Vi lever i ’rummets epoke’, påpegede Foucault for over fyrre år siden. Imidlertid er det først inden for de seneste år, at sociologien for alvor har vendt sig mod rummet. Rum- og bysociologien er i vækst, hvilket må ses som et resultat af, at verden og livet som aldrig før er urbaniseret: For første gang i historien lever over halvdelen af jordens befolkning i byer. Urbaniseringen stiller krav til sociologiens teoretiske fantasi. Ikke mindst synes det frugtbart at tænke hinsides byen som repræsentation. Således opfordrer vi til, at bidrag undersøger og diskuterer, hvorledes byens rumligt-materielle konstruktioner – arkitekturen, figurationen, tingen – også gør noget ved socialiteten, sproget og stemningen i byen. Det kan være i form af konkrete analyser af byens rumlige morfologier, henover poetisk-sociologiske associationer til teoretiske grundlagsdiskussioner.

Et ofte overset perspektiv ved studiet af bevægelse er, hvordan forskellige former for teknologier inddrages til at udføre disse studier. Teknologier der både muliggør og begrænser hvilken form for bevægelse, der emergerer ud af det studerede fænomen. Der findes mange eksempler på hvordan man har forsøgt at registrere bevægelse, hvor der til hvert forsøg har været anvendt forskellige teknologier som hjælpemidler. Man kan ligefrem våge at påstå, at studiet af både dyr og menneskers bevægelser afspejler en teknologisk udvikling. Tim Cresswell beskriver hvordan Taylor gjorde brug af stopuret til at beregne arbejdernes bevægelser på fabrikkerne i 30’ernes USA, mens fotografen Muybridge affotograferede en hest i galop for at finde ud af dens bevægelse sekund for sekund (Cresswell, 2006). Latour beskriver på samme måde hvordan fysiologen Etienne Jules Marey formåede at afbilde en måges bevægelser ved hjælp af et instrument, der senere skulle vise sig at være forløberen til filmkameraet (Latour & Yaneva, 2008: 81). Alle disse undersøgelser er alle fortællinger om, hvordan bevægelse har været genstand for utallige studier op gennem historien, men ingen af eksemplerne diskuterer hvilken form for bevægelse, den anvendte teknologi får frem. Dette paper skiller sig ud fra sine forgængere ved ikke at fokusere på de studerede bevægelser, men derimod at belyse hvordan RFID teknologien som metode skaber særlige former for bevægelsesmønstre, idet dette studium på samme måde som sine forgængere, både er begavet og begrænset af teknologiens egenskaber. Begavet fordi RFID teknologien er en relativ ny opfindelse indenfor studiet af bevægelse, der åbner op for nye måder at studere og forstå social-rumlige relationer; begrænset fordi teknologien endnu ikke er færdigudviklet til dette formål, hvilket sætter nogle begrænsninger for undersøgelsernes resultater. Ved at studere bevægelsesmønstre ved hjælp af RFID teknologi, der fordrer et individ i bevægelse, bliver forståelsen af rummet dynamisk og rummet opstår i relationen rum-teknologi-individ-bevægelse, hvoraf ingen af disse begreber kan forstås uafhængigt fra de andre. De bevægelsesmønstre der bliver studeret ved hjælp af RFID teknologien finder således sted i et rum, der opstår i det øjeblik individet bruger teknologien og bevæger sig rundt i bygningen.

Empirisk trækker paperet på casestudier i to moderne danske multifunktionelle kulturhuse, hvor bevægelsesmønstrene har været registreret og paperet er således både teoretisk funderet og empirisk forankret. 

