Khan, SS; Karimi, K; (2017) The sum of the parts is greater than the whole: Multi-scalar socio-spatial definitions of identity in Karachi's Muhajir majority areas. In: Proceedings of the 11th Space Syntax Symposium. (pp. 147.1-147.13). Instituto Superior Técnico, Portugal: Lisbon, Portugal.

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Abstract

Notions of identity and community like space consist of varying scales of definition and interaction ranging from concepts of nationhood and nationality through to local solidarities and affiliations of religion, trade, caste etc. Space Syntax research suggests that most people belong to communities that are both spatial and transpatial in nature where inhabitants of an area are bound not only to the people and spaces they physically inhabit but are simultaneously part of a larger transpatial community independent of the immediate physical context. In the context of Karachi's Muhajir community, an ethno-political entity that has evolved through spatio-political constraints applied to an amalgam of assorted post-Partition urban minority groups, these socio-spatial variations in definition of identity can be studied across the changing scale of the city. Using space syntax methodologies, this paper examines the spatial definitions of identity, i.e. how affiliations and solidarities vary across the changing scales of the city and, how the use and positioning of communal tools of identification organize and articulate spatial clusters. This study used a range of sources to map religious and political institutions as well as on-site documentation of political propaganda and related the location of these features to space syntax models of the city and four case study settlements. The intention was to analyse the accessibility and clustering of various communal spaces, how spatial configuration defines the social role communal spaces play within the community and how they may define the spatial limits of sub-clusters and internal social hierarchies of the community. This multi-scalar analysis will show that not only does the nature of the muhajir cluster change across the various scales of the city, the nature and scale of the interface between the community and the city changes too. At the city scale communal institutions articulate broad residential clusters often synonymous with political territories, indicative of spaces of dispute, at the scale of the settlement, the configuration of communal spaces describes and dictates the manner in which these communities interact, organize and define themselves internally. Identity is therefore multi-scalar; a group may present as one ethno-political entity at the scale of the city, it may simultaneously exist as multiple ethno-religious groups at the scale of the settlement. Whilst neither definition negates the other, analysis shows that broad political definitions hide richer, more nuanced definitions of identity that persist at the scale of the settlement.

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