"URBAN GENERATIONS: POST-COLONIAL CITIES"

1-3 October 2004 @ Mohammed V University, Rabat, Morocco

The focus of this international conference will be on the ways in which the colonial legacy and indigenous traditions affect and problematise the identity of the post-colonial city. Apprehensions of the city as an ideal type based on dichotomies like the city versus the country are undermined by a continuity between the two in many post-colonial contexts. This continuity has important effects on the construction of local and national identities. Along similar lines, issue may also be taken with the dual characterization of the city: on the one hand, it is a site of encounters, of life, of culture, of citizenship; on the other hand, it is a site of isolation, of misery, of violence, of pollution, of unemployment, etc. These tensions have given rise to numerous attitudes towards the postcolonial city ranging from that which construes it as a territory to be managed to that which views it as a site of struggle for the emancipation of various disenfranchised groups. The conference is being jointly organised with the GIPSC Project, Faculte des Lettres et des Sciences Humaines, Mohammed V University Rabat, and the British Council in Morocco.