Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Urban cultural archaeology'

This dissertation theorizes the genre of the urban database documentary, a mode of media art practice that uses structural systems to uncover new perspectives on the lived experience of place. While particularly prominent in recent decades, I argue that the genre of the urban database documentary arises at the turn of the 20th century in response to the rise of the metropolis and the widespread adoption of new media technologies such as photography, cinema, and radio. This was a time when the modern city engendered significant disorientation in its inhabitants, dramatically expanding horizontally and vertically. The rampant pace of technological development at this time also spawned feelings of dehumanization and the loss of connection to embodied experience. The urban database documentary emerges as a symptomatic response to the period's new cultural conditions, meeting a collective need to create order from vast quantities of information and re-frame perception of daily experience. The design of structural systems became a creative method for simultaneously addressing these vast new quantities of information, while attending to the particularities of individual experience. For media artists, building a database into the aesthetic design of a work itself offers an avenue for creatively documenting the radical multiplicity of urbanized environments, preserving attention to the sensory experience of details while aspiring to a legible whole. Crucially, I argue that the design of these systems is a vital form of authorial agency. By reading these artists' work in relation to contemporary practice, I aim to make transparent the underlying, non-technical ambitions that fuel this distinctive mode of media art practice.

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The city of Cruz Alta, in the northwest of the Rio Grande do Sul state, recognizes itself as a historical city. Founded in 1821 in a context of borders dispute between Portugal and Spain, the official history emphasizes some elements of its past, like the initial occupation of the area as the route of cattle trade, in a period where the indigenous populations were repelled of the region and the local history. Its history is the history of the white, rural elites; rarely that of the poor, slaves, or the everyday life. These histories are assumed as the real past, heritage of the city inhabitants. The cultural heritage of the city reproduces this logic, once it actuates basically on architectural goods which make reference to the same elites. Historical narratives and heritage discourses are the ways in which a city represents its own past, and then the city s past looks simplified, without conflict and without contemplate the diversity of settings and social actors that compose its history. An archaeology of the city can handle with the enormous archaeological potential of downtown area, and bring this other actors to the debate. A historiographical survey and the use of photos and historical maps allowed to draw the process of occupation of the city, and with this data areas with archaeological potential are identified, highlighting the interpretive possibilities of its study. The central area of the city is divided in three archaeological layers, identified by the period of occupation and, into these three layers, some specific places are identified by its potentialities. As a result, is proposed an archaeological map that allows the location of areas of archeological interest in the actual city
A cidade de Cruz Alta, no noroeste do estado do Rio Grande do Sul, reconhece a si mesma como uma cidade histórica. Fundada em 1821 em um contexto de disputas de fronteiras entre Portugal e Espanha, a história oficial do município dá ênfase em alguns elementos de seu passado, como a ocupação inicial da área enquanto uma rota de comércio de gado, período no qual as populações indígenas são rechaçadas da região e da história local. Sua história é em geral a das elites brancas e rurais, e raramente a dos pobres, dos escravos, ou do cotidiano. Estas histórias são assumidas como o verdadeiro passado, herança de seus habitantes. O patrimônio cultural do município reproduz esta lógica, uma vez que atua basicamente em bens arquitetônicos que se referem em geral às mesmas elites. Narrativas históricas e discursos patrimoniais são os meios pelos quais uma cidade representa seu passado, e assim o passado da cidade aparece simplificado, sem conflitos e sem contemplar a diversidade de cenários e atores sociais que compõem a história da cidade. Uma arqueologia da cidade pode dar conta do enorme potencial arqueológico da área central da cidade, e trazer aos debates estes outros atores. O levantamento historiográfico e o uso de fotos e plantas históricas permitiram traçar o processo de ocupação da cidade, e assim identificar áreas de potencial arqueológico, destacando as possibilidades interpretativas de seu estudo. A área central da cidade foi dividida em três camadas arqueológicas identificadas pelo período ao qual se referem, e nestas três camadas, alguns lugares específicos foram identificados por suas potencialidades. Como resultado, é proposta uma carta arqueológica que permite localizar na cidade atual as áreas de interesse arqueológico

