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2015 Cosmobilities/ T2M conference

2015 Cosmobilities/ T2M conference

The joint T2M/Cosmobilities conference in Caserta/Naples took off very well. We listened to two great keynotes by Andreas Knie from Berlin and Kim Sawchuk from Montreal. Andreas gave a talk where he promoted the electrical car as a mode to change transport policies fundamentally. Kim’s talk was thought-provoking and gave many new and inspiring to a critical investigation of mobilities and disabilities. Sint Maarten The sessions ran very well so far and the conference is very well attended. We listened to many very good presentations.
Everything is very well organized and right now two groups are on trips to the historic sites of Caserta and Naples.

Here is the link to the program of the conference: http://t2m.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/BOOKLET-Caserta-2015-T2M+Cosmobilities.pdf

Final Conference Programme: The Future of Mobilities, Casterta 2015

Final Conference Programme: The Future of Mobilities, Casterta 2015

The organizing committee of The Future of Mobilities Conference 2015 in Casterta, Italy is happy to announce the conference programme for this Future of Mobilities Conference. Please find the programme and practical information on the Cosmobilities event-site here.

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Watch John Urry’s keynote, Networks, Systems and Futures

Watch John Urry’s keynote, Networks, Systems and Futures

John Urry, Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Lancaster University, closed the Networked Urban Mobilities conference with a talk providing perspectives of past and future systemic changes in energy use. Drawing on complexity and systems theory the talk provides a deep theoretical understanding of complex relations between social practices and energy consumption. Additionally, the talk addresses critical issues concerning lock-ins in ‘high-carbon societies’ and the wicked problems that follows. Finally, Urry presents four urban futures and examines the transformations in mobility and social life that each scenario entails.

Read about John Urry’s experience at the Networked Urban Mobilities conference below the video.

We sat down with John Urry for a quick talk about his experience of the Networked Urban Mobilities conference.

Oskar Funk: What will you take with you from this conference?

Well, I supposed would be the contrast with the first mobility conference in 2004 that I and handful of other people here were at. That was quite formed around Ulrich Beck and “Risk Society”, mobility and risk society. What there hadn’t been was a program of research with these various kinds of mobility methods, mobile methods, not much theory and not much detailed examination of the kinds of processes, roots, forms, consequences of mobility on the go.

Oskar Funk: So it was still a very static kind of science back then?

Yes, it was static, sort of. The main thing that was research were risks and to some extent systems, but the systems were transport systems, so there hadn’t been so much of the shift from transport to mobility really. I don’t think we were as clear about that distinction as we are now.

Oskar Funk: Were there any things that caught you by surprise at this conference, as someone who has been in the mobilities studies for a long time?

(Laughs) Well, I didn’t actually attend the sessions, but the general area of disasters. I know about it, but I think it is still interesting that people see mobilities and the complex organizing and orchestrating of mobilities in disasters. I think that is interesting. I have been interested in that in the last year or two, and I think that it is well reflected in some of the papers here. I suppose the second thing was Vincents (Kaufmann) stuff about the car and the decline, and his argument about that, which I don’t quite agree with, but it is becoming much more clearly accepted that the increase in car use in western countries has almost certainly stopped, and it may have reversed. It’s interesting that people didn’t really challenge what Vincent said, they challenged the specific theory, the processes that he referred to, but I thought that was interesting.

Oskar Funk: You have worked with many different concepts and topics. From beyond the car, to offshoring and now post-carbon societies. It seems like there is always a new dimension opening up, so what new directions do you see the mobilities paradigm taking?

Personally I get bored with topics you see, so I have to move on (laughs). Well… Maybe one thing that was missing here was actually China, India and Brazil, the BRIC countries. Because clearly, what happens in those countries and societies is going to be so significant. I think there is going to be much more analysis and examination of similarities and differences between them. That also relates us to the question of the situations and the developments that has to do with futures I suppose, the whole array of future studies. I think that is going to be more significant, and doing it in a way that is more than extrapolation, in a way where the social is a core part. Also, the topic of verticality, (The subject of Stephen Grahams keynote) was very interesting. Vertical cities, vertical mobilities and the way that effects urban design and so on.

Watch Vincent Kaufmann’s keynote, The New Dynamics of Daily Mobilities

Watch Vincent Kaufmann’s keynote, The New Dynamics of Daily Mobilities

Professor Vincent Kaufmann, Director of the Laboratory of Urban Sociology at EPFL, Lausanne and member of the Mobile Lives Forum, gave a talk in which he returned to a core theme of mobilities research; Transport. In this talk Vincent Kaufmann addressed the modal shifts in transport habits away from the car and revisited the concept of ‘motility’. Drawing on quantitative data from several case studies, Kaufmann here gives us an overview of the habits of daily mobility in Western Europe.

Oskar Funk: What will you take with you from this conference?

It’s a very innovative conference with lanes between social scientists and artists, and a lot of new ideas about mobility futures. I would say that I feel a bit at home here at this cosmobilities conference and it’s very unusual for conferences, and it is a real pleasure to come.

Oskar Funk: Is there any new ideas you have discovered here at the conference, or new things you have learned?

I discovered new people. I definitely liked the links between artists and social sciences, like the map of the different trips we did to come here. That was very innovative; it was a good surprise for me.

Oskar Funk: So we need to consider the arts more when we are working as mobility researchers?

Yes for sure! It’s what we also try to do with the mobile life forum in Paris. To have strong links with the artistic field.

Update: Programme for Future of Mobilities conference

Update: Programme for Future of Mobilities conference

The joint T²M and Cosmobilities ‘The Future of Mobilities‘ conference in Caserta this September is closing in. The organizing committee have released a preliminary programme and a list of practical information for the participants travelling to Italy . Both documents can be found below.

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Preliminary Programme

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Practical Information

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For further overview and registration, please visit the T²M conference-page. We look forward to seeing you in September!