About the event
The Right to the City Film Series features five films based on changing urban landscapes near and far: in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Newark, Detroit and Istanbul. The films focus on issues of processes of urban development defined by inequality —expulsions, redevelopment, and gentrification—and their results.
Ekümenopolis tells the story of Istanbul on a neo-liberal course to destruction. It follows the story of a migrant family from the demolition of their neighborhood to their on-going struggle for housing rights. The film takes a look at the city on a macro level and through the eyes of experts, going from the tops of mushrooming skyscrapers to the depths of the railway tunnel under the Bosphorous strait; from the historic neighborhoods in the south to the forests in the north. It's an Istanbul going from 15 million to 30 million. It's an Istanbul going from 2 million cars to 8 million. It's the Istanbul of the future that will soon engulf the entire region. It's an Istanbul you have never seen before.
The screening will be followed by discussion and Q&A with filmmaker Imre Azem and Duygu Parmaksizoglu (Anthropology, The Graduate Center) and will be moderated by CUNY scholar Josh Scannell.
Cosponsored by the Sociology, Earth and Environmental Sciences, and Critical Psychology Departments; the Center for Place, Culture and Politics; the Center for Urban Research; the Gotham Center for New York City History; the Center for Human Environments; and The Public Science Project; the Narrating Change Mellon Seminar on Public Engagement and Collaborative Research.
