Papers by Barbara Buchenau
City Scripts: Narratives of Postindustrial Urban Futures, 2023
This essay provides a theorization of urban figures and the scriptivity of urban figures. It is a... more This essay provides a theorization of urban figures and the scriptivity of urban figures. It is a detailed engagement with the public monuments and figures on one of Detroit's main streets. Etching out, renovating, revolutionizing, revolting, and recreating: Stories told about Detroit’s Woodward Avenue are stories of radical spatial, temporal, and social transformation. These stories activate the makeover “narrativity” (Ryan) and the “scriptive” materiality (Bernstein 69) that is the everyday fare of any major city, whose inhabitants use structural elements of narrative as well as scriptive props to project and generate “attachment” (Felski), “belonging” (Bieger), and ethical engagement (Phelan) in contexts of complex socio-historical, spatial, and economic change and displacement. Storytelling on and about Woodward is an interesting example of community-based figural formation. This everyday narrativity and engagement with scriptive matter differs from narrative fiction in that it actively calls on its readers to intellectually, emotionally, and bodily respond to “the fact that the future is a space of yet unrealized potentiality” (Bode and Dietrich 1).
City Scripts: Narratives of Postindustrial Urban Futures, 2023
This introduction extends an invitation to a new kind of transdisciplinary narratology. It also p... more This introduction extends an invitation to a new kind of transdisciplinary narratology. It also provides a conceptual frame for the study of urban scripts. Our book responds to calls by literary theorists such as Rita Felski in Hooked: Art and Attachment (2020) and Paula M. L. Moya in The Social Imperative (2016) to develop methods for a new kind of narrative analysis that recalibrates close reading and interpretation to the multiple ways in which narratives “do things” (Felski 42) by, for instance, allowing their readers to enter into emotionally and epistemically transformative “interracial friendship[s]” (Moya 51) with literary characters and with the narrative progression that can and will “prompt a reader to question and then revise some of her assumptions about structures of racial and economic inequality” (Moya 58). We are particularly interested in how narratives take action in everyday life. This book will analyze polysemic assemblages of narrative, media, and poetics with their multiplying and contesting temporal, spatial, and material groundings. We define scripts as “artful combinations of narrative, medial as well as figural acts of framing, inscription, description and prescription [that . . .] establish contingent connective tissues between the past, the present and the future” of cities and their frequently anti-urban constituents and contexts (Buchenau and Gurr, “Urban Development” 142). This colloquial art of crafting connective tissues between an emotionally charged past, a contentious present, and an anticipated future is especially prominent in scenarios of massive deindustrialization and selective reindustrialization experienced in many second cities across the United States and Germany, the regional foci of our examination.
Hybrid Americas: Contacts, Contrasts, and Confluences in New World Literatures and Cultures. Ed. Josef Raab & Martin Butler. Inter-American Perspectives Perspectivas Interamericanas, 2008
This is a comparative study of the literary work of Emily Pauline Johnson and Sarah Jeanette Dunc... more This is a comparative study of the literary work of Emily Pauline Johnson and Sarah Jeanette Duncan. It takes its departure from a climate of rhetorical negation animating Canadian literary and cultural discourse at the turn to the twentieth century, when the establishment of differences between American and Canadian culture and politics became especially pressing.
Internationalität nationaler Literaturen, ed. Udo Schöning, 2000
This is a comparative study of the historical fiction and literary criticism in the Americas in t... more This is a comparative study of the historical fiction and literary criticism in the Americas in the nineteenth century. It addresses the emergence and transformation of cultural nationalism in Latin America and the USA.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, 2023
A future narrative (Bode, 2013) is a narrative that describes an event or experience that is set ... more A future narrative (Bode, 2013) is a narrative that describes an event or experience that is set – when seen from the perspective of actual writing –
in a moment of time in the future. A future narrative does not – as
most narratives do – present a development as having already happened
in the past and thus as no longer allowing for different outcomes.
