Postmodern City & Space of Flows

Postmodern City & Space of Flows Taipei’s Examples

Outline • Starting Questions • Taipei’s Hybrid Identity –a Historical Perspective • Review 1: Planned City vs. Organic City • Review 2: Taipei’s History • Taipei’s Hybrid Identity –a “Global Economy” Perspective 3. 〈公寓導遊〉 4.《愛情來了》 5. 〈城市飛行〉

Starting Questions • Do you find anything in common among the 3 fictional texts we read/watched for today? • Can you explain the following concepts? • 空間不只反映社會，空間就是社會。(Space does not only reflect society; the spatial is/constructs the social.) • Informal sector presents a set of dynamic historical relations with the national system playing a role between the formal and the informal. • Urban forms are symbolic expressions of urban meanings and layered histories. • The cultural forms of a space (e.g. architecture) is ideological, or ideological-spatial practice.

People in the Urban Flows • Flows of desires, commodities, information, people and capital. • The Three Stories – • The characters not family members; instead, they are interconnected • by chance in their common space and by their past (公寓導遊）, • by chance (the two films) • by their common dreams (kite, plane and flying), mutual support (the two films) and/or fears (公寓). • Three class levels: middle class at 富禮, youths, jobless or emotionally empty, urban nomads.

Taipei as a Postmodern City • A hybrid space • with layers of colonial meanings; • A mode of dependent urbanization marked with contradictions and informal sectors.

Planned City vs. Organic City • Planned City (or Administrative City): Beijin (北京), Rome, Brasilia • Organic City (or market town) – LA, Tamsui (淡水) • Hybrid type: Imposition on an Administrative City plan on a market town structure –with city walls e.g. Xinchu (新竹）(Ref. Joseph Allen )

Taipei: its Hybrid Styles • Multiple colonization • Change of rulers; change of styles: Ching Japanese  KMT  US Neocolonialism • New rulers ‘quoted’ some architectural styles to assert and ensure its power. (Quoting, but not developing a style responsive to local environment.)

Taipei: Hybrid Sites 台北府城－－四道牆忠孝西路、中華路、愛國西路和中山南路 Planned City? 舊台大醫院 1895-1925 Japanese Modernization – European-Style architecture, Parks, Blvd, Taiwan Hospital, S-Tokufu總督府 & Japanese Houses –European City like Paris? Keeping 清衙門 in The Botanical Garden.

Taipei: Hybrid Sites (2) • KMT Rule • Renamed the streets with nomenclature from 1. mainland Chinese geography; 2. authoritative figures (中山、羅斯福) and traditional Chinese concepts (忠孝)  戰國廁 • “palace” styles building – faux-traditional buildings

Taipei’s Hybrid Identity in Global Economy • Taipei as a dependent city in a developing country (dependent urbanization) – • ‘Most of modern literature on third world urbanization rejects the "overurbanization, lack of planning" thesis which prevailed in the early sixties, and adopted the structuralist point of view, arguing that much of the main patterns of urbanization in Africa, Asia and Latin America is in direct relation with pattern of industrialization, which are driven by rich-poor countries patterns of trade and international production.’(Róinson Rojas )

dependent urbanization • Opposed to city growth in industrialized areas, dependent urbanization must be understood as the expression of the colonial/neo colonial social dynamic of human settlements; • In Africa, Asia, and Latin America patterns of urbanization are internationally dependents and the existence of "overurbanization" is related to international investment.

Dependent Urbanization: Taiwan’s Case • Rapid urbanization caused by urban migration and industrialization. • Contradictions – between the cities and the ‘rural’ regions problems in the rural regions’ environment (caused by factories), labor relations and agriculture in the rural regions.  p. 312 • Prevalence of informal sectors/economy in the cities. 「都市非正式經濟構成了台灣都市生活的基本形式」(夏 310) • Articulation of elite culture and disarticulation of values of root society.

Dependent Urbanization in Taiwan: Possible Development • (夏 p. 312-13) • Increasing urban migration and discrepancies between the cities and the rural regions. • Opportunist activities prevail, which increases the gap between the haves and have-not’s. • The rise of new urban centers, decline of the old ones (?), suburbanization of service industry • The increasing power of monopolizing enterprises, ‘destructive creation’ of urban land. • Deteriorating environment and the increase of risks. Any comments?

Dependent Urbanization in Taiwan (2) • (夏 p. 312-13) • The need for and constructions of a city’s cultural identities (esp. by urban elites) • The increasing importance of leisure culture • Any comments?

Informal sector: Definition • “It is not controlled by the government (non-plan, hidden, unofficial, unrecorded), it is not legal (iilegal, black, shadow) and it is not taxable (unrecorded, parallel). ”(source) • Underground economy • 原因：社會與都市服務不足； • 有了經濟活力，卻沒有勞動關係的正式化. • 這些有利可圖的非正式部門，有系統與正式部門相連，納入世界之市場。…逐漸轉向正式化…(夏. p.310 ) • 建構了空間的混亂。

Informal sector: examples • 販厝, 野雞車，KTV, 釣蝦場, MTV，KTV, 啤酒屋, • Illegal vendors • Which of them have been formalized? Which of them are still problematic?

