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The Urban Archetypes of Jane Jacobs and Ebenezer Howard
Contradiction and Meaning in City Form
Abraham Akkerman (Author)
9781487501266
Hardback, published 9 January 2020
280 pages, 2 figures
23.1 x 15.7 x 2.8 cm, 0.52 kg
"While the book certainly is focused largely on the history and theories of city planning, the inclusion of archetypes expands the discussion to the fields of psychology and, to a more limited degree, philosophy."
Ebenezer Howard, an Englishman, and Jane Jacobs, a naturalized Canadian, personify the twentieth century’s opposing outlooks on cities. Howard envisaged small towns, newly built from scratch and comprised of single-family homes with small gardens, while Jacobs embraced existing inner-city neighbourhoods that emphasized the verve of the living street. Both figures have had their share of supporters as well as detractors: Howard's conceptualization received criticism for its uniformity and alienation from the city core, while Jacobs’s urban vision came to be recognized as the result of invasive gentrification. Presenting Howard and Jacobs within a psychocultural context, The Urban Archetypes of Jane Jacobs and Ebenezer Howard addresses our urban crisis in its recognition that "city form is a gendered, allegorical medium expressing femininity and masculinity within two founding features of the built environment: void and volume." These founding contrasts represent both tension as well as the opportunity for fusion between pairs of urban polarities: human scale against superscale, gait against speed, and spontaneity against surveillance. In their respective attitudes, Howard and Jacobs have come to embrace the two ancient archetypes of the Garden and the Citadel, leaving it to future generations to blend their two contrarian stances.
List of Figures Introduction: Modernity and Its Urban Context 1. Paradigms of City Form in the Urbanism of Ebenezer Howard and Jane Jacobs 2. Howard vs. Jacobs: Ideal City or Authentic Street? 3. Twentieth-Century Transformations of the Garden and the City 4. The Neighbourhood as a State of Wonderment: The Urbanist Dream of Jane Jacobs 5. Spectacle and Contempt in City Form: Howard and Jacobs 6. The Ghost of Howard: Advent of the Masterplan and the Loss of Place 7. "Growth Ain’t Expansion": Jacobs in Toronto 8. Urban Space: Medium or Message? Bibliography
Preface
Index