Paper short abstract:

The paper explores the “urban polyrhythmia” on the example of the Czech city Brno. Observing and analyzing the rhythmical profile of several urban localities it depicts how the different temporalities compete, clash or fuse in the space of middle-sized city.

Paper long abstract:

Urban place can be defined not only by its spatial attributes, but also through its affiliation to a particular spatio-temporal system. The aggregation of individual activities present in typical locations in typical times (at home during the night, in the workplace during the day, etc.) may help establish a specific place temporality, which stems from a rhythmical presence/absence of people, activities, things, but also noises or smells. Place can be perceived as a spatially bounded constellation of the multiple rhythms or as a kind of Lefebvre's polyrhythmicity.

The goal of the paper is to explore the "urban polyrhythmia" on the example of the Czech city Brno. Observing and analyzing the rhythmical profile of several urban localities we aim to depict how the different temporalities compete, clash or fuse in the space of middle-sized city. The attention is paid not only to up-to-date overlaying multiplicity of rhythms but also to the industrial and socialist past of the city shaping everyday negotiations of "typical times and typical places". We ask what are the dominant rhythms producing the timespace identity of the localities of interest as well as what are their agents and pacemakers. The paper should highlight the unsettled nature of urban place and the role of rhythms in its temporal colonization or appropriation.