Der er flere sociologiske bud på, hvordan man kan forstå byens rum og dens mønstre (f.eks. Simmel, Burgess, Hoyt, Lefebvre, Harvey, (Bourdieu)). Teorier om rum er forbundet til teorier om sociale og spatiale differentieringsprocesser og derfor væsentlige teoretiske udgangspunkter for empiriske studier af sociale og spatiale udviklingstræk. Oplægget vil præsentere nogle bud på rumopfattelser og differentieringsprocesser og resultater af et forskningsprojekt, der bringer forskellige opfattelser i anvendelse empirisk. Der er tale om resultater fra en større empirisk undersøgelse af udvikling i byen Aarhus i perioden 1984 til 2007. Der kan findes markante forandringer i byen. Forandringer, der f.eks. kan formuleres som stærkt øget social og spatial polarisering (Sassen, Castells, Marcuse), tydelig indikation for oprindelseskulturel segregering (Burgess, Thomas og Znaniecki) og markant øgede afstande mellem lokale sociale rum i byens sociale rum (Bourdieu). Forandringerne viser sig også i en tendens mod et ændret mønster for attraktivitet i byen i sin helhed.

The Night Time Economy (NTE) facilitates various and unique forms of social spaces. In one way it is presented as a free and hedonistic place for unlimited pleasure. But at the same time space is produced within a wider socio-spatial-economic frame. If we are to understand pleasure in nightclubs we need to acknowledge and address this socio-spatial-economic nature. This paper addresses the constructions of pleasures that are in-place and what forms that are out-of-place in an analysis of a case study from a large Danish nightclub. We approach this by investigating negotiations around proper behavior inside the nightclub at the perspective of the clubbers, the bouncers and the club owner. These negotiations can be termed the “events of the place”. These events underline the implicitly normative positions in the understanding of pleasure by identifying certain conducts as wrong behavior. As such they describe what is in place and what is out of place. Thus, within the NTE it is not only behavior (e.g. violence) that is structured. It is the specific forms of pleasure that are made possible within the night club.

The data for the paper consists of 273 cases where night time guests at a large mid-city Copenhagen night club have complained about being rejected or have been given a quarantine. The individual cases consist of the clubber’s letters to the manager and responses from the manager and bouncers. These – most often counter-positions - are the assessment-tool for the manager to consider whether they want to allow the guests entrance to the club again. These cases are used as a methodological tool to describe behavior that transgresses the idea of the appropriate pleasures. In other word, the paper looks at what is wrong, what is out of place, to get a sense of what kinds of pleasures that are in-place in the nightclub.

In sociology and cultural geography, recent years have brought about a focus upon social processes bypassing individual consciousness and rational power of judgment. Instead affective production and visual imitation is terms describing the socio-material processes in urban space.

Through the notions of affect (Thrift 2008, Ash & Amin 2002, Anderson & Holden 2008) and imitation (Tarde 1903), the paper will discuss recent urban crowd movements.

OWS has spread a global social activist movement using affective bodyly means of communication, whereas Distortion is a cultural street festival taking place in Copenhagen. However different in their contextual frame and outset, the paper seeks to discuss similarities of these urban movements in terms of affects and imitations.

I suggest that despite of the differences, these urban movements operate and materialize in urban space in the same affective manner. For instance, both crowds do not merely gather and organize in terms of verbal communication, rather they organize virally, visually and through bodily affects and imitation. In that sense they appropriate urban space and its architectural design ”like viruses that hop between people, thereby affecting them” (Massumi 2002, Pile 2007).  Thus these movements indicate an emergence of urban space as a relational and affective space between the social and the material layout of the city.

Finally the paper will propose that affects and imitations in urban space give rise to reconsider how the social and urban aesthetics are related. Similar to the socio-aesthetical understanding of the city in early modernist urban sociology such as Simmel and Benjamin, the two notions imply that social space cannot be regarded without an analysis of its aesthetical impact, for instance how urban space at the same time affects us and is being affected by us.

With the rising shares of the immigrant populations with different cultures, concerns regarding their socio-spatial integration to the host societies are increasing. Given the interwoven relation between the space and the culture, this research investigates how spatial morphology can help analyze the cultural differences among the ethnic groups, so to minimize the spatial-cultural conflicts. It is analyzed how the physical interventions, for instance through an architectural or urban design response, can have profound impacts on the public perception of the cultural diversity. The concept of transculturalism rather than multi-culturalism, as intermingling of the different peoples and cultures into one cosmopolitan city, is the bedrock of this research. Notwithstanding its emergence in sociology, transculturalism has not yet entered into the fields of architecture and urban studies. The main question of the research is that why although place has the power to either support cultural diversity or trigger ethnic segregation, there is no specific method with which the influence of place can be measured. In other words, this research is a question of method to analyze the spatial morphology of transculturalism.

