. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Abandonment Absence Actant Affordance Age-friendly city Anti-utopia Arcades Artialisation Atmosphere Autotopia Avatar Blasiertheit Boot scrapers Calmness Carrier bag Cinematic cityscape Civic design Converging media spaces Commoning Creative geography Critical performativity Delinquent narratives Destructive character Dissident heritage Dissonant heritage Dusk Dystopian narrative Enactive walking Embodied criticality Fourth places Gigantism Gossip Heteronym Horizontal metropolis Hyper-diversity Ideal city Intelligibility and readability Interculturality Landscape biography Latency Lieu de mémoire Local hero Manicure(d) Meme Metropolitan landscape Minor urbanism Moulage Multiperspectivity Nature study New natures Paths Place attachment Planthropocene Plasticity Radical inclusivity Ruderal ecologies Sensory community Simulacrum Situatedness Skeuomorphism Sociolect Soft architecture Street art Symbolic annihilation Threshold Townscape Undefined terrain Unintended design Urban habitat Urban eating Urban literacy Urban texts Vernacular Vernacular intervention Visual frame Wellbeing Yonder VADEMECUM 77 Minor Terms for Writing Urban Places . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . edited by Klaske Havik, Kris Pint, Svava Riesto and Henriette Steiner nai0I0publishers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VADEMECUM 77 Minor Terms for Writing Urban Places edited by Klaske Havik, Kris Pint, Svava Riesto and Henriette Steiner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6362 Destructive character D e s tr u c ti ve c h a ra c te r Asma Mehan University of Porto Research Centre for Territory, Transport and Environment (CITTA) asmamehan@fe.up.pt Further readings Benjamin, W. (1999a). The arcades project. Harvard University Press. Benjamin, W. (1999b). The destructive character. In M.W. Jennings, H. Eiland & G. Smith (Ed.), Walter Benjamin: Selected writing, vol. 2. (1931-1934). Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. pp. 541-3. Mehan, A. (2017). 'Tabula rasa' planning: Creative destruction and building a new urban identity. Journal of Architecture and Urbanism, 41(3), 210–220. Tournikiotis, P. (1999). The histography of modern architecture. MIT Press. In 1931, philosopher Walter Benjamin wrote a short piece titled 'The destructive character'. This text, one of Benjamin's Denkbilder ('thinking images') was written during one of the worst periods in German and European history: after the crisis of 1929, when European fascism was on the rise. Benjamin states: The destructive character knows only one watchword: make room and only one activity: clearing away. It clears away the traces of our own age and has few needs, and the least of them is to know what will replace what has been destroyed. First, for a moment at least, empty space – the place where the thing stood or the victim lived. Someone is sure to be found who needs this space without occupying it. (Benjamin, 1999b, p. 541) In a broader sense, the destructive character had equally been a feature of both the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, which presented themselves as new developments from the root. The concept also appeared in the works of the architect and writer Rem Koolhaas, where it set itself as a strategy of 'emptiness'. Koolhaas points to a number of different cities undergoing ambitious renovation plans and starting from a large urban void implemented for various reasons (Mehan, 2017). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173172 Colophon Authors Inesa Alistratovaitė-Kurtinaitienė Lieven Ameel Jana Čulek Nevena Daković Dalia Dijokienė Mirza Emirhafizović Maria Finn Lars Frers Juan A. García-Esparza Maria Gil Ulldemolins Heidi Kajita Katarzyna Kopecka-Piech Karen Lens Anne Margrethe Wagner Adriana Martins Asma Mehan Luisa Metelo Seixas Dalia Milián Bernal Matej Nikšič Sonja Novak Ann Petermans Marcel Pikhart Bie Plevoets Ida Sandström Sara Santos Cruz Lamila Simisic Pasic Angeliki Sioli Matthew Skjonsberg Eliana Sousa Santos Marie Stender Ruth Stevens Angelos Theocharis Sylvie Tram Nguyen Jan Vanrie Kristin Veel Willie Vogel Saskia de Wit Kęstutis Zaleckis Editors / Authors Klaske Havik Kris Pint Svava Riesto Henriette Steiner Editoral assistant Willie Vogel English proofreading Merl Storr Graphic design www.studiosannedijkstra.nl Publisher nai010 Publishers, Rotterdam Acknowledgement This publication is based upon work from COST Action CA18126 Writing Urban Places, supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology). COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) is a funding agency for research and innovation networks. Our Actions help connect research initiatives across Europe and enable scientists to grow their ideas by sharing them with their peers. This boosts their research, career and innovation. COST Action Writing Urban Places core team Klaske Havik Kinga Kimic Jorge Mejía Hernández Lorin Niculae Susana Oliveira Marcel Pikhart Mark Proosten Svava Riesto Luis Santiago Baptista Henriette Steiner Slobodan Velevski Weblink www.cost.eu www.writingurbanplaces.eu ©2020, COST Action Writing Urban Places and the authors. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used and/or reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recoding or otherwise without the prior written permission of the authors or the editors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174 COST Action CA18126 Writing Urban Places: New Narratives of the European city Writing Urban Places proposes an innovative investigation and implementation of a process for developing human understanding of communities, their society, and their situatedness. By recognising the value of local urban narratives – stories rich in information regarding citizens socio-spatial practices, perceptions and expectations – the Action aims to articulate a set of concrete literary devices within a host of spatial disciplines; bringing together scientific research in the fields of literary studies, urban planning and architecture; and positioning this knowledge vis-à-vis progressive redevelopment policies carried out in medium-sized cities in Europe. Working Group 2 of the Action, led by Svava Riesto and Henriette Steiner, is concerned with how theoretical reflections can stimulate the thinking and praxis of narrating urban places of medium-sized European cities. In 2019-2020, the group focused on the collaborative project of compiling definitions of Minor Concepts for Writing Urban Places into this Vademecum, a short guide that can be kept at hand for consultation when being in or writing about urban places.