Sign in or register
for additional privileges

Asian Migration and Global Cities

Anne Cong-Huyen, Jonathan Young Banfill, Katherine Herrera, Samantha Ching, Natalie Yip, Thania Lucero, Randy Mai, Candice Lau, Authors
Los Angeles, page 1 of 9
Previous page on path     Next page on path

 

You appear to be using an older verion of Internet Explorer. For the best experience please upgrade your IE version or switch to a another web browser.

Los Angeles: Reading the City


(Photo by Weiling Deng)

There are almost too many texts to characterize Los Angeles in any coherent way. In fact, it is its incoherence that makes L.A. special, as it is a city-object whose layers and histories run in a multiplicity of directions, both backwards and forwards in time, in a way that is like no other place. As Reyner Banham says, it is its “non-sense of history” that is important, as well as the fact that it “breaks all the rules”. There are simply too many Los Angeles’s, too many entry and exit points, with each presenting a different window into a city that has deeply penetrated the world’s cultural imagination. As one views it from a macroscopic vantage, say from the top of Mulholland Drive or from the Griffith Park Observatory, one can see all these things. They emerge from the sheer spatial immensity of the city to tell different stories or embody different contrasting narratives, steeped both in reality and stereotype. The following will try to survey just some of these important pieces in order to give a portrait of where Los Angeles has been and where it is going, culled from the existing cultural textual history of the city. It will zoom into some specific areas, film of course, but other mediums like literature and music, as well as historical or other notorious events, and give a sketch of some of the major works/events that make L.A. what it is. Fundamental to this analysis will be the dialectical relationship between light and dark, or as Mike Davis so eloquently puts it, Sunshine or Noir, that permeates every relationship within this city.
Comment on this page
 

Discussion of "Los Angeles: Reading the City"

Add your voice to this discussion.

Checking your signed in status ...

Previous page on path Los Angeles, page 1 of 9 Next page on path

Related:  GTA V UCLAHer - Official Trailer (HD) Joaquin Phoenix, Amy AdamsExpat MigrationBeijing GhostsBeijing FilmDTLAFuturistic Los Angeles SubwayBeijing: Reading the City (Culture)Virtual Dubai: Spec Ops: The LineThe City of Angels and the Beverly Hills ChihuahuaBeijing: PastNorth Korean RestaurantYoudu 幽都720 RapidBeijing: Recycling VillageL.A. Songs: It Was a Good DayTaijian BowuguanBeijing to SeattleMulholland DriveBeijing: GulouEducational MigrantsDiscover LABeijing: A Global City?Beijing DoorsBeijing Subway VisualizationBeijing MonumentsBeijingWelcome to the Northern CapitalAmerica's Next Great City: Downtown L.A.L.A. Songs: HappyWangjing: Korean MigrationBeijing Music SceneMigrant Children in the RubbleTsinghuaBlade RunnerSkylinesBeijing TourismBeijing PhotosTian'anmenLos Angeles: FuturesSanlitunBeijing SimulacraL.A. Songs: Sunshine, Santa Monica, and Sheryl CrowCity Lights in a Highway HeartbeatFahaisiBeijing: Chang'an JieChinatown - 1974History Channel City Of The Future: Los Angeles 2106Little Tokyo in Los AngelesFuturistic LA SubwayCNN: How Los Angeles may look in the futureAppendix: Towards a Reading of Los AngelesBeijing SkylineBeyond the Black DahliaHow The Her Filmmakers Created A Utopian Los Angeles Of The Not-Too-Distant FutureMulholland Drive VantageLine I: Orientations & PlacesBeijing: Reading the City (Official Texts)Beijing LiteratureBeijing Death CloudBlade Runner - Opening SceneWhat's Beef? Featurette - Jesse Proudfoot on Mike Davis' "City of Quartz"南锣鼓巷Beijing: First Ring RoadLos AngelesLos Angeles: Light and Dark798Beijing: FuturesL.A. Songs: Desperados Under the EavesRural to Urban MigrationBeijing: BookwormLine 13: Experiencing MigrationsChinatown - TrailerThis Is What Los Angeles Could Look Like in 2033Seeing Foreign Bands in BeijingWudaokouBeijing SkyBeijing: Asian Migrants and LaborersPinguoyuanBeijing: YonghegongLong Live Shougang SteelTimeout BeijingL.A. Songs: Funtimes in BabylonDay on Broadway event