One of the first things that I noticed when I visited Rio de Janeiro a few years ago was the clear fixation on safety and security. There are gates and cameras everywhere. And the guidance you tend to receive from the locals usually resolves around how to stay safe. Don't wander around at night. Be careful when you take out your phone. Be mindful of certain areas. You know, those sorts of things.

Of course, you never really know how dangerous a city is because it's one of those things that's impractical to test. You're not going to wander around dark places just to see what the probability of being robbed is. The more sensible thing to do is simply believe what people are telling you and you observe the cues scattered around the built environment.

The result is a general sense of anxiety. You're not quite sure if all the gates and cameras are truly necessary, but their mere presence makes you believe that they might be. I mean, why else would they be so pervasive? Or, could it be that people are overshooting with their investments in safety and security because, well, fear and paranoia are strong motivators?

I was reminded of all of this as I read through Ed Chartlon's recent book review of, Panic City: Crime and Fear Industries in Johannesburg. The title of his review is Anxious Urbanisms, and I think that's a good way of describing some of these phenomenons. It's an urbanism of uncertainty. I haven't read the book (yet), but it's an interesting topic.

So I will leave you all with this excerpt from the review:

Ultimately, what we might take from Panic City, then, is less a comprehensive sociology of crime in the city and more a method of affective analysis. What the book provides is a sense of the ways in which the emotional sphere organises space, how feelings like anxiety or fear or panic, currently widely distributed across the world, materialise themselves, architecturally and politically. If immunity is anything like security, Murray offers us a cautionary tale. For wherever uncertainty thrives, so does the tendency towards paranoid thinking—which is to say, a contagion of a different sort, one that licences regimes of suspicion, self-protection and individual security, and all at the eventual cost of collective wellbeing and interdependence. 

I’ve written about the Ponte Tower in Johannesburg before. At 54 storeys, it is the tallest building in Africa. It’s located in Hillbrow, which is an inner city neighborhood known for its crime and poverty. 

In the 1970s when the tower was built, Hillbrow was an Apartheid-designated white-only neighborhood and the tower was filled with affluent residents. But that didn’t last long and eventually the wealth fled for the suburbs.

Here’s a brief 6 minute video talking the Ponte Tower. Let’s call it the real estate perspective. Click here if you can’t see it below.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EIKmmSifqw?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

Now, here’s a Real Scenes documentary talking about the thriving electronic music scene in Johannesburg. I think it’s fascinating to look at a city from a particular subculture and, compared to the first video, I get a very different feel for the city. Click here if you can’t see it below.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykt2f6o7-e8?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

I just stumbled upon a fascinating documentary series called Real Scenes. Each film explores “the musical, cultural and creative climate” within a particular city. 

Below is Real Scenes: New York (click here if you can’t see it below). It’s an inside look at the underground music scene that has developed in Brooklyn, but that is at the same time being threatened by development and rising rents. Disclaimer: There’s a lot of f-bombs and a lot of hating on gentrification.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDtf0uIUPuE?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

I’ve only watched the New York video from this series, but I plan to watch each and every one of them. The other cities are Tokyo, Johannesburg, Paris, Berlin, Detroit, and Bristol.

What’s fascinating about these short documentaries is that they give you a glimpse into a particular undertone within each city – one that would otherwise be hard to get if you weren’t living there and engrossed in the scene.

It’s also interesting to see how some people view change within cities. 

To some, transforming a neighborhood from one that looks like a “bomb went off” to something more pristine, is a good thing. But to others, it’s the worst possible outcome. It all depends on your frame of reference.

Now, how do I get them to make a Real Scenes: Toronto? :)

Image: Resident Advisor

One of the first things that I noticed when I visited Rio de Janeiro a few years ago was the clear fixation on safety and security. There are gates and cameras everywhere. And the guidance you tend to receive from the locals usually resolves around how to stay safe. Don't wander around at night. Be careful when you take out your phone. Be mindful of certain areas. You know, those sorts of things.

Of course, you never really know how dangerous a city is because it's one of those things that's impractical to test. You're not going to wander around dark places just to see what the probability of being robbed is. The more sensible thing to do is simply believe what people are telling you and you observe the cues scattered around the built environment.

The result is a general sense of anxiety. You're not quite sure if all the gates and cameras are truly necessary, but their mere presence makes you believe that they might be. I mean, why else would they be so pervasive? Or, could it be that people are overshooting with their investments in safety and security because, well, fear and paranoia are strong motivators?

I was reminded of all of this as I read through Ed Chartlon's recent book review of, Panic City: Crime and Fear Industries in Johannesburg. The title of his review is Anxious Urbanisms, and I think that's a good way of describing some of these phenomenons. It's an urbanism of uncertainty. I haven't read the book (yet), but it's an interesting topic.

So I will leave you all with this excerpt from the review:

Ultimately, what we might take from Panic City, then, is less a comprehensive sociology of crime in the city and more a method of affective analysis. What the book provides is a sense of the ways in which the emotional sphere organises space, how feelings like anxiety or fear or panic, currently widely distributed across the world, materialise themselves, architecturally and politically. If immunity is anything like security, Murray offers us a cautionary tale. For wherever uncertainty thrives, so does the tendency towards paranoid thinking—which is to say, a contagion of a different sort, one that licences regimes of suspicion, self-protection and individual security, and all at the eventual cost of collective wellbeing and interdependence. 

I’ve written about the Ponte Tower in Johannesburg before. At 54 storeys, it is the tallest building in Africa. It’s located in Hillbrow, which is an inner city neighborhood known for its crime and poverty. 

In the 1970s when the tower was built, Hillbrow was an Apartheid-designated white-only neighborhood and the tower was filled with affluent residents. But that didn’t last long and eventually the wealth fled for the suburbs.

Here’s a brief 6 minute video talking the Ponte Tower. Let’s call it the real estate perspective. Click here if you can’t see it below.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EIKmmSifqw?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

Now, here’s a Real Scenes documentary talking about the thriving electronic music scene in Johannesburg. I think it’s fascinating to look at a city from a particular subculture and, compared to the first video, I get a very different feel for the city. Click here if you can’t see it below.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykt2f6o7-e8?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

I just stumbled upon a fascinating documentary series called Real Scenes. Each film explores “the musical, cultural and creative climate” within a particular city. 

Below is Real Scenes: New York (click here if you can’t see it below). It’s an inside look at the underground music scene that has developed in Brooklyn, but that is at the same time being threatened by development and rising rents. Disclaimer: There’s a lot of f-bombs and a lot of hating on gentrification.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDtf0uIUPuE?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

I’ve only watched the New York video from this series, but I plan to watch each and every one of them. The other cities are Tokyo, Johannesburg, Paris, Berlin, Detroit, and Bristol.

What’s fascinating about these short documentaries is that they give you a glimpse into a particular undertone within each city – one that would otherwise be hard to get if you weren’t living there and engrossed in the scene.

It’s also interesting to see how some people view change within cities. 

To some, transforming a neighborhood from one that looks like a “bomb went off” to something more pristine, is a good thing. But to others, it’s the worst possible outcome. It all depends on your frame of reference.

Now, how do I get them to make a Real Scenes: Toronto? :)

Image: Resident Advisor