VIRTUAL London.
Abstract
Every city is actually two cities: the city that we move through and the city that we perceive. This presentation explores the inherent dichotomy of urban experience by investigating the contrasting perspectives of cities as communal and individual realms through a literary lens. Inspired by fictional works such as Miéville’s The City & The City, and the speculative non-fiction of Iain Sinclair (among others), one can navigate the interplay between the physical city as a collective community experience and the metaphysical city as an individualized one. By scrutinizing this dichotomy, this work reflectively dissects the layers of urban experience, revealing intersections and disparities between the externally constructed physical reality (urban design, architecture, infrastructure) and the internal realm of understanding (communication, movement, interaction) in so-called “young” cities, with Dallas, Texas specifically highlighted as an archetypal case study. This amorphous metropolis, one of the largest in the United States, is further scrutinized within the context of other Sun Belt Cities—burgeoning areas in the southern third of the country characterized by their rapid population expansion – that are often dismissed as geographically, functionally, and aesthetically forgettable from a global perspective. Drawing on interdisciplinary approaches from urban sociology, psychology, art, and literature studies, alongside the individual experiences of the researcher, this work aims to decipher how these dual realities intersect, coexist, and occasionally conflict in these adolescent, sprawling urban spaces that so many of us inhabit.
Justin Childress is a Clinical Assistant Professor for SMU’s Master of Arts in Design and Innovation program at the Lyle School of Engineering. He holds an MFA focused on design pedagogy from Texas A&M University – Commerce, where his thesis work explored the impact of interactive tools on commuter cyclists’ hazard projection and route planning. His work focuses on interdisciplinary design/build strategy and methodology in both physical and digital environments.