Events

On Thursday 29th August, Melissa Harrison and Ana Méndez de Andés presented the Urban Commons Handbook as a framework to facilitate a conversation about the commoning processes taking place in the city. They were joined by Alkistis Thomidou and Berta Gutiérrez Casaos, co-founders of forty five degrees and co-editors of Radical Rituals. 

In this presentation, we explained how the Urban Commons Handbook culminated from a collective learning process: it presents a compilation of definitions, experiences and references around key questions that arise when thinking about commoning the city beyond accumulation, extraction and enclosure of material and immaterial social re/production. The handbook is an invitation to reflect on the potential elements for activating the urban commons as tools for reinventing, sustaining and reproducing our lives, along seven strands: ecologies that contribute to social and planetary repair; economies based on sharing and collaboration that resist enclosure; infrastructures as the creation of possibilities and consistencies; knowledge co-produced through situated processes of mutual learning; socialities as the capacity to assemble as cooperative communities; localities cultivating situated ways of being, thinking and acting across places and cultures; and governance as the institution of attachment and autonomy needed to produce and re-produce commoning practices.

The Urban Commons Research Collective organised a half-day workshop session chaired by Ana Méndez de Andés (University of Sheffield), Beatrice De Carli (London Metropolitan University) and Katharina Moebus (University of Sheffield) as part of Situated Ecologies of Care conference on 27th of October 2023 that brought together researchers of urban commons across seven localities from different countries. The workshop was UCRC’s initial attempt of expanding the understanding of urban commons beyond the ‘European’ context through engaging with multiple conceptions and practices of collective sharing and management of resources across different geographies, cultures and experiences. 

Researchers came together under a format of co-creation where concepts, stories and practices were shared among the group to trigger new conversations to trace translations of ‘commons’. For this workshop, this process was a work of care to recognise “the always imperfect translation between cultural systems, languages, spaces of action, and epistemic environments” (Translations in common/s as a matter of care – Situated Ecologies of Care (ahra2023.org)). Workshop participants were asked to present a situated term with a brief definition, a description of the term’s context, and a project or story that illustrates the term together with an audio or visual item. A total of six contributions started the conversations in the first session: ‘Radical Play’ by Catalina Pollak Williamson, ‘Hesitation as Care’ by Emre Akbil and Lara A Scharf (University of Sheffield), ‘Instituting Hayat’ by Esra Can (University of Sheffield), ‘Masha’s’ by Hala Ghanem (The Hashemite University University), ‘Al-Awneh’ by Jakleen A Al-Dalal’a (University of Sheffield), ‘Hobby and DIY Culture’ by King Him Obed Cheung and Kim Josée Colette Gubbini (Royal Danish Academy), ‘Reappropriation’ by Miza Moreau (University of Glasgow). 

The second session was a discussion to map the resonances that emerge between terms to fill the gap between different situations, contexts and positions. We initiated a process of ‘deep translation’, referring to translations across languages by taking into account the cultural and contextual nuances and understanding of the intent behind the original meaning. We proposed five possible operations to start a collective effort of deep translation: translating (translate one of the contextual terms into another language and explore what can/cannot be translated), comparing (examine two terms side by side and explore similarities and differences); transposing (move one of the contextual terms to a different story and/or context, and explore what the term allows/doesn't allow you to see), adapting (consider a contextual term and come up with a word in English/another language/your own language that captures the same/similar meaning in a culturally/politically situated way); shifting (consider what new meanings a term brings to current discussions compared to existing terms in English, e.g. commons, commoning, etc.). 

Workshop contributions will provide a loose framework for translation(s), supporting UCRC’s desire to learn transversally from  practices and knowledge(s) of commons that are often discreet - particularly in marginalised contexts - yet come with their strong potential to democratise and resist the forms of urban enclosures and territorial separations.

Operationalising the terms across different different situations, contexts and positions 

Workshop Translation Boards 

 Urban Commons Research Workshop and Book Launch

A two-day research event, hosted and supported by London Metropolitan University together with the Urban Commons Research Collective, will bring together researchers across the arts, humanities and social sciences working on urban commons. 

BOOK LAUNCH/ Thursday 23 June

The public launch of the forthcoming Urban Commons Handbook, authored by the Urban Commons Research Collective and published by dpr-barcelona. The handbook reflects on different aspects of the urban commons and presents examples of urban commoning in Europe. 

WORKSHOP / Friday 24 June

A one-day workshop open to researchers at any career stage, which we imagine as a space of sharing and thinking together about the urban commons. The workshop will include a guest talk, a set of small-group discussions around different aspects of the urban commons and a debate around future research trajectories in the field.

The workshop was an opportunity to bring together a diverse community of researchers who would like to think together about the urban commons. We encouraged researchers at any career stage and in any disciplinary field to join us for a collective reflection on the meaning and transformative potential of the commons in urban contexts. Proposed contributions engaged with the topic by addressing one or more of the themes discussed in the handbook: common economies, ecologies, infrastructures, knowledges, socialities, localities and governance.

VISIT WORKSHOP WEBSITE FOR MORE INFORMATION.

Urban Struggles and Arrival of Commons at Venice Bienale

This talk for the Common Ground Symposium at the London Festival of Architecture focused on two stories from the Urban Commons Handbook which gathered seven stories on urban commons resulting in a handbook informed by members' situated practices, including their companions and allies. The stories tell how urban commons can transform the way we conceptualise and reimagine cities  through principles of care and collaboration. The transformative capacities of urban commons are explored through seven strands: ecologies, economies, knowledges, localities, socialities, infrastructures, and governance.  The talk expanded on the localities and socialities strands through introducing the associated stories that illustrate how it is possible to reframe [collective] vulnerabilities as shared resources for building alliances across differences in the city.