Esta pesquisa tem como objetivo elaborar um estudo sobre o patrimônio cultural e o turismo na cidade de Pelotas no sul do Brasil enfocando a importância do patrimônio para o desenvolvimento do turismo cultural. A cidade de Pelotas se desenvolveu economicamente com o estabelecimento de charqueadas escravista no final do século XVIII. E com um grande acumulo de riqueza a cidade passou por um período de desenvolvimento modernista e tecnológico diretamente influenciado pela cultura Europeia, em meados de século XIX e inicio do século XX, destacando-se do resto do país no processo de modernização urbana. Esse período consolidou uma paisagem cultural histórica materializada no seu conjunto arquitetônico artístico de exemplar importância para o país, possibilitando o desenvolvimento do turismo cultural. Em um primeiro momento é apresentado uma discussão de patrimônio, turismo e desenvolvimento. E no segundo momento é apresentado o estudo do turismo e patrimônio cultural da cidade identificando de forma sistemática o patrimônio cultural inventariado e outros elementos do patrimônio cultural, como o patrimônio artístico, arqueológico bem como o patrimônio cultural imaterial. Apresenta a contextualização do período de apogeu econômico, industrial e moderno e o seu impacto na vida urbana justificando a importância do estudo. O presente trabalho demonstrou que a cidade de Pelotas apresenta um rico patrimônio cultural constituindo um importante conjunto patrimonial de importância nacional.
The present work aims to elaborate a study about the cultural heritage and tourism of the city of Pelotas, in the south of Brazil with a focus on the importance of this heritage in order to boost cultural tourism. Pelotas city has developed economically with the establishment of “charqueadas” which were basically country houses that produced salted, dried meat through slave labour in the end of the eighteenth century. It lead to an accumulation of wealth in the city, which brought modern and technological development influenced directly by european culture. This development occured mainly during the second half of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries, and made the city stood out in the country as na exemple of modern urbanization. This period consolidated a historical cultural landscape that can be seen in the artistic and architectural ensambles materialized in the city’s beautiful buildings and public spaces. These facts enabled the development o the city’s cultural turism. In a first moment, the present research intends to present a discussion about heritage, tourism and development. After that, it focuses on presentig how the cultural tourism Works in the city, identifying, in a systematic way, the city’s enrolled cultural heritage and its other elements or branches, like artistic and the intangible cultural heritage. This work also presents a contextualization of the city’s industrial, economic and modern apogee and its impacts on peoples’ lifestyle, facts that justify the need for such study. It is possible to see through this research that the city of Pelotas has a very rich cultural heritage which constitutes a set of nacional importance.

It has recently been recognised that concepts of health contain multiple dimensions. One area that has received little attention in archaeology is that of health and well-being, so this research seeks to contribute to this area of study. It does so by investigating healthiness in the late Iron Age and Romano-British periods. The literature review explores current thinking around this topic, and confirms that aspects of good health mattered to people in the past. The research explores small finds that are traditionally associated with personal use (mirrors, combs, glass unguent containers, bronze cosmetic grinders and other additional toilet items) from the main urban-type settlements of south-east Britain. The investigation included collecting data concerning the sites, contexts, dates, materials, types, forms, colours and decoration ofthese objects, and any associated archaeological remains found with these items. Given the social nature ofthis work, a contextual approach was central to the design. The research takes an interpretive interdisciplinary position that draws on theoretical models based on the self and other, the body and face, the senses and perception, as well as concepts from material cultural studies, such as agency. Patterns seen in the data-set coupled with theoretical frameworks, and understandings of late Iron Age and Roman life, are brought together, and offer a means of interpreting how and why some of these small finds contributed to practices ofmaintaining good health. These proposals include healthiness in personhood and domestic and public life, in religion and the control of healthiness.