Rather, future narratives portray the future as being open and
subject to intervention. A future narrative tends to establish a relationship
between the real world (at the time of writing or narrating)
and the world described in the future narrative on the basis of a measure
of continuation, with possible pathways to the narrated future
implied or explicitly outlined. A future narrative contains decision
points at which different future developments are possible; these decision
points are referred to as “nodes”.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, 2023
Narrativity is the ability to evoke stories. A building, or a built environment, cannot literally... more Narrativity is the ability to evoke stories. A building, or a built environment, cannot literally tell a story, neither can a map or a random list. But buildings, maps, and urban form can have narrativity, by suggesting or bringing to mind particular stories.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, 2023
Literary genre is a type of literature defined by a distinct form, style, and aims. Genre can eit... more Literary genre is a type of literature defined by a distinct form, style, and aims. Genre can either mean a historical genre (such as the 1930s-50s hard-boiled detective novel), or a more general category, such as the genres of poetry, prose, and drama. Genres act as important "storehouses of cultural knowledge and possibility" and as "frameworks of expectation" (Seitel 2003); as such, they are crucial for guiding the reader's expectations and interpretations. Textual genres also include non-fictional genres, such as the travel novel, the diary entry, or the memoir. The explanatory sections of urban plans can be seen as one textual genre with relatively rigid features in terms of form, style and aim, with specific genre conventions dependent on local and legal context.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, 2023
A model in the broadest sense of the term is an example worthy of
imitation and emulation. More s... more A model in the broadest sense of the term is an example worthy of
imitation and emulation. More specifically, it is a structural design
or blueprint that can be adapted to a variety of purposes. In planning
history and theory, a model is also a systematic collocation of data,
layered information and inferences which is used to describe and assess
a spatial setting and its developmental dynamics.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, 2023
Path-dependencies are defined as developments in which a situation or decision predetermines futu... more Path-dependencies are defined as developments in which a situation or decision predetermines future development; present-day decisions might thus limit the range of options for future decision makers. 2. Example Big infrastructural works for mobility or energy production provide the clearest contemporary examples of decisions that create pathdependency. The building of a nuclear power station creates a legacy not only of dangerous nuclear waste that will need to be safely stored for thousands of years, it also predetermines social processes and power relations. The specific risks associated with the management of a nuclear power station in critical situations may require rapid expert intervention and quick decision-making that bypass democratic decision-making processes. The decision to build a nuclear power station can thus be said to create multiple-technological, environmental, social and political-path-dependencies. 54 Cities located at the water are particularly vulnerable to decisions that create path-dependencies. Bridge heights, for instance, will limit the scale of vessels that can pass under them; the entry points and size of tunnels can define ingoing and outgoing traffic, and everything that builds up in connection with such traffic, for generations.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, 2023
Travelling models are blueprints for urban development – such as
‘waterfront revitalization’, the... more Travelling models are blueprints for urban development – such as
‘waterfront revitalization’, the ‘eco-city’, the ‘creative city’ or the
‘smart city’– that come to be implemented globally or at least across
different regions within a comparatively short period of time. Such
blueprints are frequently, though not always, promoted by globally
operating tech companies, consultancies or investors and are
frequently publicized and diffused by means of suggestive narratives,
attractive visualizations and promises of economic prosperity,
sustainability and/or lifestyle benefits to consumers and residents.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
How do rhythm and repetition as literary devices matter in urban planning?
Rhythm and repetition... more How do rhythm and repetition as literary devices matter in urban planning?
Rhythm and repetition – established through sequences of words or
recurring sound patterns – constitute the grid from which affective
and imaginative world-building in language can emerge. Such sequences
are the literary equivalents of the building blocks of an urban
environment. They are the aesthetic material of prose and poetry,
combing audio-visual form (more recognizable in sound than in
sight) with fragments of meaning and purpose, as well as with symbolic
function.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
Do can literary devices such as polyphony be used in urban planning?
Polyphony is literally mult... more Do can literary devices such as polyphony be used in urban planning?
