Place-making Processes Research Articles

User's Perception of Public Space at Malioboro Street After Revitalization using Placemaking Approach

Public open space has functioned as a development image and livability of a city. Malioboro is the most famous street in Yogyakarta with various activities and users. Malioboro street is a corridor that has been revitalized. One of the revitalization purposes is developing a public space that should accommodate all users with their activities. This research will be concentrated on the revitalization of Malioboro as a public space. Placemaking is used as an approach to find out the process of forming public space that has already formed at Malioboro street after the revitalization. So, the research aims to find out that process. The method is quantitative approach, which is a questionnaire to know the user's perception (merchant, tourism, and communities) of the placemaking. Aspects of placemaking are from Project of Public Space (PPS) with four variables: uses and activity, comfort and image, access and linkage, and sociability. Furthermore, the data will be analyzed to find out the placemaking process. The result of this research will be how far the process of the public space that occurred in the revitalized Malioboro street.

Branding Built Heritage through Cultural Urban Festivals: An Instagram Analysis Related to Sustainable Co-Creation, in Budapest

Global tourism is posing challenges on the environmental and social sustainability of host communities, while the industry itself has proven to be vulnerable to threats such as a global pandemic. Proximity tourism was demonstrated to be a more sustainable form in every aspect, especially when locals can co-create the experience and develop place attachment in urban environments through placemaking practices valuing previously underused urban heritage. An alternative urban festival in Budapest focusing on the built environment attracts locals annually to visit open houses providing visitors with genuine experiences. Residents are actively involved in the cultural placemaking practices of the event. As visitors documented the festival and the architectural heritage and uploaded hundreds of photos of their experience to social media platforms such as Instagram, they contributed to the branding process of the event and to the placemaking process involving less known heritage values. In this study, a dataset of more than ten thousand posts was retrieved by scraping Instagram posts based on hashtags related to the Budapest100 festival and analyzed from a temporal and spatial aspect. Returning visitors were identified, who contribute substantially to the sustainability of the event and to the branding of the built environment. Results suggest that community-based local urban festivals are a sustainable form of proximity tourism, resilient even to the COVID-19 pandemic. Place branding through urban festivals focusing on the local built heritage can also decrease the growing pressure on city centers in tourist-historic cities dealing with overtourism.

Reconceptualising Digital Placemaking: A Netnographic Study from the State of Uttarakhand, India

This article aims to contribute towards the theoretical and practical implications of ‘digital placemaking’ in the context of the state of Uttarakhand, India. In this study, we conducted a prolonged netnographic immersion with a popular online community on Facebook and analysed how the members make sense of digital placemaking in the cultural context of Uttarakhand. The data is collected using observations of the digital community and in-depth interviews of the administrators. We draw the theoretical inspirations from the perspective of ‘dialogue’ and ‘participation’ to further re-conceptualise digital placemaking and align its conceptual roots with the discipline of social change communication. Furthermore, using inductive insights, we propose key strategies shaping the process of digital placemaking.

Toward User-Generated Content as a Mechanism of Digital Placemaking—Place Experience Dimensions in Spatial Media

Spatial media bring out new forms of interaction with places, leading to the emergence of new ways of embodying the experience. The perception of place and its dynamics of change has been multiplied by the emergence of digital platforms, which create many and varied representations of place in spatial media. These representations are dependent on the digital platforms’ ecosystem, formed by platform-specific mechanisms of digital placemaking. The study applied text mining techniques and statistical methods to explore the role of user-generated content as a digital placemaking practice in shaping place experience. The online reviews were collected from Google Maps for 23 places from Poznań, Poland. The analysis showed that place experience is described by three dimensions: attributes, practices and atmosphere, or place practices that most closely reflect the specificity of a place. The place attributes blurred the boundaries between their digital images, whereas the atmosphere dimension reduces the diversity and uniqueness of the place. In conclusion, user-generated content (UGC) as an element of the process of digital placemaking increases place awareness and democratizes human participation in its creation, yet it affects its reduction to homogeneous information processed through mechanisms operating within a given digital platform.

Sustainability through the place-making process:

Sustainability through the place-making process:

The wave cannot catch me: children, place and local knowledge in the Faroe Islands

ABSTRACT This paper – at the intersection of childhood studies, island studies, and geographies of place – explores place and sense of belonging in relation to the childhood memories of people from a Faroese village community in a time of societal shift. It examines and analyses the role of and dynamic connection between everyday life practices, local knowledge, and intra- and intergenerational relations in children's place-making practices and narratives. It aims to scrutinize in which sense the interplay between past and present, and between processes of continuity and discontinuity, in people's childhood narratives reflects their relations to place and ties to the past. It investigates the meaning of the coast and ocean in childhood memories, everyday life activities, and local maritime culture in a village community with strong connection to modern large-scale fisheries. It suggests that children's place-making processes and future orientations are influenced by family relations, social capital, local knowledge, and innovation.

