Reading mental maps as an approach to urban imaginaries /////

The revitalization of former port areas and their transformation into luxury offices, residential neighborhoods and cultural hotspots, through the construction of spectacular architecture and tourist attractions, considered as central elements of urban management.  About a decade after a first research on this specific urban landscape by means of mental maps,  a  second take of mappings  demonstrates the ways in which images are challenged by lived experiences and practices. What about the imaginaries, promises and apprehensions of urban development today? How do people perceive and use this new part of the city?  This is a  first approach to further discuss possibilities of a methodological tool to do research on urban imaginaries.

The article is a contribution to:  Astrid Wonneberger / Mijal Gandelsman-Trier / Hauke Dorsch (eds.) Migration – Networks – Skills.  Anthropological Perspectives on Mobility and Transformation. Bielefeld: Transcript 2016//////

Migration, networks, skills: these keywords not only denote three popular and important fields of current investigation in Social Sciences and Cultural Studies, they also mark the wide range of interests of cultural and social anthropologist Waltraud Kokot, who is to be honoured in this Festschrift. Internationally distinguished scholars from five European countries and various academic disciplines present their most recent research findings on topics such as diaspora and migration studies, urban anthropology and the anthropology of crafts, all of which are connected by the common themes of mobility and transformation.