Overlooked people, places, and practices: shifting the gaze in Asian and South African cities

Overlooked cities, overlookedness, counter-overlooking: With these three terms, the Special Issue in the Journal Urbanisation, edited by Isolde de Villiers and Julia Wesely, evokes reflections on so-called “global” urban studies from the perspective of the mis-, mal, and non-recognised elsewheres. It focuses on intentionally or unintentionally ignored and off-the-map people, places and practices, specifically bringing together such reflections from academics and artists who focus their research on South African and Asian cities.

The aim of this Special Issue is to illustrate the generative potential of thinking, writing, and caring with an attentiveness to structural absences and omissions, developing methods, concepts and an ethos of collective counter-overlooking.

The Issue has been conceived as part of a seminar series curated by the Overlooked Cities Collective and funded by the Urban Studies Foundation. It was titled Overlooked Cities: Thinking and doing global urban studies differently. More specifically, contributions draw from a conference and workshop for early career researchers in Bandung, Indonesia, as well as a colloquium in Bloemfontein, South Africa held in September and October 2023.

Overlooked People, Places and Practices: Shifting the Gaze in Asian and South African Cities. / Wesely, Julia; de Villiers, Isolde.
in: Urbanisation, Band 10, Nr. 1, 30.05.2025, S. 7-10.