Claiming the Place; Informal Placemaking, Power and Territorial Identity in Heliopolis, Cairo

The bottom-up or informal placemaking process is “illegal”, practised only by the “poor” and “unintellectual” classes. The author argues that various classes practise informal placemaking regardless of their economic status or educational level. Studying the spatial manifestation of informal placemaking helps to understand the concrete needs of the residents and reconsider their role in identifying places. Aiming to comprehend informal placemaking and its importance, this study investigates informal placemaking in Sheraton Residence, Heliopolis, Cairo. The area is chosen for its formality, socio-economic and cultural patterns. Cases of informal placemaking in Sheraton Residence are described and analysed to pinpoint their role in creating a sense of place, territorial identity and comprehending their meaning. A comparison with cases in informal low-income housing is conducted to construct diversities and similarities. The study encourages the re-thinking of the public role in placemaking as a place of negotiation and belonging. We can improve their urban quality by re-thinking informal placemaking and looking at how people use the place. The general impression that only informal housing and low-educated classes practise informal placemaking is incorrect.

Politics of Placemaking and Positions of the Musahars at Jamdaha-Golbazar

A certain unity of place and people have been long assumed in the anthropological concept of culture. The association between a particular geographical territory and a cultural group has been studied by classical anthropologists. The taken-for-granted logic was that the Madhesi live in Madhes, 'the Nuer live in Nuerland', 'the Andamanese' are the indigenous peoples of the 'Andaman Islands, and the Musahar live in Musahari. The places are named behind the name of the first settler. The clearest illustrations of these kinds of thinking are the classic 'ethnographic map' that purported to display the spatial distribution of peoples, tribes, and cultures. Place itself becomes a neutral grid on which cultural differences, political identity, historical memories, and societal organizations are inscribed. This assumed isomorphism of place and culture results in some significant problems. The place is not natural, rather it is cultural construction of peoples and it has no singular narratives. This article represents a modest attempt to deal with the issues of interrelation between people and place, displacement and crisis of place-based identity at Golbazar-Jamdaha in Siraha. The Musahar, the first settler of the Jamdaha, are not only marginalized from socioeconomic positions but also displaced from the placemaking process. The history of the Musahar and their places have been refigured in favor of the dominant community. The fundamental question is on the anthropological practices of captivating the association of a culturally singular group and its territorial location as natural. For me, places with cartography are always imagined in the context of political-economic privileges that have a logic of their own.

Place-making: From a Residents’ Initiative to a Participatory Effect: The Case Study of BOMBAST

Abstract This case study illustrates an organic bottom-up place-making process, which started with the initiative of a couple of residents who created an invented folktale as a gift to their community. Through the development of a fictional character, these residents intuitively tried to embody the place’s norms and values or, in other words, the DNA of the community. The challenge, however, was how to transform this single initiative into shared meaning-making, borne by the wider local community. Two trends, noted in place-making literature, are of significance for the case. First, the case shows that, in making the place more attractive to live, the focus should be on the intangible attributes— the cultural soul of the place. Secondly, the case illustrates, through the use of the Imagineering Design Methodology, how the wider community has been enabled to become co-producers and co-consumers in the place-making process. Moreover, by actively including disruptive voices, such as those locals who were critical in the enabling interventions, the place-making process evolved. The case, therefore, shows how these interventions led to a participatory effect. VIU logo WLCE logo Information Vancouver Island University World Leisure Centre of Excellence Main image: Stichting BOMBAST, 2020. Drawing by Clema van Bekhoven © Monique Schulte – van Alphen and Nicoline de Heus2022

Making and learning: Envisioning a third place for Lakota artists

ABSTRACT This case study discusses a course where 125 South Dakota State University School of Design (SoD) students collaborated with faculty, staff, and 30 artists at Sitting Bull College (SBC), Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, North Dakota, US. Students received authentic instruction through SBC artist workshops, conversations, and storytelling, then joined visioning exercises to design festival grounds, workshop spaces, kitchen and dining facilities, and guest camping. Students demonstrated that they understood the function of a “third place” by asking informed questions, reflecting on unique cultural requirements, and looking to the future to supply sustainable site and building recommendations. All interactions were held online. Students’ reflections were gathered using Brookfield’s Critical Incident Questionnaire. Tara Page’s embodied and material pedagogies are useful when making, designing, and learning about sites, local culture, and people. Future work will examine how knowledge, understanding, learning, and belonging strengthen the placemaking process to better prepare students for professional practice.