Articulation of elite culture • Understanding of ‘culture’ through consumption, esp. that of name brands. (p. 315) • Taste as a marker of class identity and power position. • Formation of exclusive clubs, rich residential areas(e.g. 台北高峰會）, high-tech security system in buildings. • Opportunist City  Alienated space (e.g. 101, 京華城)

Disarticulation of Values of Root Society • Wild City  disarticulated culture; see examples on p. 318; • 「網路錢櫃幫」 • Disorganized (and sometimes disrupting social order), wild, associated with folk cultures and beliefs, not institutionalized yet.

Similarities between elite culture and root society  Taipei as an informal city • “Justified” Pursuit of money • Collapse of the boundaries between art and pornography • 101 (the commodified and capitalized space) as the new Taipei landmark; • 十八王公廟 as an example of heterotopia p. 321-22

十八王公廟 • 北海岸的一則傳奇，據說靈驗非常，香火極旺 (source)

公寓導遊 (1986) • Do you live in an apartment building like this? • What does the name 富禮 of this apartment building mean? • What does the plot development of this story imply? • Are they anomies and their contacts, as put Louis Wirth it, “impersonal, transitory, segmental, and mostly utilitarian” • The city dwellers are connected by chance encounters, their past lives and their present fears and desires.

chance encounters or connections by the narrator • 范設計師  林南施  關管理員 魏太太、易單身女郎 林色狼 (their past) 梁少將  中年寡婦 (her son)  J.J. and Susan 小妞（梁少將 and her father） 關管理員  管畫家（農夫）易單身女郎 齊老太太  劉茶莊老闆  魏太太 and her suspicious husband  黃、朱小情侶 朱去舞廳 dances with 林南施  runs over a dog  狗主人張保險公司襄理  拿到獎卷的賴進財  once helped a blind man  Mr. Wu’s twin boys playing blind men and revelation of death  the suicide of 林南施  賴進財

their present fears and desires. • Male chauvinists: • 易單身女郎 and 林色狼 –Lin’s pursuit of her in the past –proves him a chauvinist. • 梁少將‘s loss of power  中年寡婦 (her son)  his past power over Susan’s father • 關管理員‘s desire for 易, and his marking his territory with urine. • 管畫家‘s use of the guard, 關 as an image of farmer • Other signs of male power 劉茶莊老闆、朱小情侶﹔張襄理‘s power over the victims • Accidents:齊老太太﹔the suicide of 林南施  賴進財

Love Go Go • A cute film about the mismatch and warm support of city dwellers (house mates, or strangers). • The characters as ‘nobodies’ – What do you think about them? 阿姨，胖妹, 阿盛,阿松, 麗華, 喬書培

胖妹 Lonely, boring job as a typist. Eats “TV” food

阿盛 Shy and loves to sing

胖妹, 阿盛, and the musician Two bread-lovers and one bad singer 神雕俠侶？

阿松 the salesman Lonely Interested in watching air planes

Mismatch: A nice aunt who fails to understand her nephew 大胖妹 -- 小痞子喬書培: Call機One with a gentle voice, nice name but mean heart.

Mismatch and Good Will: Connections Made in Spaces of Flows • 推銷員阿松(施易男飾)-- 麗華: 理髮店 • Seen as a robber by the wife; Selling the gun when she is sad;

Mismatch and Good Will: Connections Made in Spaces of Flows • For 阿盛 -- 麗華 was his ‘invisible man.’ • The ending:

The Final Scene

城市飛行 by 黃銘正 • What is the film about? • What do the characters have in common or in contrast with each other? Which of them are from China? • What is the recurrent motif in the film? Are their relationships ‘transitory and utilitarian?’

城市飛行 • Theme: Urban nomads • Similarities: their menial and unstable jobs; • Connections: their dreams, chance encounters and their mutual support.

城市飛行 – urban nomads 1 • Chinese laborer 阿祥 illegal immigrant, looks for his wife （阿娟）(Disappeared for two years; they thought he died of plane crash.)  taxi driver

城市飛行 – urban nomads 2 • Betel nut vendor, traffic flow counter, a homeless kid

城市飛行 – urban nomads 3 • motorcycle courier (bad luck—things falling from above.) • director – goes for the dramatic or sensational (killings, black society)

Common Dream: airplane

Common Dream: dream of transcendence Revenge? But against whom?  Turns to look at the airplane.

Airplane : connected with an unknown past • After the car accident, the airplane in the dark; the betel nut vendor’s words; • the moment of shooting the deer

Chance Encounters  mutual support (1) Compromise, fun, mutual support.

Chance Encounters Like a family

Common Dream support (2) Self-Parody; the film vs. the film within the film  offer work turns the urban mess into an art form

Chance Encounters support (3) Lonely, bored, but willing to help. Joining the hunting ritual of the aborigine.

Chance Encounters (4)

Chance Encounters (5): the mysterious The blue pilot

Chance Encounters (6) –in Daily Life

References • 夏鑄九〈台灣的文化編入與脫落－依賴城市都市象徵支初步觀察〉 • Joseph Allen Traces of Ethnic Tension in the Taipei Public Space: Taipei New Park http://www.international.ucla.edu/cira/paper/TWAllen.pdf • 歷史台北 http://www2.ctps.tp.edu.tw/country/history/hist.htm • NOTES ON URBANIZATION IN DEVELOPING SOCIETIEShttp://www.rrojasdatabank.org/urban1.htm • A question of definition:What is the informal sector?http://www.gdrc.org/informal/001-define.html

Postmodern City & Space of Flows