OVERVIEW

The course aims to provide students with the analytical tools to understand the urban phenomenon, in its historical evolution up to the point of focusing on the contemporary period at different scales and in different geographical contexts. PThe planetary urbanization is the reference.

AIMS AND CONTENT

LEARNING OUTCOMES

The aim of the course is to bring the student closer to the themes of quantitative and qualitative analysis, through a multidisciplinary approach to analyze the structuring characteristics of the city and the territory: physical elements, processes, uses, practices, rules, aimed at achieving, as a result final, a 'design' perspective. The path has an eminently critical-descriptive character and contains both a "theoretical" part (the tools to interpret the urban fact, at different scales and in different historical periods) and an "analytical" part (the interpretative description of cities and urban regions ), with a particular focus on the contemporary period, analyzed at a global-planetary level.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

The student will come to know how to use and understand both the theories of urban morphology (intended as a universal key to the urban phenomenon and its continuous metamorphosis), and the contents of some disciplines collateral to urban design and planning, but fundamental for the analysi of the urban phenomenon (urban economics and sociology, demography, urban history, urban and regional geography).

The use of urban and territorial analysis tools and techniques will allow the student to acquire a good level of knowledge and ability to understand the transformations that have taken place and to read and restore the complexity of an urban system.

PREREQUISITES

Although no explicit prerequisite is required, the course requires already acquired knowledge of basic mathematics and calculus.

TEACHING METHODS

Theoretical lectures. Interactive teaching. Work group (critical reading of scientific papers and essays indicated by the teacher)

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

The activities to be activated in the training course will be aimed at introducing students to the analysis and understanding of the historical, cultural, demographic, physical and economic transformations that took place in the city and in the urban regions starting from its origins 9000 years ago up to the megalopolises of the present time, through the learning of the coordinated use of quantitative and qualitative analysis tools.

The course is divided into four modules.

The first module focuses on theories and investigations concerning the city of origins and the start of the urban phenomenon. Agriculture, language, technology and settlement. The dualisms: synecism - foundation and spontaneous - planned. Ancient settlements: matrices, models, outcomes, with particular reference to Hippodamian schemes and Roman planning.

The second module deals with the theme of the slow and long transformation of the urban fact in the III - XIX centuries b.C.. Regional and urban phenomena in the Middle Ages: a long legacy. Urban cycles. The city-countryside relationship. Economies and geographies of the ancient and medieval settlement. The formation of urban fabrics in the historic city. Building types and building fabrics. Examples: Rome, Venice, Genoa, Florence, Siena and the smaller Tuscan cities, Bologna and the cities of Emilia, Pavia, Verona, Rimini, Naples, Matera. - The Italian city and the Renaissance: Pienza, Urbino, Ferrara and the renovatio urbis of the big cities - From the Baroque (Baroque town planning from Rome to Sicily) to neoclassicism.

The third module investigates the process of formation of the modern city, starting from the same models of the ancient city (polis, civitas, comune, ideal city) - introduced in the second part of the course - and its evolution towards the contemporary city, proceeding from the large rupture - caused by the "industrial revolution" and the urbanization process - of the reference framework within the city had been conceived and built in previous centuries. The topic is thematized in relation to issues such as the transformations of the urban phenomenon and their relations with economic development and social change, the formation of the bourgeois industrial city and the ideas, images and projects that have tried to interpret and prefigure the change, therefore with the different systems of regulation of the built space, the plans and construction practices, from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. This reconstruction is carried out through the study of exemplary case studies, with particular attention to the physical and symbolic construction of urban space, examined in its historical evolution and its functions, from the modern city to the contemporary city.

The fourth module deals with the change (still in progress) from the industrial city to the contemporary urban maga-cities and mega-regions: spread of the urban, deindustrialization and new urban economies, from metropolises to magalopolises, demographic trends and urbanization, planetary urbanization , the areas in post-demographic transition (shrinking cities and regions). The environmental question: the urban phenomenon and sustainability turn and the the challenge of climate change.

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

The teacher will be responsible for providing specific bibliographic references on the various topics.

The course refers to the following general texts:

Barbera C. (2017), Ippodamo di Mileto and the beginnings of territorial planning. Milan: FrancoAngeli.

Batty, M. (2018) Inventing Future Cities. Cambridge (MA): MIT Press. C.

De Seta C. (2017), The city. From Babylon to the Smart city. Milan: Rizzoli.

Greiner, A., Dematteis, G., & Lanza, C. (2012). Human geography a visual approach. Turin: Utet University.

Scott, J., (2018). The origins of civilization. A counter-story. Turin: Einaudi.

West, G. (2017) Scale: The Universal Laws of Growth, Innovation, Sustainability, and the Pace of Life in Organisms, Cities, Economies, and Companies. New York: Penguin Press. (trad it: Scala, Milan, Mondadori)

TEACHERS AND EXAM BOARD

Exam Board

GIAMPIERO LOMBARDINI (President)

ROBERTO BOBBIO

LESSONS

LESSONS START

February 2022

Class schedule

The timetable for this course is available here: Portale EasyAcademy

EXAMS

EXAM DESCRIPTION

Oral colloqium on the topics addressed during the lectureres and discussion about the exercises of interpretative reading of the essays indicated.

Exam schedule