Place-making, Politics and Borderscapes in Southeastern Europe

This article introduces a collection of case studies on the politics of borders and the place-making processes in Southeast European border environments. It opens with explorations of how the social analysis of borders oscillates between border studies and border theory, and between the study of borders as things and as ideas. The focus on the territoriality of borders, analyzed as dynamic social-spatial formations, is proposed as a meeting point between the two approaches. On this premise, this article examines some key elements in contemporary ethnographic research on borders in Southeastern Europe.

Sojourning as a wife, a mother and a daughter: a critical autoethnography of a Vietnamese doctoral student in New Zealand

ABSTRACT This study is a critical autoethnography in which I recorded how I, as a Vietnamese student pursuing a doctoral degree in New Zealand with accompanying children, navigated between cultures and learned to raise children to be well adaptive to the New Zealand context and at the same time sustained the bond with the Vietnamese heritage. Based on theories of transnationalism, space and place, I explored my own spatial production and place-making process during my first year of candidature when my family had just entered New Zealand. Going beyond the description of the conventional enculturation and the detailed account of social and academic challenges that are normally found in previous literature on international doctoral students, the paper focuses on the way I myself got used to spatial practices outside Vietnam, the way I grew to become ‘a cultural translator’ for my parents, the way I made my home a space of cross-cultural exchanges and inter-generational legacy inheritance. In that sense, my motherhood, daughterhood, and studenthood entangled in a complex network of different cultures, lifestyles and social structures. The paper also features a shift in family dynamics and the reconfiguration of power in a Vietnamese family in New Zealand.

Tourism and the (re)making of rural places: The cases of two Chinese villages

Tourism is a major force in rural place-making and is widely adopted to maintain and revitalize rurality in times of economic uncertainty. A mixed methods approach is used to examine and compare place-making experiences of two villages in central China from the perspective of social capital Interviews, observations and household surveys are used to identify the place-making processes, experiences, and outcomes. Rural tourism place-making in both villages follow proposal, negotiation, implementation and maintenance stages. A clear tourism orientation in place-making processes and involvement of external partners brought higher economic benefits for residents but a lower sense of ownership. The social capital of the two villages resulted in variations in place-making styles and processes, and influenced rurality outcomes. Practical suggestions for the planning and management of rural destinations are offered.

Of Bastions and Bulwarks: A Multi-Scalar Understanding of Local Bordering Practices in Europe

In recent years, local authorities in Europe have increasingly developed bordering practices that hinder or further migrant rights, such as the freedom of movement. They bypass national borders by facilitating refugee resettlement, they claim local space to welcome or shun certain migrants, and they develop or break down local impediments to migrant mobility. These local practices, we argue, can best be understood from a multiscalar perspective, which considers processes of placemaking as reproductive of power dynamics. Applying such a perspective to local bordering practices in Greece, Turkey, the Netherlands, Italy, and Germany, we point out the importance of the multitude of the actors involved; legal pluralism; and the contextual role of social, economic, and spatial factors. This offers a theoretical foothold for understanding the power dynamics at play when local authorities become bastions or bulwarks, in which some migrants are welcomed, and others are not.

Revisiting the place of philosophy with Heidegger: Being-in-academia

In this article, I elucidate the meaning of the act of philosophizing as a research activity in academia. My main thesis is that, as academic philosophers, we need to change our existing relation to thinking in academia, which requires a radical re-evaluation of the ēthos, or, the dwelling-place of philosophy. Drawing on Martin Heidegger’s thought, I offer a place-based thinking, taking up the issue of being-in-academia as part of the question of dwelling. First, I explore the technological nature of being-in-academia departing from Heidegger’s account of scientific research as ‘constant activity’. After identifying the ontological character of our situation in academia as captivation in the world, I bring up the matter of overcoming modern academia, discussing the possibility of orienting ourselves at the limits of education. I argue that reassessing our utilitarian relation to world and language, and recognizing the meontological dimension of thinking, is key for being able to de-structure academia and make room for ‘ontological freedom’. I conclude that the emergence of a new dwelling-place requires a poietic process of place-making at the limits of academia.

