B-Side Urbanism: a Dub City.

Abstract

According to the UN-Habitat, "developing countries will have 80% of the world's urban population in 2030. By then Africa and Asia will include almost seven out of every ten urban inhabitants in the world." (UN-Habitat, 2006) "the Dubai Fever can be found all over cities in countries throughout Africa, especially Sudan, Angola, and Ethiopia. It is a desire to copy or import an urban model and thereby align with certain economies linked with capital and power." Katrina Stoll (Angelil, Hebel, Schmidt, & Stoll, 2010, p. 151) In the current practice of urbanism in these regions the strategies being developed sometimes fail to make use of the existing potentials and opportunities which sustain the way of life. Driven by standards and development processes that appeal to portions of the society and global networks, the local patterns are usually misunderstood. These local conditions have been tested in time and result in an efficient use of resources through an intricate network of relationships between various actors. Even more so these conditions allow for a resilient, continuously engaging environment. This is evident in the spatial and material expressions of the built environment in these regions. The purpose of my thesis is to investigate and apply an urban/architectural strategy that serves to negotiate the various potentials; local patterns which are continuously being reformatted and designed development processes which promise `improved' conditions and connectivity within global networks. In doing so I hope to approach architecture as a spatial and physical manifestation of cultural and social processes it supports. To better understand this nature of architecture I will compare it with another means of cultural production, music in particular the act of 'dubbing'. As part of this investigation I will apply the strategy in the city of Bahir Dar in Northwestern Ethiopia.