Planning Middle Eastern Cities: An Urban Kaleidoscope

This is a book about what may be loosely referred to as ‘Middle Eastern’ or ‘Moslem/Arab’ cities. Cities in the Arab world are too diverse and hybrid to be lumped together as a single, arbitrary group. Rather they make up the urban kaleidoscope of the title, and the diversity of the six cities included here supports that contention. They range from cities rich in tradition, the ones one would immediately conjure up on hearing the phrase ‘Middle Eastern’ (Cairo, Tunis, and Baghdad), to cities that have not been explored sufficiently, or ‘forgotten’ cities (Algiers and Sana’a), to newly emerging ‘oil-rich’ aGulf cities (Dubai).

The authors are all young Arab scholars and architects educated either in Britain or the United States, but most importantly all belong to, were raised in, or are a citizen of the city they describe and so they provide a ‘local voice’ not previously heard and an understanding which no outsider could achieve. 

As Yasser Elsheshtawy says in his Introduction, he and his contributors move away from the exclusively ‘Islamic’ reading of Arab cities – an approach they regard as outdated and counterproductive. Instead, they explore issues of identity, globalization, hybridity, colonization and the struggles, strategies and solutions offered by each city from the late nineteenth century to the present day. Their focus is on the built environment and its change over time and under different influences and their discussions are supported by extensive illustration.