Kuwait Transformed: A History of Oil and Urban Life
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Type
Book
Authors
ISBN 10
0804796394
ISBN 13
9780804796392
Category
Unknown
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Publication Year
2016
Publisher
Pages
296
Subject
Kuwait - History; Kuwait - Economic Conditions; Kuwait - Social Conditions; Urbanization - Kuwait
Tags
Abstract
As the first Gulf city to experience oil urbanization, Kuwait City's transformation in the mid-twentieth century inaugurated a now-familiar regional narrative: a small traditional town of mudbrick courtyard houses and plentiful foot traffic transformed into a modern city with marble-fronted buildings, vast suburbs, and wide highways. In "Kuwait Transformed", Farah Al-Nakib connects the city's past and present, from its settlement in 1716 to the twenty-first century, through the bridge of oil discovery. She traces the relationships between the urban landscape, patterns and practices of everyday life, and social behaviors and relations in Kuwait. The history that emerges reveals how decades of urban planning, suburbanization, and privatization have eroded an open, tolerant society and given rise to the insularity, xenophobia, and divisiveness that characterize Kuwaiti social relations today. The book makes a call for a restoration of the city that modern planning eliminated. But this is not simply a case of nostalgia for a lost landscape, lifestyle, or community. It is a claim for a "right to the city"―the right of all inhabitants to shape and use the spaces of their city to meet their own needs and desires. - from Amazon
Description
296 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
Biblio Notes
Includes bibliographical references and index
Number of Copies
1
Library | Accession No | Call No | Copy No | Edition | Location | Availability |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Main | 17 | HT147.K9 A46 2016 | 1 | Yes |