Mapping the Megalopolis: Making an Atlas of Mexico City

Session Submission Type: Panel

Abstract

Mapping the Megalopolis is a collaborative Great Lakes College Association project which aims to produce an urban atlas of Mexico City. The individual papers in this panel offer rich interpretations and visualizations of multiple facets of Mexico City, and demonstrate unique approaches to representing urban dynamics using mapping techniques. Based in fieldwork conducted Mexico City during summer 2015, this panel of social science and humanities scholars explore how urban order is created and contested, and the ways urban dwellers transform, and are transformed by, this seemingly infinite megalopolis. Panel presenters have mapped literary representations of Mexico City, traced flows of migrant populations, documented the production of diverse linguistic landscapes, and investigated the local impacts of privatization and policing in the city, in an effort to spatially depict the megalopolis. Thus, each project utilizes distinct theoretical and methodological lenses to offer a glimpse into the complexities of Mexico City’s urban form.

Sub Track

• Cities and Urban Studies

Chair

• Marta Josefina Sierra, Kenyon College

Individual Presentations

• Carlos Slim’s Urban Imaginary: Plaza Carso and the Privatization of Public Space - Glen D Kuecker

• Transforming Urban Space in four Mexico City Neighborhoods: Citizen Responses to Insecurity - Shannan L Mattiace, Allegheny College; Jennifer L Johnson, Kenyon College

• Mapping Ana Clavel’s Los deseos y su sombra - Carmen Patricia Tovar, Oberlin College

• Mapping Signs of Linguistic and Cultural Diversity in Mexico City - Karen Velasquez