Grammars of the Urban Ground

16 March 2024

Exactly a year ago, I picked up a copy of “Grammars of the Urban Ground” (Amin and Lancione) at AAS 2023 in Boston, but I never moved past the introduction chapter. Now, as I’m traveling to AAS 2024 in Seattle, it seems fitting to revisit this book! Reading it on my flight from Bangkok to Seattle (via Tokyo), I’m glad to reconnect with its content.

Building upon recent calls for a more comparative urban theory, this edited volume presents a ‘post-categorical urban theory’ that focuses on the ground rather than a priori categories of (Western) thought. I found Ananya Roy’s chapter on “Grammars of Dispossession” particularly enlightening. She argues that what we witness in major American cities is far more fundamental than terms like ‘gentrification’ or ‘displacement’ suggest. Instead, it’s an active logic of racial banishment tied to a larger history of colonialism.

I also enjoyed Colin McFarlane’s chapter on “Future Densities,” where he proposes a more political understanding of density, a key concept in urban planning and design often taken for granted as a ‘social good.’ McFarlane argues that density is not just an abstract, quantitative calculation, but a social ideology. This argument resonates personally with me, as in Thailand, urban planning often assumes density to be desirable without critically questioning its ideological implications. Why, for example, is a dense, middle-class-oriented TOD celebrated while other forms of density are labeled as ‘congestion’?

Look forward to reading more on my flight back to Bangkok!