorientation in a place geographically and culturally very far away from her habitat recognizing what she knows in what she sees. In doing so, she contests the abstraction of “going to do fieldwork” as separate from everyday scientific practices.

CRC 1265 researcher Eric Lettkemann unravels the intriguing dynamics between digital technology and public spaces. Uncovering contrasting approaches to the of hybrid reality game Pokémon Go, from cemetery bans in Germany to seamless integration in Tokyo, he discusses the social implications and future challenges of such locative media as we navigate an evolving world where the digital of physical increasingly overlap.