Polyphony is literally multi-voicedness: the ability of a text or story
to include several different voices and perspectives, undisrupted by
an overarching authorial voice.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
How can a term from literary analysis such as scenraio help to improve urban planning processes? ... more How can a term from literary analysis such as scenraio help to improve urban planning processes? A scenario, especially in the field of future studies, is a description
of a potential future development, usually presented in the form
of alternative possible developments. A scenario can be merely
sketched or fully developed.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
Originally, a palimpsest is a paper or parchment which, in times
when writing material was scarc... more Originally, a palimpsest is a paper or parchment which, in times
when writing material was scarce, was written on more than once,
with a first layer of writing being written over in such a way that
older layers are still (partly) legible underneath (see fig. 10). Given the
multiple historical layers still more or less visible in many presentday
cities, these are often suggestively described in terms of the
palimpsest.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
In the conctext of planning, a script is a suggestive recipe for urban
development that combines... more In the conctext of planning, a script is a suggestive recipe for urban
development that combines a self-description or self-positioning
as well as a plausible path from the past through the present
and into the future, all packaged into a compelling story. For their
persuasiveness, scripts frequently rely on an oscillation between
descriptive and prescriptive components. Many globally current
recipes or blueprints for urban development – from the ‘sustainable
city’ through the ‘creative city’ to the ‘smart city’ – can best be
understood as ‘scripts’.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
Metaphor is the transfer of meaning from a word’s usual context to a
new one. Typically, a metap... more Metaphor is the transfer of meaning from a word’s usual context to a
new one. Typically, a metaphor takes the form of a comparison without
explicitly saying “x is similar to y”. The transfer of meaning from
one domain to another is not entirely random, but nevertheless provides
a sense of the unexpected: it tends to happen according to an
internal logic.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
Placemaking may be defined as the art of creating recognizable,
unique and liveable places with ... more Placemaking may be defined as the art of creating recognizable,
unique and liveable places with a distinct place identity, an identity
that works both internally, to residents and users of a place, and externally,
to people outside, who may not even have visited the place
in question but who nonetheless have an image or mental map of
that place. While placemaking has a lot to do with iconic buildings,
attractive green spaces and livability, it relies heavily on narratives,
performances and medial images.
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
Narrative is when somebody at a particular occasion tells somebody
else a real or fictional stor... more Narrative is when somebody at a particular occasion tells somebody
else a real or fictional story (Phelan, 2007, 3). An example of a narrative is someone
telling someone else a personal anecdote; or when the narrator in a
literary novel recounts a story to the reader; or when a newspaper reporter
breaks a news story. This broad definition of narrative can be
applied with relative ease to urban planning documents: planners (or
a planning agency) can be seen as the narrator(s) who recount a story,
usually aimed at the inhabitants of the area affected by planning, at
the stakeholders, or at future planners. Most of the recounted events
will be real enough (rather than fictional), but planning documents
also tend to involve elements that are not real (yet), such as claims
about what an area will look and feel like in the future.
To fully define a narrative, it is necessary to also define what
makes a story. A story is defined here as having: 1. clearly outlined
human (or human-like) characters doing things; 2. a change of
situation, typically (but not necessarily) from balance to imbalance
to balance; and 3. an association with mental states: human desires,
fears, hopes may drive the events in the story, which are relevant
also for why we are interested to hear about a particular story (Ryan, 2005, 347).
Narrative in Urban Planning: A Practical Field Guide, Mar 3, 2023
Research Literature in the field of literary studies and its relevance to city planning, urban an... more Research Literature in the field of literary studies and its relevance to city planning, urban analysis.
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Papers by Barbara Buchenau
in a moment of time in the future. A future narrative does not – as
most narratives do – present a development as having already happened
in the past and thus as no longer allowing for different outcomes.
Rather, future narratives portray the future as being open and
subject to intervention. A future narrative tends to establish a relationship
between the real world (at the time of writing or narrating)
and the world described in the future narrative on the basis of a measure
of continuation, with possible pathways to the narrated future
implied or explicitly outlined. A future narrative contains decision
points at which different future developments are possible; these decision
points are referred to as “nodes”.
imitation and emulation. More specifically, it is a structural design
or blueprint that can be adapted to a variety of purposes. In planning
history and theory, a model is also a systematic collocation of data,
layered information and inferences which is used to describe and assess
a spatial setting and its developmental dynamics.
