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Mediapolis Journal
@mediapolis.bsky.social
Mediapolis: A Journal of Cities and Culture

https://www.mediapolisjournal.com/
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Hey Bluesky! Welcome to new followers and hello to old friends. Stay tuned for issue 9.4, in which you'll find spectacular dirigibles, the media archaeology of supercomputers, feminist videotape networks, Mexican graffiti, homelessness in Hollywood, gentrification and media, and more!
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For @mediapolis.bsky.social, I wrote a short article provoked in part by the jarring visions of play represented by art like this on the one hand and the Play Commission's All To Play For report and the everyday spaces of play that I engage with in my research on the other.
November 14, 2025 at 10:13 AM
Anthony Albright and Frans Willem Korsten discuss the playful appropriation of a vacant building by a squatters’ group as part of an effort to recapture urban environments from the profit-oriented ‘game’ of waiting by investors.
Urban Investors’ Play with Time: Stakes of the Game and Waiting as Playful Strategy
Anthony Albright and Frans Willem Korsten discuss the playful appropriation of a vacant building by a squatters’ group as part of an effort to recapture urban environments from the profit-oriented ‘ga...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
November 14, 2025 at 1:02 PM
In our latest Q&A, Erica Stein speaks to İpek Çelik Rappas about her new book Filming in European Cities. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/11/film...
The Mediapolis Q&A: Ipek Çelik Rappas’s Filming in European Cities
Erica Stein speaks to İpek Çelik Rappas about her book Filming in European Cities.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
November 13, 2025 at 12:16 PM
The city is a playground. But is it really? In the intro to the Playable Cities dossier, @carobirdsall.bsky.social, @lindakopitz.bsky.social and Alex Gekker discuss how cities are built, how cities are navigated, and how cities are resisted with and through play.
Playable Cities: An Introduction
The city is a playground. But is it really? This introduction to the Playable Cities dossier discusses how cities are built, how cities are navigated, and how cities are resisted with and through play...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
November 13, 2025 at 12:14 PM
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Proud to present the Dossier „Lightscapes/Nightscapes“ I edited together with my friend and colleague Patricia Pia Bornus for @mediapolis.bsky.social - Full Issue here: www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/07/ligh... Lightscapes/Nightscapes – An Introduction – Mediapolis
Lightscapes/Nightscapes – An Introduction
Patricia Pia Bornus and Bianka-Isabell Scharmann introduce the dossier on Lightscapes and Nightscapes with some reflections on cities, light, and night.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
July 11, 2025 at 1:02 PM
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Call for Papers: The Synthetic City

We’re putting together a special issue dossier for @mediapolis.bsky.social on 'urban AI' and seek short essays, provocations, creative-critical reflections on synthetic urbanism.

📅 Abstracts due: Nov 30
🔗 Details: mediacitytwg.wordpress.com/2025/10/16/c...
CFP: ‘The Synthetic City’ Dossier for Mediapolis Journal
The Synthetic City A Dossier for Mediapolis: A Journal of Cities and Culture Guest Editors: Scott Rodgers, Helena Atteneder, Lou Therese Brandner, Marcos Dias, Diogo Pereira Henriques and Sara Tren…
mediacitytwg.wordpress.com
October 16, 2025 at 11:11 AM
In the latest podcast, @baykurt.bsky.social discusses with @scott-rodgers.bsky.social her longstanding interests in Google as an increasingly influential agent in urban affairs, and her efforts to rethink ‘test-bed urbanism’ through the local.

www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/voic...
Voices Episode 8: Burcu Baykurt on Google Urbanism
In the latest episode of our Voices podcast series, Burcu Baykurt discusses with Scott Rodgers her longstanding interests in Google as an increasingly influential agent in urban affairs, as well as he...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
April 29, 2025 at 12:28 PM
What happens when a Brutalist building becomes a screen? Drawing on the Concrete Cinema project in Coventry, Michael Pigott explores the affordances and potentials of outdoor moving image projection for the analysis and critique of architecture. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/conc...
April 17, 2025 at 12:41 PM
How do residents respond to public art in gentrifying areas? Pauline Panetta investigates attitudes to activist projection art in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro neighborhood and its Lundtoftegade housing complex. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/acti...
Activist Screen Projection Art in the Gentrifying Neighborhood
How do residents respond to public art in gentrifying areas? Pauline Panetta investigates attitudes to activist projection art in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro neighborhood and its Lundtoftegade housing compl...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
April 17, 2025 at 12:40 PM
Duncan Whitley and Mel Jordan discuss the film Phoenix City 2021 and the potential for site-based artworks to challenge placemaking narratives and the politics of the UK City of Culture.
www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/phoe...
Phoenix City 2021: Art, Regeneration, and Counter-Atmospheres in the UK City of Culture
Phoenix City 2021 explores the role of art in Coventry’s regeneration. Duncan Whitley and Mel Jordan discuss the various iterations of the film and the potential for site-based artworks to challenge p...
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April 16, 2025 at 2:46 PM
The dossier continues ... Giorgia Rizzioli explores how posthumanist theory helps us to understand the potential for projection activism as a feminist spatial practice. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/proj...
Projection Activism as Spatial Practice: Words and Gestures for a Feminist City
Giorgia Rizzioli explores how posthumanist theory helps us to understand the potential for projection activism as a feminist spatial practice.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
April 15, 2025 at 4:02 PM
From May 1968 to Black Lives Matter, visual and textual strategies have been central to protest movements. Giuseppe Previtali reflects on projection activism as a tool for bringing new political configurations into being. More to come in this dossier soon! www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/take...
Take Your Desires for Realities: Projection and Political Imagination
From May 1968 to Black Lives Matter, visual and textual strategies have been central to protest movements. Giuseppe Previtali reflects on contemporary projection activism as a tool for bringing new po...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
April 14, 2025 at 1:00 PM
Giorgia Rizzioli introduces the Projection Activism dossier with some reflections on urban projection as a means to assert the right to the city. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/urba...
Introduction – Urban Light, Activist Fight: Redesigning Spaces of Change
Giorgia Rizzioli introduces the Projection Activism dossier with some reflections on urban projection as a means to assert the right to the city.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
April 14, 2025 at 12:59 PM
Stanley Corkin discusses his latest book, Boston Mass-Mediated: Urban Space and Culture in the Digital Age, with Bruce Isaacs. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2025/04/cork...
The Mediapolis Q&A: Stanley Corkin’s Boston Mass-Mediated
Stanley Corkin discusses his latest book, Boston Mass-Mediated: Urban Space and Culture in the Digital Age, with Bruce Isaacs.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
April 14, 2025 at 12:59 PM
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there is still some time to submit an essay for the UGA SIG Graduate Student Award @scmsurbanism.bsky.social @scmstudies.bsky.social @mediapolis.bsky.social if you have students working on urbanism/geography/architecture topics, please do encourage to submit!
A reminder that our Graduate Student Essay Prize is accepting submissions through the end of the month!

