Architecture and the Urban Life of Cairo

When it comes to Cairo, there is a plethora of writing taking place amid its streets and alleyways. Trying to make sense of, and structure, such an immense output is quite a difficult task. However, this article aims to highlight some significant writings that would offer those interested in Cairo’s architecture an opportunity to learn more about the city and its built environment. My intent is also to expand the scope of the inquiry. Rather than simply focusing on specific buildings, I seek to include the broader urban context and also look at the socioeconomic conditions that gave rise to important structures. I start with a review of some major texts that have looked at the city from different perspectives and, in doing so, shed light on the city’s urban and architectural development. It is interesting to note that for the most part, authors in this section do not come from an architectural or urban-planning background. Instead they write from a historical, economic, and geographic perspective. Following this, I look at a variety of other sources and writings that have appeared in edited books and book chapters. I have also included journal articles, since they offer an in-depth examination of certain buildings and the city’s overall urban growth. In addition to writings about the city, I also sought to capture its “urban imaginary” (i.e., the extent to which its built environment has been represented by writers, filmmakers, and artists). To that end, a section is dedicated toward a review of key works and the extent to which they have shed valuable insights into Cairo’s past, present, and future. The city’s urban imaginary is also portrayed through the medium of film, which allows for a conveyance of a visual narrative that evokes the sight and sounds of the city. Here I review key articles discussing the representation of the city through cinema, which is then followed by a filmography of major movies released since the late 20th century. Last, I review online resources, offering researchers material about the city’s architecture and urban environment in the form of images, maps, and drawings, in addition to blogs discussing Cairo’s rich history as well as modern problems.

Coming-Out Narratives in Audiovisual Culture

The rejection of coming out as a linear narrative must be accompanied by an alternative to the formulas of confession, disclosure, and identity adoption that have pervaded the current representations of coming out in the West. The appearance of coming out in film narratives provides important opportunities to observe how elements such as repetition, rehearsal, and, above all, contrasts are incorporated into the stories that are recounted. Conventional coming-out films have relied so heavily on the restrictive nature of the genre’s narrative structure that the potential for alternative, or queered, realities of coming out is erased. The continual reappearance and adaptations of coming out will enable a better understanding of the ways in which the act is presented as a moment that is never finished and that often evades a final, perfected, and polished performance. Four specific narratives from queer film—Beautiful Thing (1996), Summer Storm(2004), Brotherhood (2009), and North Sea Texas (2011)—will be presented to offer counter models for coming out. In Beautiful Thing, the visual narrative demonstrates the importance of the reiterative, adaptable, and unanticipated representation of the act in visual media. In Summer Storm, the audience witnesses how coming out occurs in a world of competitive sports and where the teenage athletes reveal secrets that everyone already knows. In Brotherhood, the act of coming out is transformed into a moment when identities are instantaneously accepted and rejected within a homophobic, neo-Nazi subculture. In North Sea Texas, the script of coming out is reimagined by two characters who ambiguously decline any opportunity to define their identities. Coming out in visual narratives must be understood through an elaboration of Janet Harbord’s belief that the audience gravitates toward particular visual narratives where a comfort zone is created. These films have authored reiterative and adaptable approaches to the act of coming out that both comfort and challenge the audience.

Overdue: The stories of rural Otago & Southland librarians and volunteers

<p>Research Problem: Rural librarians and library volunteers may be viewed as isolated and almost on the geographical fringes of the knowledge information profession. In New Zealand, rural librarians’ stories have not been heard and continue to be underrepresented. Therefore, in this report I have sought to answer the question: “What are the experiences of Otago and Southland rural librarians and library volunteers?” Methodology: I used an arts-based approach that utilised both textual and visual narrative methodologies. I recruited four rural Southland & Otago librarians and two rural Southland & Otago library volunteers through both previously established networks including closed community Facebook pages, and the LIANZA Otago/Southland committee representative. Results: The findings in this report are presented as stories. They explore the everyday experience of Zoe Heriot, The Volunteers, Alicia Hull, & Barbara Gordon (not their real names). Woven throughout are a series of collages representing the photo documentation of rural Southland and Otago libraries. These findings are then viewed through the key themes of connections, collections, and conditions. Implications: The methodology of narrative inquiry could have a big impact on LIS scholarship as the telling of stories have provided new understandings of the role that rural librarians and library volunteers play in their communities. Their stories can become vehicles of change. The evolution of librarians and volunteers can be seen through the promotion of inclusion and valuing diversity within rural communities including what may be perceived as sensitive topics like mental health and the LGBTQI+ community. This is critical if rural librarians and volunteers are to cater to their changing and evolving communities. Ultimately, the stories of librarians and library volunteers highlight the way the institutions of libraries are experienced by those who work in them.</p>