‘waterfront revitalization’, the ‘eco-city’, the ‘creative city’ or the
‘smart city’– that come to be implemented globally or at least across
different regions within a comparatively short period of time. Such
blueprints are frequently, though not always, promoted by globally
operating tech companies, consultancies or investors and are
frequently publicized and diffused by means of suggestive narratives,
attractive visualizations and promises of economic prosperity,
sustainability and/or lifestyle benefits to consumers and residents.
Rhythm and repetition – established through sequences of words or
recurring sound patterns – constitute the grid from which affective
and imaginative world-building in language can emerge. Such sequences
are the literary equivalents of the building blocks of an urban
environment. They are the aesthetic material of prose and poetry,
combing audio-visual form (more recognizable in sound than in
sight) with fragments of meaning and purpose, as well as with symbolic
function.
Polyphony is literally multi-voicedness: the ability of a text or story
to include several different voices and perspectives, undisrupted by
an overarching authorial voice.
of a potential future development, usually presented in the form
of alternative possible developments. A scenario can be merely
sketched or fully developed.
when writing material was scarce, was written on more than once,
with a first layer of writing being written over in such a way that
older layers are still (partly) legible underneath (see fig. 10). Given the
multiple historical layers still more or less visible in many presentday
cities, these are often suggestively described in terms of the
palimpsest.
development that combines a self-description or self-positioning
as well as a plausible path from the past through the present
and into the future, all packaged into a compelling story. For their
persuasiveness, scripts frequently rely on an oscillation between
descriptive and prescriptive components. Many globally current
recipes or blueprints for urban development – from the ‘sustainable
city’ through the ‘creative city’ to the ‘smart city’ – can best be
understood as ‘scripts’.
new one. Typically, a metaphor takes the form of a comparison without
explicitly saying “x is similar to y”. The transfer of meaning from
one domain to another is not entirely random, but nevertheless provides
a sense of the unexpected: it tends to happen according to an
internal logic.
unique and liveable places with a distinct place identity, an identity
that works both internally, to residents and users of a place, and externally,
to people outside, who may not even have visited the place
in question but who nonetheless have an image or mental map of
that place. While placemaking has a lot to do with iconic buildings,
attractive green spaces and livability, it relies heavily on narratives,
performances and medial images.
else a real or fictional story (Phelan, 2007, 3). An example of a narrative is someone
telling someone else a personal anecdote; or when the narrator in a
literary novel recounts a story to the reader; or when a newspaper reporter
breaks a news story. This broad definition of narrative can be
applied with relative ease to urban planning documents: planners (or
a planning agency) can be seen as the narrator(s) who recount a story,
usually aimed at the inhabitants of the area affected by planning, at
the stakeholders, or at future planners. Most of the recounted events
will be real enough (rather than fictional), but planning documents
also tend to involve elements that are not real (yet), such as claims
about what an area will look and feel like in the future.
To fully define a narrative, it is necessary to also define what
makes a story. A story is defined here as having: 1. clearly outlined
human (or human-like) characters doing things; 2. a change of
situation, typically (but not necessarily) from balance to imbalance
to balance; and 3. an association with mental states: human desires,
fears, hopes may drive the events in the story, which are relevant
also for why we are interested to hear about a particular story (Ryan, 2005, 347).
in a moment of time in the future. A future narrative does not – as
most narratives do – present a development as having already happened
in the past and thus as no longer allowing for different outcomes.
Rather, future narratives portray the future as being open and
subject to intervention. A future narrative tends to establish a relationship
between the real world (at the time of writing or narrating)
and the world described in the future narrative on the basis of a measure
of continuation, with possible pathways to the narrated future
implied or explicitly outlined. A future narrative contains decision
points at which different future developments are possible; these decision
points are referred to as “nodes”.
imitation and emulation. More specifically, it is a structural design
or blueprint that can be adapted to a variety of purposes. In planning
history and theory, a model is also a systematic collocation of data,
layered information and inferences which is used to describe and assess
a spatial setting and its developmental dynamics.