Halvdelen af jordens befolkning lever nu i byer, hvilket bl.a. giver anledning til teser om, at jordens befolkning er på vej ind i en ny urban tidsalder. Men definitionerne verden rundt på bymæssighed er yderst varierende. For statistisk at tale om by kræver man Frankrig 2.000 mennesker i en sammenhængende bebyggelse med ikke mere end 200 meter mellem husene, i Danmark 200, i Japan 30.000, i Ægypten 11.000. For så vidt er det ganske uklart og forskelligartet hvad den urbane tidsalder vil kunne gå ud på, ligeledes hvad man kan forstå ved bymæssighed.

Formålet med dette paper er at bidrage til diskussionen af primært det sidstnævnte spørgsmål ved at kaste et fornyet blik Louis Wirths klassiske sociologiske definition af byen fra 1938: ”en forholdsvis stor, tæt og permanent bosætning af samfundsmæssigt forskelligartede individer” (1938: 8). Hensigten er at stille til diskussion om - og argumentere for at - dette begreb om bymæssighed fortsat har relevans som en minimal fællesnævner for en sondring urbant|ikke-urbant, der markerer sondringens urbane side. Med Deleuze/Guattari kan denne fællesnævner kaldes det bymæssiges immanensplan eller konsistensplan. Men der vil være flere forudsætninger herfor. Der kan ikke bygges en teori om urbanisme som livsform mere eller mindre direkte på denne basis, som Wirth forsøgte; begrebet må omfatte såvel humane som ikke-humane aktører, således at det åbner sig for andre formål end rent sociologiske; størrelse, tæthed og forskellighed må betragtes som inhærent relationelle, som skalaer, der ydermere ikke nødvendigvis samvarierer, men kan forefindes i vidt forskellige sammensætninger. Endvidere må begrebet kunne forstås ikke blot topografisk, som hos Wirth, men også topologisk, således at nærhed/tæthed, eksempelvis, ikke kun betyder kort rumlig, topografisk afstand, men også nærhed/tæthed i tid, medieret af hurtige kommunikationssystemer. Et således åbnet bybegreb vil det kunne associeres med en mangfoldighed af perspektiver på byen: sociologiske, økonomiske, geografiske, biologiske, teknologiske, politologiske, arkitektoniske, planlægningsmæssige, atmosfæriske o.a., som ikke dækker hinanden.

Already in the paradigmatic formulation in The Social Logic of Space Bill Hillier and Julienne Hanson stated the theoretical affinity between space syntax and sociology. Taking Émile Durkheim’s classic concept of social morphology as their analytical starting point, they established an operational methodology with the prospect of analyzing the hitherto under-theorized relationship between society and spatiality. In this Durkheimian light, it is obtrusive how silent urban sociology has been in response to the space syntax methodology, its path breaking analytical potentials, and empirical results. However, we are dealing with a silence that is analytically injurious to both space syntax and sociology: while the latter overlooks the space syntax’s original contribution to a genuinely neo-Durkheimian theory of urban morphology, the former loses a valuable interlocutor who potentially could clarify how space syntax is embedding social life in urban morphological space. Thus, it is this dual problem caused by the silence of sociology that the current paper is a contribution to transcend. First, the paper revisits Durkheim’s social morphology and discusses the space syntax’s distinct methodological operationalization and application of the social morphology. Second, the paper attempts to develop and exemplify a theoretical framework that integrates, on the one hand, space syntax’s urban morphological insights, and, on the other hand, Randall Collins’ neo-Durkheimian developments of a micro-morphologically founded sociology of interaction rituals.