This thesis outlines a technique for rapid documentation of historic sites in volatile cultural landscapes. Using Holt Cemetery as an exemplary case study, a workflow was developed incorporating RTK terrain survey, UAS aerial imagery, photogrammetry, GIS, and smartphone data collection in order to create a multifaceted database of the material and spatial conditions, as well as the patterns of use, that exist at the cemetery. The purpose of this research is to create a framework for improving the speed of data creation and increasing the accessibility of information regarding threatened cultural resources. It is intended that these processes can be scaled and adapted for use at any site, and that the products generated can be utilized by researchers, resource management professionals, and preservationists. In utilizing expedited methods, this thesis specifically advocates for documentation of sites that exist in coastal environments and are facing imminent destruction due to environmental degradation.

Christianity and Hip-Hop culture are often said to be at odds with one another. One is said to promote a lifestyle of righteousness and love, while the other is said to promote drugs, violence, and pride. As a result, the public has portrayed these two institutions as conflicting with no willingness to resolve their perceived differences. This paper will argue that there has always been a healthy conversation between Hip-Hop and Christianity since Hip-Hop’s inception. Using sources like Hip-Hop lyrics, theologians, historians, autobiographies, sermons, and articles that range from Ma$e to Tipper Gore, this paper will look at the conversation between Hip-Hop and Christianity that has been ongoing for decades. This thesis will show why that conversation is essential for the church and necessary for Hip-Hop artists to express themselves fully. This paper will show rap and Hip-Hop culture to be a complex institution with its own theology, history, and prophets – that uses its own voice to express how urban youth view not only their lives but also how God and the church are present in their lives.

Notre travail se propose d'analyser les formes et les fonctions que peut revêtir le paysage dans un corpus de textes épiques posthomériques. Les Argonautiques d'Apollonios de Rhodes et leur réécriture tardive anonyme, les Argonautiques Orphiques, les Posthomériques de Quintus de Smyrne, la Prise d'Ilion de Triphiodore et les Dionysiaques de Nonnos de Panopolis nous offrent un champ d’investigation fructueux pour analyser les représentations littéraires du paysage de manière transhistorique. Nos textes opèrent une première transformation du paysage épique archaïque qui est d'abord l'image du monde avec laquelle il se confond (adéquation posée entre bouclier, île et monde) en détachant de cette équation le paysage pour lui conférer une plus grande autonomie. Le monde devient une mosaïque de paysages autonomes qui gagnent en épaisseur du fait qu'ils se chargent d'une dimension identitaire. La polymorphie du paysage donne alors sa texture mouvante au monde des Grecs : c'est la dimension plastique et artiste que le texte de poésie épique emprunte pour mettre en mots ces images du monde qui révèle les formes du paysage épique. Une diversité de schèmes paysagers émergent et ouvre l'intertexte littéraire à l'hétérogénéité des formes artistiques. De cette fusion de processus et de formes naît une singularité bien antique de perception et de traduction du paysage : la merveille. Paysage et merveille s'entremêlent étroitement au point de se substituer l'un à l'autre : c'est là une définition possible du paysage antique à partir de la période hellénistique. Mais le paysage ainsi identifié et construit appartient aussi au monde dont il contribue à imager la forme. Il est clairement localisé d'un point de vue géographique : image vivante d'une partie du monde il lui offre son identité par ses caractéristiques topiques singulières. Il est une forme d'identification régionale et confine au vernaculaire. Le paysage devient un instrument de promotion intellectuelle et culturelle. Entre diversité formelle et singularité locale, le paysage voyage entre fiction et réel : ses modalités de construction empruntent au littéraire et à l'artistique et s'étendent ensuite grandeur nature. Le genre épique, marqué par l'intertextualité innovante, fait du paysage l'image même du processus de transposition et d'adaptation. Manifestation de l'exercice d'une subjectivité antique singulière puis collective, instrument de mesure du travail de l'imaginaire à l’œuvre dans les processus complexes de réception littéraire et culturelle, le paysage antique entre transmission et invention, s'ouvre à l'expérience quotidienne et sociale. Son existence antique est effective
The undertaking of this work is to analyze the forms and functions that the landscape can take in a corpus of posthomeric epic texts. The Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes and its late anonymous rewriting The Orphic Argonautica, the Posthomerica of Quintus Smyrnaeus, the Ilioupersis of Triphiodorus, and The Dionysiaca of Nonnus Panopolitanus provide us with a fruitful field of investigation for the analysis of the literary representations of the landscape as transhistorical. Firstly, our texts operate one transformation of the archaic epic landscape that is first the image of the world with which it merges (the conformity placed between shield, island, and world) by separating the landscape from this equation and giving it greater autonomy. The world is a mosaic of autonomous landscapes that gain texture as they take on a dimension of identity. The polymorphism of the landscape then gives its moving texture to the world of the ancient Greeks : the plastic and artist dimension is borrowed by the Epic text to put into words the images of the world, which reveal epic landforms. A variety of landscape patterns emerges and opens the literary intertext to the heterogeneity of artistic forms. From this fusion of process and forms, a singularity arises, a singularity particularly antique of the perception and the translation of the landscape : wonder. Landscape and wonder mingle so narrowly as to substitute one for the other : this is a possible definition of the ancient landscape from the Hellenistic period. But the landscape as thus identified and constructed also belongs to the world the image of which it contributes to form. It is clearly localized in a geographical perspective : the landscape becomes a vivid picture of the world and the former offers the latter its identity by its unique topical characteristics. It is a form of regional identification and it is sometimes confined to the vernacular. The landscape becomes an instrument for intellectual and cultural promotion. Between formal diversity and local singularity, the landscape travels between fiction and reality : its construction methods borrow from the literary and artistic and then extend to nature. The epic genre, characterised by innovative intertextuality, makes the landscape the image of the process of transposition and adaptation. As a manifestation of the exercise of a singular and then a collective ancient subjectivity, the landscape is an instrument for measuring the unfolding of the imagination at work in the complex process of literary reception and cultural transmission ; the ancient landscape between transmission and invention, opens itself up to the everyday and social experience. Its ancient existence is effective