‘waterfront revitalization’, the ‘eco-city’, the ‘creative city’ or the
‘smart city’– that come to be implemented globally or at least across
different regions within a comparatively short period of time. Such
blueprints are frequently, though not always, promoted by globally
operating tech companies, consultancies or investors and are
frequently publicized and diffused by means of suggestive narratives,
attractive visualizations and promises of economic prosperity,
sustainability and/or lifestyle benefits to consumers and residents.
Rhythm and repetition – established through sequences of words or
recurring sound patterns – constitute the grid from which affective
and imaginative world-building in language can emerge. Such sequences
are the literary equivalents of the building blocks of an urban
environment. They are the aesthetic material of prose and poetry,
combing audio-visual form (more recognizable in sound than in
sight) with fragments of meaning and purpose, as well as with symbolic
function.
Polyphony is literally multi-voicedness: the ability of a text or story
to include several different voices and perspectives, undisrupted by
an overarching authorial voice.
of a potential future development, usually presented in the form
of alternative possible developments. A scenario can be merely
sketched or fully developed.
when writing material was scarce, was written on more than once,
with a first layer of writing being written over in such a way that
older layers are still (partly) legible underneath (see fig. 10). Given the
multiple historical layers still more or less visible in many presentday
cities, these are often suggestively described in terms of the
palimpsest.
development that combines a self-description or self-positioning
as well as a plausible path from the past through the present
and into the future, all packaged into a compelling story. For their
persuasiveness, scripts frequently rely on an oscillation between
descriptive and prescriptive components. Many globally current
recipes or blueprints for urban development – from the ‘sustainable
city’ through the ‘creative city’ to the ‘smart city’ – can best be
understood as ‘scripts’.
new one. Typically, a metaphor takes the form of a comparison without
explicitly saying “x is similar to y”. The transfer of meaning from
one domain to another is not entirely random, but nevertheless provides
a sense of the unexpected: it tends to happen according to an
internal logic.
unique and liveable places with a distinct place identity, an identity
that works both internally, to residents and users of a place, and externally,
to people outside, who may not even have visited the place
in question but who nonetheless have an image or mental map of
that place. While placemaking has a lot to do with iconic buildings,
attractive green spaces and livability, it relies heavily on narratives,
performances and medial images.
else a real or fictional story (Phelan, 2007, 3). An example of a narrative is someone
telling someone else a personal anecdote; or when the narrator in a
literary novel recounts a story to the reader; or when a newspaper reporter
breaks a news story. This broad definition of narrative can be
applied with relative ease to urban planning documents: planners (or
a planning agency) can be seen as the narrator(s) who recount a story,
usually aimed at the inhabitants of the area affected by planning, at
the stakeholders, or at future planners. Most of the recounted events
will be real enough (rather than fictional), but planning documents
also tend to involve elements that are not real (yet), such as claims
about what an area will look and feel like in the future.
To fully define a narrative, it is necessary to also define what
makes a story. A story is defined here as having: 1. clearly outlined
human (or human-like) characters doing things; 2. a change of
situation, typically (but not necessarily) from balance to imbalance
to balance; and 3. an association with mental states: human desires,
fears, hopes may drive the events in the story, which are relevant
also for why we are interested to hear about a particular story (Ryan, 2005, 347).
The stakes are especially high in cities where economic, ecological, and social futures are delimited by histories of large-scale extraction and racialized industrial labor. Contributors thus focus on cities in postindustrial areas of Germany and the United States, examining how narratives about cities become scripts and how these scripts produce real-life results. This approach highlights how uses of narrative and scripting appeal to stakeholders in urban change. These actors continually deploy narrative, media, and performance, with consequences for urban futures worldwide.
Contributors: Lieven Ameel, Juliane Borosch, Barbara Buchenau, Florian Deckers, Barbara Eckstein, Kornelia Freitag, Walter Grünzweig, Randi Gunzenhäuser, Jens Martin Gurr, Elisabeth Haefs, Chris Katzenberg, Johannes Maria Krickl, Renee M. Moreno, Hanna Rodewald, Julia Sattler, Maria Sulimma, James A. Throgmorton, Michael Wala, Katharina Wood.