The Night Time Economy (NTE) facilitates various and unique forms of social spaces. In one way it is presented as a free and hedonistic place for unlimited pleasure. But at the same time space is produced within a wider socio-spatial-economic frame. If we are to understand pleasure in nightclubs we need to acknowledge and address this socio-spatial-economic nature. This paper addresses the constructions of pleasures that are in-place and what forms that are out-of-place in an analysis of a case study from a large Danish nightclub. We approach this by investigating negotiations around proper behavior inside the nightclub at the perspective of the clubbers, the bouncers and the club owner. These negotiations can be termed the “events of the place”. These events underline the implicitly normative positions in the understanding of pleasure by identifying certain conducts as wrong behavior. As such they describe what is in place and what is out of place. Thus, within the NTE it is not only behavior (e.g. violence) that is structured. It is the specific forms of pleasure that are made possible within the night club.

The data for the paper consists of 273 cases where night time guests at a large mid-city Copenhagen night club have complained about being rejected or have been given a quarantine. The individual cases consist of the clubber’s letters to the manager and responses from the manager and bouncers. These – most often counter-positions - are the assessment-tool for the manager to consider whether they want to allow the guests entrance to the club again. These cases are used as a methodological tool to describe behavior that transgresses the idea of the appropriate pleasures. In other word, the paper looks at what is wrong, what is out of place, to get a sense of what kinds of pleasures that are in-place in the nightclub.

The abstract is written in English, the presentation will be in Danish.

Spaces and places are not only socially inhabited and determined, they also integrate an almost seamless web of communication – an intertwinement of code and space (Kitchin/Dodge 2011). A particular good case in point for this combination of the virtual and the spatial is the airport. The airport is a space where software and steering systems are part of its function and infrastructure as well as its architecture. As place the airport is inhabited by passengers who spend their time waiting, strolling around, shopping, sleeping and also actively connecting with others via digital means, such as WiFi- technology etc. And passengers are also passively part of the steering technologies that are part of the airport (e.g. SMS about check- in). Thus Wi-Fi technology as well as other software and code based ICTs become an integrated part of both space and place. The presentation investigates into this intertwinement of the spatial and the virtual with three main perspectives:

- The approach taken in this paper to understand the coupling of the spatial and the virtual is a pragmatic one. Neither are space and place determined by users and ‘social relations’, nor are users/passengers totally free within the framework of the airport. Latour’s ‘matter of concern’ and the pragmatic notion of ‘situation’ might be good starting points to investigate into the intertwinement of the space/place, communication and social relations.
- Virtual and cellular systems are steering the airport space in the background. Air traffic control (ATC) and bar codes for baggage transfer steer the planes and the flight schedules as well as the flow of passengers and goods. But there are also critical nodes and zones of transition that are situated between the independent software/code controlled systems and the more open flow of passengers, .e.g. through automated messages (e.g. check in via SMS).
- Micro-coordination via the mobile phone as well as constant access both to data and to social or family contacts characterise travel patterns today. The traveller e.g. inhabits the space of her/his compartment of a train with the means of communication technologies. The paper will present some results of an ethnographic study of the combination of virtual and spatial mobility.

Reference: R. Kitchin/M.Dodge (2011), Code/Space: Software and Everyday Life, Cambridge Mass.: MIT Press.

Over the past 20 years, urban sustainability has emerged as a key objective among city planners world-wide, tied to growing concerns with the ecological consequences of urban life; concerns that are presently intensified by long-term climate change risk scenarios. While urban studies has gradually started to pay attention to the massive challenges of energy and transport infrastructures implied in visions of sustainable cities, most approaches remain tied to a Marxist political economy insensitive to STS notions of the contingencies of socio-technical design processes. In this paper, I sketch an alternative theoretical approach to ‘urban green assemblages’, inspired by recent attempts to bring actor-network theory (ANT) –and wider STS concepts – to bear on urban studies. ANT, I argue, ultimately offers a new ontology for the city, allowing for the study of the concrete and plural sites at which urban sustainability is known, practiced, re-scaled, negotiated and contested, in heterogeneous and dynamic assemblages of humans and non-humans. I illustrate the analytical potentials of this ANT urban ontology by drawing on on-going comparative case studies, using multi-sited ethnographic methods, into future-oriented sustainable city building projects in Copenhagen (Denmark), Kyoto (Japan) and Surat (India).