Performing cities: Engaging the high-tech flâneur

Abstract

The city as place forms the backdrop to many study abroad experiences. Our sense of place, however, is often fractured by modern mobilities. As Sack (1988) notes, we move from place to place so much that places often begin to appear ever more generic and alike. Or they seem to be “out there,” and we forget that they are humanly constructed. If we now have trouble conceptualizing place, when we turn to cities in particular, we also find that they are being submerged into a discourse of sameness where today’s “global cities” are portrayed as almost cookie-cutter copies of one another in their consumption-based, high tech identities. Yet the culture-neutral character of this discourse about contemporary cities belies the cultural-historical personality that each city retains, and it can obscure or even erase the rich placespecific learning opportunities that each city offers.