While Schwerin has earned many names since Henry the Lion formally declared it a city in 1164—like ‘the city of seven lakes and forests’, ‘Germany’s smallest state capital’, and ‘Florence of the North’, just to name a few—shrinking city is not necessarily one of them. However, as the saying goes, one shouldn’t judge a city solely by its cover.
Author Archives: editor
Perspective through paradoxes: a visit to Zwickau
by Ruiying Liu, ESR at the Technical University of Dortmund Cities are collages of places, with not one but many places and genii loci (spirits of place) — a general rule for big cities, but especially essential to the East German city Zwickau, the destination of my fieldtrip. Although strictly it is no longer a …
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“Together, we go further”
I came to know the Vertpré community centre while I was conducting my fieldwork for a case study, as part of my PhD. I am interested in the role of social networks – of relatives, friends, neighbours or acquaintances – and I try to understand whether belonging to a social network allows people to better cope with everyday difficulties, including those that could be caused, directly or not, by urban shrinkage. I contacted the team working at Vertpré in order to know more about their actions, as well as the specific characteristics and issues of the people who come there.
REflections
RE-CITY network members on research, working from home, and societal changes during the COVID-19 pandemic PhD-ing in Times of Corona by Agnes Matoga, early stage researcher at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern A couple of days ago I read a tweet that said something similar to: “You are not working from home. You are at …
RE-CITY: Reviving Shrinking Cities 