Description
This course is an exploration on the trajectory of Mike Davis (1946-2022)– a political organizer, historian, journalist, and urban theorist based in Southern California. A former faculty member of SCI-Arc in the 1990s, Davis was instrumental in cultivating a radical and outspoken critical voice that exposed the militarism, injustice, and contradictions of civic powers, whilst at the same time venerating and writing on diverse grassroots cultures that were sustaining and reinventing the city of LA from the ground up.
This 14 week course will chronologically traverse pivotal themes within Davis’ life, including internationalism, unnatural disasters, landscape engineering, imperial and state insecurity, creativity of the dispossessed, common cultures of generosity, and histories of resistance– all within an “urban space” theorized beyond, under and over the borders of municipal boundaries. Orchestrated by SCI-Arc faculty Thabisile Griffin and John Cooper, weekly sessions will be led by