City Habits Workshop

Dates: Wednesday 6 November - Thursday 7 November 2019

Location: Western Sydney University, Parramatta City Campus (169 Macquarie Street, Parramatta)

Registration: attendance is free, but registration is essential as places are limited (opens in a new window).

‘Habit’ is a term that is rarely used in contemporary urban policy, it is considered decidedly old-fashioned. But assumptions about habit as unthinking repetitive actions persist. They have just been deflected onto other categories like behaviour or practices. Equally significant is the way in which certain classifications of humans that are central to urban governance: commuters, residents, consumers, litterers, migrants or crowds, for example, depend on implicit assumptions about the interactions between habits, freedom, will and repetition. Just as cities shape people in certain ways they also shape habits. The issue is how do these three elements – urban milieus, people and habits – interact and mutually shape each other? Looking at a range of urban settings and current issues, this workshop explores the habit/city nexus and the ways urban environments and governance provoke habits, know habits, and make them calculable as sites of regulation.

The workshop includes panels on Habit Infrastructures; Sensing Habits/Habit Data; Habit, Space and Difference and Mental Life and the Modern City. It will also involve a hands on Littering Walkshop in the City of Parramatta.

Speakers include: Tony Bennett, David Bissell, Andrea Connor, Ben Dibley, Simone Fullagar, Stephen Healy, Nicole Kalms, Abby Lopes, Nick Manning, Donald McNeill, Greg Noble, Nikolas Rose, Gavin Smith, Yolande Strengers, Sophie Watson

Download the City Habits Workshop Program here  (opens in a new window)