Cool Istanbul

... mit Derya Özkan

1. »Books the world doesn't need.« Why is this not the case for your publication?

The world always needs books! This book is particularly indispensible because it contributes to the bridging of urban studies and cultural studies perspectives, which is an inexhausted and relatively recent endeavor. It also touches upon questions that engage postcolonial studies.

2. Which novel points of view does your publication offer?

The book develops an interdisciplinary perspective to understand the ›cool Istanbul‹ phenomenon not only in a critical but also in an affirmative way. The chapters critically analyze commercialized imaginations of cool cities while at the same reclaiming urban cultural coolness in a spatially situated way.

3. What is the significance of the subject in current debates?

The book's simultaneously critical and affirmative approach is new to the debates focusing on ›cool cities‹ in urban, cultural and postcolonial studies. Analyses of cool cities have been conducted often from negative critical perspectives. Affirming the cool city and reclaiming coolness at the urban cultural scale, which this book opens a path for, is a completely novel endeavor.

4. With whom would you most like to discuss your publication?

Urban Studies, Cultural Studies and Postcolonial Studies scholars and students, particularly those working on and interested in other ›cool‹ cities.

5. Your publication in one sentence:

Cool Istanbul can be understood as a qualitatively new enclosure of the urban cultural commons in the age of postfordist social production of space.