Call for papers
Time as infrastructure: For an analysis of contemporary urbanization
Editors: Dr. Natalia Besedovsky, University of Hamburg; Fritz-Julius Grafe, Humboldt University Berlin; Dr. Hanna Hilbrandt, HafenCity University Hamburg; Hannes Langguth, Technical University Berlin
 
We are looking for papers to be published as part of a Special Issue planned for “City. Analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action”
Different and partly contradictory tendencies in describing present notions of time reflect the multiplicity of temporal experiences in contemporary urban life. Especially throughout the Western world, authors describe the acceleration of everyday experiences through demands of interactivity, multitasking, and hyper-solicitation as processes of social alienation in the course of rapid technological and socio-economic change. However, experiences of uncertainty, stagnation, insecurity, and waiting challenge these narratives of acceleration under late capitalism. The precarity of large segments of the job market, the uncertainty of residence rights for refugees and asylum seekers, the struggle to balance work and life, or the increasing marginalization of communities that lack basic infrastructures can be seen as cases in point.
This Special Issue debates the social and political implications of such temporal dynamics for our cities and everyday urban life. In doing so, it explores the making and constitution of temporalities, the power relations in and through which these processes are embedded, the inequalities that their effects entail, as well as potentials for socio-political change. To unveil the manifold structures and practices that underlie the making of temporal dynamics, it probes the concept of infrastructure. Considering time through the analytical lens of infrastructure promises to elucidate the ways in which political, social, and economic conditions shape and exert authority over the everyday urban. Temporalities, as we see it, themselves constitute infrastructures: As structures that underlie and powerfully shape current forms of organization and interaction, considering temporalities through the analytics of an infrastructural perspective facilitates an understanding of their making and effects. An infrastructural perspective allows us to unpack struggles around the making of temporalities, their use as modalities of domination and resistance as well as resultant inequalities. In sum, this Special Issue advances three aims: to strengthen and enrich the analytical notion of infrastructure through disentangling and understanding urban temporalities; to facilitate and politicize knowledge about the construction of urban temporalities and thus the present time; and to unveil potential starting points for social and political interventions that aim to develop alternative future conditions and modes of urban coexistence.
 
Call for papers
We welcome submissions of abstracts (~500 words) for empirical papers (between 4,000 and 8,000 words) that unveil the political moments of time as infrastructure. Topics include but are not limited to:

• Infrastructures of acceleration, waiting, limbo or stagnation
• Contradictions between temporal structures: frictions and tensions in urban rhythms, cycles or synchronization processes
• Temporal domination through capitalist or state infrastructures or the entanglement of both
• Practices of resistance / political activism that aim at appropriating or disrupting temporal regimes
• Physical, social, financial, environmental infrastructures (e.g. infrastructures of water supply, computer trading, urban transport etc.) and their temporal implications

We particularly encourage comparative work and post-colonial as well as southern perspectives.
Deadline for abstract submissions is September 1st 2017. Please send the abstract to Hanna Hilbrandt at [email protected]. If you have any queries or would like to see the extended CfP, please don´t hesitate to email. Full paper submission is due by January 15th.
 
…………………………………………………………………….
Dr. Hanna Hilbrandt
 
Geschichte und Theorie der Stadt /
History and Theory of the City
 
HafenCity Universität Hamburg
Überseeallee 16, R. 4.129
20457 Hamburg
 
Tel.: +49 (0)40 42827-4394
Mail: [email protected]

Conference of Irish Geographers, University College Cork. 
Thursday 4 May - Saturday 6 May 2017. 
 
Call for Papers (Deadline 20th March 2017). Early bird registration closes 20th March. 
 
Organisers: Temporality in the City.  [email protected]
 
Session abstract
 
Space and time are key concepts in Geography but often space is prioritised over time. Temporality within the urban is often focused on understanding temporary uses of vacant spaces and this has been an increasing narrative in the literature in recent years. These types of temporary uses are often critiqued as fitting neatly into neoliberal city agendas (O’ Callaghan and Lawton, 201). The often temporariness of these sites can lessen their impact on urban discourse, thus, in this session we want to illustrate alternative narratives of temporariness.  We wish to explore temporality more broadly to include not only temporary spaces, but also events in the city which are temporary, such as emergencies or politics. Exploring issues such as, in what ways do these narratives merge, diverge, illuminate one another, and create one another? What can be learned from expanding the concepts of temporary use to other examples in the city? Examples could include the temporariness of emergencies, elected officials, governance and acts of governmentality, public response, protest, technology, governance and work amongst others. Simply, this session is interested in exploring the idea of urban temporariness, which is seen as a distinct form of modernity (Benko, 1997), beyond just its effects on spaces but on how they are connected and constantly re-create, sustain and dismantle each other.
 
Thus, this session is not prescriptive and welcomes academics and postgraduate students interested in urban temporality and its effect on different urban systems, infrastructures, phenomenon’s and issues.   We particularly welcome case studies that add to the limited empirical work in the area of urban temporality in the context of permanent systems with a temporary element such as emergencies and elected officials.
 
Areas of potential interest for research papers may include, but are not limited to:

• A temporary space evolving out of temporary politics or  a semi- permanent emergency;
• How ‘temporary’ emergencies become embedded in permanent policy;
• How temporary but sustained protest can change cities, policy and even countries;
• What can temporality as a concept tell us about the city?
• How ever-evolving technology creates a temporariness in its use and yet, it is being invested in highly within cities.
• The idea of modernity and the city.
• Vacancy, homelessness and emergency.
• Governmentality in a temporary city. 

 
Instructions for authors
Please submit your abstract through the CIG paper abstract form and select 'Temporality in the City' as the themed session and forward your abstract and interest to session convenors.  Form can be found here: http://www.conferenceofirishgeographers.ie/abstract-submission-form-c1r5x
Please note: You cannot submit an abstract until you have registered for the conference which we urge you to do asap. 
The expected format is 15 minutes with 5 minutes for Q&A but is subject to change.