Urban Morphology and Anthropology – Synergies and a Joint Language

Abstract

Urban anthropology is a sub-branch of social anthropology, and works, like urban morphology, with the city as field of study. While urban morphology is concerned with physical form, urban elements and pattern analyses over time, anthropology’s perspective is that of the social and cultural in the present moment. Anthropology investigates people’s experiences and meaning-making, and can bring a humanistic and qualitative lens to historical morphological studies, as well as futuristic planning and urban design. This paper looks at literature and theories in social anthropology and urban morphology to discuss and encourage convergence in morphological, anthropological, planning and urban design discourses. Pierre Bourdieu's theories are widely used by anthropologists and his concepts of habitus and social space are relevant to morphology. Habitus are the embodied dispositions that guide individuals in their behaviours and has been described as a sense of one’s own and other’s place. Social space is the physical space where relations between different habit uses play out. These two concepts are of interest to the study of spatiality, emplacement and mobility and can inform how we think about physical and social environments in relation to each other. This paper aims to find a joint language and create synergy between urban morphology and urban anthropology and contribute with holistic and humanistic approaches in analysing cities, city planning and urban design.