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Like other cities on water, Tokyo and Venice are characterised by intrinsic fragility, resulting from the combined work of the continuous emergence of technological, economic, social, and environmental forces, which affect the urban structure and landscape. Their tangible and intangible (material and immaterial) heritage can play a fundamental role in both maintaining their peculiar maritime identity and defining a future vision for the city. Accordingly, this volume focuses on how the rediscovery of water, from both architectural and cultural points of view, as well as the preservation of the historical and local character of the use of water, can contribute to new forms of resilience. The contributions from scholars, experts, and practitioners in various disciplines – from the social sciences and humanities to architecture and urban planning – that are brought together in this volume help to clarify the basic importance of maintaining and preserving the distinctive identity of two paradigmatic cases of cities on water.
The process of modernization, especially during the twentieth century, has brought about dramatic changes in most cities situated on a body of water. The search for efficiency and functionality has profoundly affected coastal and urban landscapes: gigantism in the port industry has contributed to the degradation of environmental resources and habitats, and modernization processes have marginalized local cultures and historical, community-based values, thus causing original features and local specificity to disappear from most of our historical waterfronts. During the last few decades, the restructuring of port and industrial activities, the greater importance of leisure and tourism, and increasing concern for environmental matters have led to the “rediscovery of water” and to the design and implementation of new urban policies aimed at redeveloping urban waterfronts. Against this background, Venice and Tokyo represent paradigmatic cases of the many challenges which confront urban governance in cities on water. In fact, the urban history of these cities is intimately linked to their relationship with water, which has changed over the centuries, creating articulated and complex structures that have characterized their physical aspect, and even the image of the two cities offered to the rest of the world. From this perspective, this volume highlights the most important socio-economic, historical, identitarian, environmental, and cultural dimensions of the process of the “rediscovery of water” in Venice and Tokyo, as well as offering a re-evaluation of their heritage and identity as cities of water. It pays particular attention to the various implications of living in such a fragile and liminal space between land and water, where natural risks and social and economic vulnerability are particularly high.
Tokyo: destroyed by the earthquake of 1923 and again by the firebombing of World War II. Does anything remain of the old city? The internationally known Japanese architectural historian Jinnai Hidenobu set out on foot to rediscover the city of Tokyo. Armed with old maps, he wandered through back alleys and lanes, trying to experience the city's space as it had been lived by earlier residents. He found that, despite an almost completely new cityscape, present-day inhabitants divide Tokyo's space in much the same way that their ancestors did two hundred years before. Jinnai's holistic perspective is enhanced by his detailing of how natural, topographical features were incorporated into the layout of the city. A variety of visual documents (maps from the Tokugawa and Meiji periods, building floorplans, woodblock prints, photographs) supplement his observations. While an important work for architects and historians, this unusual book will also attract armchair travelers and anyone interested in the symbolic uses of space. (A translation of Tokyo no kûkan jinruigaku.)
Water control is essential to Japan, as more than half of its invested capital is concentrated in elevations under sea level and the majority of the island nation is exceptionally vulnerable to flooding. To avoid potential crisis, the Japanese have developed exceptionally innovative water management practices. Offering the unique perspective of Dut
This book discusses existing and future global problems of physical, chemical, biological and societal origins faced by increasingly populated cities and mega-cities, and options to mitigate or eliminate them. In nine chapters, the book focuses on rehabilitation and redevelopment projects aimed at converting shantytowns/slums into well serviced neighborhoods via secure housing, clean piped water, adequate access to sanitation, and other amenities for good living conditions. Examples of rehabilitation (restore capacity, structures, efficiency) and redevelopment (redesign, rebuild, attract investment) are addressed in detail, as are the sources of major financing to support such projects and proposals. The final chapters also discuss problems faced by countries with contracting populations, and their viable solutions. The book will be of interest to academics, city planners, land-use planners, NGOs, and designers /architects specializing in urban development and redevelopment.
In 1995, on the thirtieth anniversary of Tanizaki Jun’ichirō’s death, Adriana Boscaro organized an international conference in Venice that had an unusally lasting effect on the study of this major Japanese novelist. Thanks to Boscaro’s energetic commitment, Venice became a center for Tanizaki studies that produced two volumes of conference proceedings now considered foundational for all scholarly works on Tanizaki. In the years before and after the Venice Conference, Boscaro and her students published an abundance of works on Tanizaki and translations of his writings, contributing to his literary success in Italy and internationally. The Grand Old Man and the Great Tradition honors Boscaro’s work by collecting nine essays on Tanizaki’s position in relation to the “great tradition” of Japanese classical literature. To open the collection, Edward Seidensticker contributes a provocative essay on literary styles and the task of translating Genji into a modern language. Gaye Rowley and Ibuki Kazuko also consider Tanizaki’s Genji translations, from a completely different point of view, documenting the author’s three separate translation efforts. Aileen Gatten turns to the influence of Heian narrative methods on Tanizaki’s fiction, arguing that his classicism, far from being superficial, “reflects a deep sensitivity to Heian narrative.” Tzevetana Kristeva holds a different perspective on Tanizaki’s classicism, singling out specific aspects of Tanizaki’s eroticism as the basis of comparison. The next two essays emphasize Tanizaki’s experimental engagement with the classical literary genres—Amy V. Heinrich treats the understudied poetry, and Bonaventura Ruperti considers a 1933 essay on performance arts. Taking up cinema, Roberta Novelli focuses on the novel Manji, exploring how it was recast for the screen by Masumura Yasuzō. The volume concludes with two contributions interpreting Tanizaki’s works in the light of Western and Meiji literary traditions: Paul McCarthy considers Nabokovas a point of comparison, and Jacqueline Pigeot conducts a groundbreaking comparison with a novel by Natsume Sōseki.
Tokyo: Memory, Imagination, and the City is a collection of eight essays that explore Tokyo urban space from the perspective of memory in works of the imagination—novels, short stories, poetry, essays, and films. Written by scholars of Japanese studies based in England, Germany, Japan, and the United States, the book focuses on texts produced in Japan since the 1980s. The closing years of the Shōwa period (1926-1989) were a watershed decade of spatial transformation in Tokyo. It was also a time (in Japan, as elsewhere) when conversations about the nature of memory—historical, cultural, collective, and individual—intensified. The contributors to the volume share the view that works of the imagination are constitutive elements of how cities are experienced and perceived. Each of the essays responds to the growing interest in studies on Tokyo with a literary-cultural orientation.
Presents more than thirty of the architect's recent works, including high-profile commissions such as the Suntory Museum in Tokyo and the Ondo Civic Center in Kure; the exlusive Lotus House in Zushi; large-scale urban developments in Sanlitun Village South in Beijing, and more.
'Climate Resilient Cities: A Primer on Reducing Vulnerabilities to Disasters' provides city administrators with exactly what they need to know about the complex and compelling challenges of climate change. The book helps local governments create training, capacity building, and capital investment programs for building sustainable, resilient communities. A step-by-step self-assessment challenges policymakers to think about the resources needed to combat natural disasters through an innovative hot spot risk and vulnerability identifi cation tool. This primer is unique from other resources in its treatment of climate change using a dual-track approach that integrates both mitigation (lowering contributions to greenhouse gases) and adaptation (preparing for impacts of climate change) with disaster risk management. The book is relevant both to cities that are just beginning to think about climate change as well as those that already have well established policies, institutions, and strategies in place. By providing a range of city-level examples of sound practices around the world, the book demonstrates that there are many practical actions that cities can take to build resilience to climate change and natural disasters.