Brian Rosa
I am a researcher and educator in urban studies, and have experience teaching in the fields of urban planning, sociology, geography, architecture, and art. My academic interests are at the intersection of the built environment, the political economy of urban (re)development, critical urban theory, urban heritage, and experimental qualitative methodologies.
I am a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Research Fellow at the Department of Humanities, Universitat Pompeu Fabra. Previously I was Assistant Professor of Urban Studies and Geography at the City University of New York and Lecturer in Urban and Community Studies at the University of Connecticut, Storrs. My current research deals with the relationship between urban infrastructures, deindustrializing cities, and the way "left-over" spaces of the city are re-appropriated. More broadly, I am interested in the experience of the city, urban imaginaries, and thinking of the built environment as a dynamic artifact of social relations.
I am a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Research Fellow at the Department of Humanities, Universitat Pompeu Fabra. Previously I was Assistant Professor of Urban Studies and Geography at the City University of New York and Lecturer in Urban and Community Studies at the University of Connecticut, Storrs. My current research deals with the relationship between urban infrastructures, deindustrializing cities, and the way "left-over" spaces of the city are re-appropriated. More broadly, I am interested in the experience of the city, urban imaginaries, and thinking of the built environment as a dynamic artifact of social relations.
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Books by Brian Rosa
Deconstructing the High Line is the first book to analyze the High Line from multiple perspectives, critically assessing its aesthetic, economic, ecological, symbolic, and social impacts. Including several essays by planners and architects directly involved in the High Line’s design, this volume also brings together a diverse range of scholars from the fields of urban studies, geography, anthropology, sociology, and cultural studies. Together, they offer insights into the project’s remarkable success, while also giving serious consideration to the critical charge that the High Line is “Disney World on the Hudson,” a project that has merely greened, sanitized, and gentrified an urban neighborhood while displacing longstanding residents and businesses.
Deconstructing the High Line is not just for New Yorkers, but for anyone interested in larger issues of public space, neoliberal redevelopment, creative design practice, and urban renewal.
Papers by Brian Rosa
Upon establishing the mutually constituted history of Manchester’s elevated railways and its city centre and demonstrating how this 19th century process has shaped the form and character of the city, it excavates a cultural history of the infrastructural landscapes of the city. Special emphasis is placed on the uses and perceptions of railway arches, which have long served as symbols of dereliction and social disorder. These spatial and cultural histories act as a foundation for analysing how the city’s railway viaducts have been implicated in the re-‐ imagining of Manchester as a post-‐industrial city. These histories and representations are explored in relation to property-‐led strategies of environmental improvement, industrial displacement, and heritage tourism along the southern fringe of Manchester city centre, focusing on three thematic and spatially bound case studies. These case studies rely on documentary data of planning and design strategies, interviews with elite actors involved in the re-‐imaging of Manchester city centre, and ethnographic observation. Using critical discourse analysis, the thesis unpacks the narrative relationship between dominant representations of these spaces and professional justifications for their material and symbolic reconfiguration.
Scientific papers by Brian Rosa
Contested cultural heritage: the Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba
Cordoba, Spain is currently the center of a dispute over its most highly recognizable symbol: the Mosque-Cathedral. Built for Islamic worship, consecrated as a Catholic church in the 13 th Century this temple is protected as cultural heritage representing an outstanding architectural legacy of al-Andalus. Contemporary conflicts have revolved around the Diocese of Cordoba's controversial registration of the Mosque-Cathedral as their property, along with the discursive strategies Church authorities have used to claim the site, by which the Muslim legacy of the building has almost disappeared in visitor information. These strategies clash with its designation of universal cultural heritage, unfolding contradictions that deserve academic scrutiny. Current interpretations of the history of Spain, especially in relation to al-Andalus, are explored in relation to the origins, trajectory, and public character of heritage. In this context, we explore connections to the recent controversy surrounding conflicting discourses over the meaning and value of the Mosque-Cathedral.
Deconstructing the High Line is the first book to analyze the High Line from multiple perspectives, critically assessing its aesthetic, economic, ecological, symbolic, and social impacts. Including several essays by planners and architects directly involved in the High Line’s design, this volume also brings together a diverse range of scholars from the fields of urban studies, geography, anthropology, sociology, and cultural studies. Together, they offer insights into the project’s remarkable success, while also giving serious consideration to the critical charge that the High Line is “Disney World on the Hudson,” a project that has merely greened, sanitized, and gentrified an urban neighborhood while displacing longstanding residents and businesses.
Deconstructing the High Line is not just for New Yorkers, but for anyone interested in larger issues of public space, neoliberal redevelopment, creative design practice, and urban renewal.
Upon establishing the mutually constituted history of Manchester’s elevated railways and its city centre and demonstrating how this 19th century process has shaped the form and character of the city, it excavates a cultural history of the infrastructural landscapes of the city. Special emphasis is placed on the uses and perceptions of railway arches, which have long served as symbols of dereliction and social disorder. These spatial and cultural histories act as a foundation for analysing how the city’s railway viaducts have been implicated in the re-‐ imagining of Manchester as a post-‐industrial city. These histories and representations are explored in relation to property-‐led strategies of environmental improvement, industrial displacement, and heritage tourism along the southern fringe of Manchester city centre, focusing on three thematic and spatially bound case studies. These case studies rely on documentary data of planning and design strategies, interviews with elite actors involved in the re-‐imaging of Manchester city centre, and ethnographic observation. Using critical discourse analysis, the thesis unpacks the narrative relationship between dominant representations of these spaces and professional justifications for their material and symbolic reconfiguration.
Contested cultural heritage: the Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba
Cordoba, Spain is currently the center of a dispute over its most highly recognizable symbol: the Mosque-Cathedral. Built for Islamic worship, consecrated as a Catholic church in the 13 th Century this temple is protected as cultural heritage representing an outstanding architectural legacy of al-Andalus. Contemporary conflicts have revolved around the Diocese of Cordoba's controversial registration of the Mosque-Cathedral as their property, along with the discursive strategies Church authorities have used to claim the site, by which the Muslim legacy of the building has almost disappeared in visitor information. These strategies clash with its designation of universal cultural heritage, unfolding contradictions that deserve academic scrutiny. Current interpretations of the history of Spain, especially in relation to al-Andalus, are explored in relation to the origins, trajectory, and public character of heritage. In this context, we explore connections to the recent controversy surrounding conflicting discourses over the meaning and value of the Mosque-Cathedral.