Thrownapartness – a view from Al-Quds/Jerusalem

Abstract

This visual essay introduces the concept of ‘thrownapartness’ as an embedded logic of contemporary urbanization, existing in dialectical tension with ‘throwntogetherness’. Tracing the working of urban walls, displacement and abandonment on the fringes of Al-Quds/Jerusalem provides a stark contrast to the perceived image of cities as hubs of mixing, toleration and liberalism. In Al-Quds, as in a growing number of cities, minorities and marginalized groups are commonly racialized, displaced and segregated, creating a colonial regime of de-facto urban apartheid. In such settings, Doreen Massey's concept of ‘throwntogetherness’ appears like a distant mirage, with its portrayal of flexibility, indifference and coexistence (albeit within an exploitive political economy and oppressive ‘power geometries’). In times of rapid change and multiple crises, the putative ‘threat’ from ‘unwanted’ or ‘deeply different’ groups harbored in urban space drives authorities to use colonial separation strategies, such as ghettoization or ‘gray spacing’ which minimize or prevent encounters. Such settings, we argue, require critical attention to ‘urban thrownapartness’ – a concept that extends Massey's formulations of ‘throwntogetherness’, in order to better fathom the workings of contemporary cities.