Animated Urbanism : Bringing Cities to Smart Digital Life

A critical examination of the digital imagery and visualization tools that mediate urban life

Animated Urbanism explores the ways urban life is increasingly mediated by digital visualization tools, from elaborate marketing productions to specialized techniques of urban planning that rely on the collection of large datasets. By developing a critical vocabulary for these forms of digital imagery, Gillian Rose investigates the implications of using digital technology to manage the spatial and temporal organization of life in cities.

Pushing back against the so-called smartness mandate, which sees urban existence and its infrastructure as necessarily governed by big data, automation, and artificial intelligence, Animated Urbanism is a nuanced examination of the various types of media structuring urban life and their propensity to replicate highly gendered and racialized forms of human embodiment. From smartphone apps to special effects in movies to sophisticated "fly-through" videos of cities created by urban developers, Rose analyzes the corporate imaginaries that are being created, building on the influential theories of Donna Haraway, among others, concerning the interrelation of technology, power, and human life.

While recent digital analysis often focuses on the political economy of tech platforms or the efficacy of data in smart cities, Rose emphasizes the role of human subjectivity in the shifting configurations of these new urban landscapes. With an incisive, feminist approach to the imagery enabled by software and handheld devices, Animated Urbanism invites us to question how human life emerges from these complex entanglements of technology and visual culture.

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