[csaa-forum] Public Lecture in Sydney -- David Bell -- Hospitality and the City

[Meredith Jones]

Please be invited to a TfC Public Lecture by Dr David Bell from the School of Geography, Leeds University, UK:

Hospitality and the City

When: Thursday, 9th August
Time: 5.30 for 6.00 PM (drinks from 5.30 PM)
Where: TBC
RSVP: Transforming.Cultures at uts.edu.au

Abstract:
The concept and practices of hospitality have generated considerable cross-disciplinary interest in recent years, enlivened by interventions from a broad range of perspectives which have used hospitality as a 'social lens'. These studies have also looked closely at hospitality as a doing, a set of practices or performances -- whether in formal, commercial settings (the 'hospitality industry') or in the everyday encounters of ordinary life. In this talk, I will explore three key ways in which hospitality practices have been framed in an urban context: sites for doing hospitality in cities. First, I will discuss the role of formal, commercial hospitality spaces -- bars, cafes, hotels, restaurants -- in producing forms of sociality and conviviality. While these settings have been critiqued for 'instrumentalizing' hospitality, I will argue that they are nevertheless playing a vital role in changing the culture of cities. Moreover, these hospitality spaces are being used in reimaginings of urban life and in attempts to regenerate city centres. Second, I will focus on the role of food and eating, especially eating together, as a practice used to promote community cohesion and 'social regeneration'. In particular I will discuss how community arts groups seek to use food and eating as a way to draw different groups of people together, and thereby explore the idealization of urban commensality as productive 'social work'. Last, I will think about the 'throwntogetherness' of city life, and how informal, intersubjective interaction -- what I have called 'moments' of hospitality -- are equally important, if often fleeting and elusive, components of the hospitable city. Despite critiques of modern urban life as alienated, hurried, ill-mannered and unwelcoming, I will argue that we can see in these moments at least the possibility of hospitality as an ethics of social relations.

David Bell teaches critical human geography at the University of Leeds, UK. He has extensive experience of supervising and examining PhDs, on topics as diverse as alienabduction, Chinese theme parks, experiences of gay spaces, Taiwanese docudramas, culinary biographies, archaeological tourism and café culture.

This is a free event. All welcome.

Cornelia Betzler
Transforming Cultures Research Centre (Tue & Fri)
Project Officer Indian Ocean & South Asia Research Network (Mon & Thur)
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
University of Technology, Sydney | PO Box 123, Broadway, NSW 2007 | Australia
Ph.: +61 2 9514 2768
www.tfc.uts.edu.au<http://www.tfc.uts.edu.au/>
www.iosarn.com<http://www.tfc.uts.edu.au/>
UTS CRICOS Provider Code: 00099F
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