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The (Spatial) Memory Game: Testing the Relationship Between Spatial Language, Object Knowledge, and Spatial Cognition
Published on: February 19, 2018
Spatial practice, conceived space and lived space: Hong Kong's "Piers saga" through the Lefebvrian lens
Mee Kam Ng1, Wing Shing Tang, Joanna Lee
1Department of Urban Planning and Design, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
Abstract:
By applying the Lefebvrian lens, this paper tries to understand why unlike previous similar cases, the latest removal of the Star Ferry and Queen's Pier was so controversial. To Lefebvre, embedded in "spatial practices" that "secrete" a place are two contradicting spaces: "conceived spaces" produced by planners to create exchange values and "lived spaces" appropriated by citizens for use values. Applying Lefebvre's framework to examine the "Piers saga", it is found that the pre-Second World War (WWII) piers were "conceived" by spatial practices of a colonial and racially segregated trading enclave. The public space in the commercial heart that housed the previous generations of piers was not accessible to the Chinese community, thus denying them opportunities to appropriate them and turn them into "lived" spaces. It was only after WWII when the Government carried out further reclamation to meet the needs of an industrializing economy that inclusive public spaces were conceived in the commercial heart, enabling the general public to "appropriate" them as "lived" space. When the Government planned to remove this very first "lived" space in the political and economic heart of the city to conceive further reclamation for the restructuring economy, the more enlightened citizens were determined to defend it.
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