What happens to a historically African American church when its local African American community no longer exists? Can attempts to emphasize its historic heritage help it to survive? In this dissertation, I consider the racial politics of urban gentrification and the ways in which one historic Black church community utilizes cultural heritage politics as a survival strategy and resistance to city planning in the city of Dallas, Texas. This case study is part of a much broader phenomenon dating to the post-WWII era whereby U.S. local, state, and federal government officials “redeveloped” urban neighborhoods as part of urban renewal plans. Some of these government actions resulted in drastic changes to neighborhood landscapes, displacing entire “minority” communities. Affected by similar circumstances, the St. Paul Church community chose to remain in its original neighborhood and restore its historic building, rather than bend to the will of Dallas city planners. In particular, I examine two church heritage projects; a public archaeology project in which a shotgun house site was excavated on the church property and a public history project which resulted in an interpretive history exhibition on the church. I examine how this church community became involved in these two projects and whether these approaches are practical to the historic preservation of this church community. Basic contributions of this work include: 1) filling gaps in public archaeology research by examining a public archaeology project, beyond the excavation, and critiquing its viability in jeopardized urban contexts, 2) analyzing strategies of political mobilization around heritage politics; 3) determining which Black communities are more likely to engage in and benefit from this type of political mobilization; and 4) problematizing what constitutes giving the power to a community to negotiate its past in the present. This dissertation project finds that although African-American and other minority groups are often politically and economically disadvantaged when challenging eminent domain abuse, these communities are not powerless. The St. Paul community’s utilization of heritage politics as a means to avert eminent domain abuse is one case in point.
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The City of Holyoke, Massachusetts is one of many aging, industrial cities striving to revitalize its economy based on the promise of increased digital connectivity and clean energy resources. But how do you renovate 19th century mills to meet the demands of the information age? This architectural study explores the potential impact of sensing technologies and information networks on the definition and function of buildings in the 21st century. It explores the changes that have taken place in industrial architecture since 1850 and argues for an architecture that supports local relationships and environmental awareness. The author explores the industrial history of Holyoke, appraises emerging uses of sensing technologies and presents a thorough narrative of her site analysis and conceptual design of a digital fabrication and incubation center within an existing textile mill.