Spaces of Transformative Practice: Co-producing, (Re)Making and Translating Fractional Urban Space in Gugulethu, Cape Town

Reimagining neglected urban space offers the potential for social cohesion, integration, and connectivity. The intimate, interstitial or fractional spaces of a city represent a key component of social infrastructure in a neighbourhood. The smallest of interventions in urban space adds value and complexity to urban life. However, fractional, yet deeply transformative, urban space is often unrecognised and undocumented. Transformative practice seeks to accommodate, anticipate and represent inclusive public life but requires discovering new content and definitions on public space to decode emerging processes of incremental place-making in an African context. The narrative focuses on a network of place-making intervention projects as part of an urban upgrading programme in Lotus Park informal settlement, located in Gugulethu, Cape Town. A set of tracings, integrated with theoretical frames, reveal the impact of upgraded urban space through firstly, emerging centres and the (re)making of place on the periphery; secondly, disrupting edges and the co-production process involved in the negotiation of space; and lastly, crafting shadows and interpreting traces of micro-interventions. The purpose is to explore urban space as continually adapting to the intrusions in the city grid to translate (1) innovative modes of spatial production; (2) dynamic forms of local agency; (3) marginal ways of operating; and (4) interconnected and multi-scalar urban processes of everyday place-making. The practice of co-producing and (re)making urban space in Gugulethu uncovers alternate mechanisms for governance, partnerships and operations.

Gastronomy as a social catalyst in the creative place-making process

This paper examines the integration of gastronomy in the creative place-making process. The study is based on the interviews with the organizers of five gastronomy events: a cooking workshop, a gastronomy festival, a series of gastronomy events at museums, a gastronomy theatre performance and an intimate dinner event. The contextual analysis shows that gastronomy events can contribute to five important features defining quality of place: diversity, liveliness, innovativeness, creativity and openness/tolerance. The final phase of our study brings comparison with findings in art-based place-making studies and discusses on diversity, integration in development policies and replicability potential of analyzed gastronomy events.

Engaging locals in rural areas: value correspondence in placemaking through mobile augmented reality

ABSTRACT This research proposes value correspondence, which posits that the value shared in correspondence between stakeholders is essential for the development of placemaking in rural areas. By investigating location-based media; particularly mobile augmented reality (MAR) apps aimed at both reviving local tourism in rural townships and soliciting opinions from major stakeholders, the author has determined that local residents play a vital role in the placemaking process. However, research in this field has often ignored local residents and instead focused on tourists’ perceptions and augmented reality technology. Various MAR apps have been designed as forms of self-service technology that benefits tourists but, to some extent, also hinders dialog between tourists and locals; this results in value noncorrespondence, which may lead to the failure of placemaking. Thus, the author advocates that more attention should be paid to how locals can generate value in correspondence with other stakeholders via the use of MAR.

Radical Placemaking: Utilizing Low-Tech AR/VR to engage in Communal Placemaking during a Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has made the struggles of the excluded louder and has also left them socially isolated. The article documents the implementation of one instance of Radical Placemaking, an “intangible”, community-driven and participatory placemaking process, in Kelvin Grove Urban Village (KGUV), Brisbane, Australia to tackle social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. KGUV community members were engaged in storytelling and interactive fiction online workshops to create experiential, place-based and mobile low-tech AR digital artefacts. The article expands on the methodology which involved a series of online workshops to design low-tech AR digital artefacts using digital collaboration tools (Google Classroom, Slack, Zoom) and VR environments (Mozilla Hubs). The study’s findings confirm the role of accessible AR/VR technology in enabling marginalised communities to create connectedness and community by co-creating their own authentic and diverse urban imaginaries of place and cities.

A Conceptual Framework for Large-Scale Event Perception Evaluation with Spatial-Temporal Scales in Sustainable Smart Cities

The harmony relationship between people and places is crucial for sustainable development. The smart sustainable city concept is widely based on making efforts to understand this relationship and create sustainable communities. The placemaking process is highly dependent on people’s perception of places, events and situations in which they find themselves. Moreover, the greater the event scale, the more essential the research concentrated on them. A certain number of scientific papers have focused on the event management and event perception; however, there is still a research gap in works regarding sustainable development concepts. Thus, to fill this gap, the framework for large-scale event perception evaluation was created. Moreover, the cognitive map of large-scale event perception based on the Szczecin city citizens’ opinions was created. In order to acquire the opinions, a questionnaire with spatial–temporal measurement scales was applied. The representativeness estimation method, natural event ontology and framework for image interpretation were used for event segmentation. The storm phenomenon scenes were selected for picture measurement scale creation. The most significant factors of large-scale event perception were identified based on the questionnaire results. Finally, the cognitive map of global event perception factors is presented. By applying the analysis presented in this paper in various industries, relevant policies related to different dimensions of the citizens’ well-being could be created by governments.