IN-PERSON: Livable Cities – New York

Abstract

The concept of ‘guidance’ is neglected as an area of interest, defined as ‘help and advice about how to do something or about how to deal with problems’ (Cambridge Dictionary, 2022). This presentation explores what it terms ‘guided forms’ in the city, such as guides to social and medical services, or maps, surveys, and manuals, through a poetic interrogation of form and language. It is argued that poetic practice acts as a sociological tool and public service in the city, by rethinking what it means to guide and be guided, this makes space for ‘non-linear’ and ‘atypical’ minds and bodies. The research discusses how a city can be made livable through an insistence on creative writing as a right in every community. By discussing ‘guidance’ in the context of practice-based methods, such as hybrid writing styles, workshops, and collaborations with public libraries and educational spaces, ‘livability’ is engaged with through rejecting the ‘model’ citizen, for an approach to wellbeing that accounts for difference and social justice. This creative strategy acknowledges both busy and still moments (Carson, 2021) in the city, and imaginative (McKittrick, 2021), unintentional, or ‘unguided’ experiences. Through using poetry and experimental writing as a bridge between disciplines and addressing calls to prioritise rather than treat as an addendum the topics of mental illness and disability (Ahmed, 2019), the research contributes to existing urban knowledge production. Ultimately, poetry develops a ‘life’ of its own in the city, where creative writing can make cities livable by reimagining community spaces.