Overdue: The stories of rural Otago & Southland librarians and volunteers

<p>Research Problem: Rural librarians and library volunteers may be viewed as isolated and almost on the geographical fringes of the knowledge information profession. In New Zealand, rural librarians’ stories have not been heard and continue to be underrepresented. Therefore, in this report I have sought to answer the question: “What are the experiences of Otago and Southland rural librarians and library volunteers?” Methodology: I used an arts-based approach that utilised both textual and visual narrative methodologies. I recruited four rural Southland & Otago librarians and two rural Southland & Otago library volunteers through both previously established networks including closed community Facebook pages, and the LIANZA Otago/Southland committee representative. Results: The findings in this report are presented as stories. They explore the everyday experience of Zoe Heriot, The Volunteers, Alicia Hull, & Barbara Gordon (not their real names). Woven throughout are a series of collages representing the photo documentation of rural Southland and Otago libraries. These findings are then viewed through the key themes of connections, collections, and conditions. Implications: The methodology of narrative inquiry could have a big impact on LIS scholarship as the telling of stories have provided new understandings of the role that rural librarians and library volunteers play in their communities. Their stories can become vehicles of change. The evolution of librarians and volunteers can be seen through the promotion of inclusion and valuing diversity within rural communities including what may be perceived as sensitive topics like mental health and the LGBTQI+ community. This is critical if rural librarians and volunteers are to cater to their changing and evolving communities. Ultimately, the stories of librarians and library volunteers highlight the way the institutions of libraries are experienced by those who work in them.</p>

Narrative Structure Transformations of the Last Supper Painting in Graphic Design

The transformations of the visual narrative come from preoccupation with the aesthetics of the artistic form and the creative presence of the artist, and the centrality of the system's discourse and its reference to the discourses of shattering the fixed meaning, demolishing the centrals and dissolving connotations in an infinite continuous movement in the sense of shifting to new imagined and potential structures closer to the assumption and the possibility of a reality that cannot be represented because it is a structure hidden behind Phenomena, so the dismantling and reshaping of reality takes place through the imagination, which may be parallel to reality or alternative to it, but it differs in its manifestations and may give us something else from knowledge, self-awareness, criticism of reality, and understanding of the world, so there is a new tendency is the tendency of rejection and rebellion, which confirms according to its own system its rejection of the public, Also, technology sought to create a new reality in which the subject contradicts the subject.

"Lessons to flight" to start living again. Visual narrative in a state time of emergency. The ridescovery of educational potential

In the months of lockdown, in that suspended time, we recovered the «lessons of the Open» that books have to offer (Recalcati, 2018). Narratives, art expressions which «fit on the shelf» (Lee, 2012, p.170), allowed children to live an enveloping experience (Petit, 2002/2010), to discover fragments of beauty, thus contrasting boredom and educational poverty in its diverse forms. This essay will look into how beauty was unexpectedly found in the visual narrative, nurturing hope to overcome fears, to seize the emergency as an occasion to free oneself of what is excess, to be strong in bravely accepting adversities and to cultivate the ability to look at reality from original perspectives, as the picture book Flight lessons teaches us. Here, through the use of metaphor, the young readers are taught that living is a little like flying and that it is “not necessary to reach the stars to touch the sky” (Vainio, 2008/2021).

Projection: Architecture of Intimacy

<p>This thesis unravels ties between the individual and architecture. Offering an architectural demonstration of and for the body. The primary goal is to challenge the conventional relationship of architecture as a form of housing for the body, exploring the possibility of the body's dynamism in respect to movement, transformation, and reaction, informing an intimate architecture of the individual and highlighting the importance of a personalised architectural condition. The boundary between the individual and architecture is explored through the idea of intimacy. Intimacy becomes the goal of a relationship that is intrinsic to the body. Through intimacy this provides security and comfort for the individual. The individual is projected upon architecture to create an intimate environment. The research is grounded by three main themes: Firstly 'proximity', the degree to which the interface between the body and architecture can become intrinsically tied. Secondly 'speed', the movement of the body in relation to architecture as a static form. And lastly 'duration', the flexibility and adaptability of possible architectural solutions. Each of these themes is developed in the research chapters and explored from both a written and visual narrative. The 'Chair' is adopted as a familiar object which allows for discussion and development of ideas. The chair becomes a means of developing the argument, and demonstrating these ideas through imagery and text. A train carriage is the apparatus which will be used as a vehicle for the design exploration. A train carriage has been identified as being a transitory zone for the individual, and therefore, employed as the point of departure for further design experiments, tying the three themes of proximity, speed, and duration together. The train carriage acts as a conceit; a way of describing and demonstrating ideas through extended metaphors. The design is revealed through diagrams of components used within the housing of the individual, then further presented with varying scenes exploring the dynamic possibilities of an architectural interpretation. This research informs and demonstrates a design initiative which emphasises the poetic form of individuals and their bodies within the architectural discipline. Bringing to light the importance and possibility of the fluctuations of the body, in constant movement and evolution to the discipline of architecture. Allowing for intimacy of the body to be defined in unison with architecture, a growing spatial relationship with the individual.</p>