Coexistence in the Urban Everyday: Interdisciplinary Perspectives Toward New Understandings

Abstract

Using a novel interdisciplinary focus, this title examines cities as sites of coexistence where different ideas, discourses, histories, and people are constantly brought together in the course of everyday life. While the proximity of “difference” has been discussed as a key feature in urban life, its various meanings and the way in which people perceive and make sense of diversity and the presence of inequalities have been met with less attention. To unpack the complex question of how people live together and what is between them in contemporary cities, the book brings together perspectives from a broad range of disciplines and different methodological approaches. As such, the book is also poised to deepen our understanding of the specificity and value of interdisciplinary research through an embedded reflection on how a change in method or theoretical ground also drastically reframes and affects the topic under study. The book thus adds to the knowledge on the specificities of interdisciplinary inquiry and calls for further reflection on its potential and limitations. Exploring how everyday life in cities bears potential in revising the conceptual apparatus through which togetherness and separation are discussed, it will appeal to scholars, researchers, and post-graduate students with interests in urban studies, sociology, human geography, cultural anthropology, social psychology, and peace and conflict research.