The winning essay will receive a $200 grant and publication in @mediapolis.bsky.social.

Submissions are due by January 31, 2025, at scmsurbanism@gmail.com.

For more details, please see below:
January 20, 2025 at 11:12 PM
Ipek Celik Rappas and Noelle Griffis select some key texts on Gentrification & Screen Media in the latest addition to our Reading and Resource List section. mediapolisjournal.com/2024/12/gent...
Gentrification and Screen Media
Ipek Celik Rappas and Noelle Griffis select some key texts on film/TV and gentrification.
mediapolisjournal.com
December 18, 2024 at 2:13 PM
And here's a text version of the interview with Caitlin Bruce. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2024/12/voic...
The Mediapolis Q&A: Caitlin Bruce on Voices in Aerosol
Scott Rodgers talks to Caitlin Bruce about her recent book, Voices in Aerosol.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
December 16, 2024 at 10:11 AM
In the latest episode of our Voices podcast series, Caitlin Bruce discusses with Scott Rodgers her recent book exploring shifting judgments of graffiti culture in urban Mexico, and how the book has taken on new life as socially-engaged scholarship.

www.mediapolisjournal.com/2024/12/voic...
Voices Episode 7: Caitlin Bruce on Graffiti Culture and Urban Institutional Attunement
In the latest episode of our Voices podcast series, Caitlin Bruce discusses with Scott Rodgers her recent book exploring shifting judgments of graffiti culture in urban Mexico, and how the book has ta...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
December 16, 2024 at 10:10 AM
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Apply for @scmsurbanism.bsky.social's Graduate Student Writing Award! Students please consider applying, mentors please share this Award CFP with students!
Deadline: January 31, 2025
Award: Publication in Mediapolis Journal & $200.
Details are below. We look forward to your submissions!
November 20, 2024 at 5:17 PM
In the latest Mediapolis Q&A, @adamochonicky.bsky.social talks to Pamela Robertson Wojcik about her recent book, Unhomed: Cycles of Mobility and Placelessness in American Cinema. www.mediapolisjournal.com/2024/12/wojc...
The Mediapolis Q&A: Pamela Robertson Wojcik on Unhomed: Cycles of Mobility and Placelessness in American Cinema
Adam Ochonicky talks to Pamela Robertson Wojcik about her latest book, Unhomed: Cycles of Mobility and Placelessness in American Cinema.
www.mediapolisjournal.com
December 12, 2024 at 11:59 AM
Issue 9.4 continues with the latest in our From the Archive series. Ariel Dougherty looks back on her work with International Videoletters (1975–1977), a groundbreaking feminist media network that connected communities across cities through grassroots video exchanges. wp.me/p6zYkX-3Dv
International Videoletters: Feminists’ Hope and Our Own Self-Grown Media
International Videoletters (1975–1977) was a groundbreaking feminist media network that connected communities across cities through grassroots video exchanges. Looking back on her involvement with the...
wp.me
December 2, 2024 at 4:16 PM
Next up in issue 9.4: Stefano Corbo traces the infrastructural and architectural development of Bologna's computer centers, arguing that to understand the recent history of the city, we must pay attention to the material history of data.

www.mediapolisjournal.com/2024/11/bolo...
Bologna and its Computing Centers: An Archaeology of Urban Media (1961–2022)
Bologna is one of the main data processing hubs in Europe. Stefano Corbo traces the infrastructural and architectural development of the city’s computer centers, arguing that to understand the recent ...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
November 25, 2024 at 4:19 PM
The first article in issue 9.4 is Jane Zhang's Deep Dive into the advertising of Douglas Leigh, which is brilliantly illustrated with archival materials from the Smithsonian and elsewhere. Check it out!

www.mediapolisjournal.com/2024/11/mark...
Marketing Nation: The Spectacular Outdoor Advertisements of Douglas Leigh in Postwar America
From electronic billboards to spectacular dirigibles, the outdoor advertising of Douglas Leigh incorporated theatrical techniques into the urban landscape. Jane Zhang shows how Leigh’s corporate campa...
www.mediapolisjournal.com
November 25, 2024 at 3:08 PM
Hey Bluesky! Welcome to new followers and hello to old friends. Stay tuned for issue 9.4, in which you'll find spectacular dirigibles, the media archaeology of supercomputers, feminist videotape networks, Mexican graffiti, homelessness in Hollywood, gentrification and media, and more!
November 25, 2024 at 3:06 PM