Summer School in Istanbul on Urban Political Ecology

Urban Political Ecology On The Road:

City’s Nature And Nature’s City Through Istanbul

Would you like to be a part of a critical urban discussion this summer in Istanbul, one that is both theoretically challenging and intensively embedded in field experience?

Our times depend on the (re)production of space, often at two fronts: the built and the biophysical. These two fronts are traditionally understood as divided, the former belonging to the city and the latter named as the environment. Yet a vast array of contemporary challenges from urban sprawl to climate change and from urban speculation to food and energy crises have shown us that the two are analytically as well as politically inseparable.

Koç University invites you to Istanbul to critically consider the contemporary city and its environment in a three-week graduate summer school inspired by the flourishing literature on urban political ecology.

Istanbul presents a unique laboratory where large-scale urban and infrastructural projects meet grassroots activism and opposition. Our graduate summer school intends to bring the lived aspects of this laboratory to the forefront with field trips along the transformation zones to sides of contestation, interviews with urban residents, activists, and lawyers as well as guest lecturers by local academics.