Falahat, Somaiyeh and Shirazi, M. Reza (2019) The making of Tehran: the incremental encroachment of modernity. In: Yacobi, Haim and Nasasra, Mansour, (eds.) Routledge Handbook on Middle East Cities. Routledge, London, UK. ISBN 978-1315625164 (doi:https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315625164-3)

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Abstract

This chapter argues that after being selected as the Persian capital in 1788, Tehran’s development was primarily and predominantly a modern project aiming at meeting the requirements of the modern world and a changing society. Based on a critical reading of major moments of urban modernity from the mid nineteenth century onwards, it discusses how, despite the strong presence of anti-Western discourse at various times (more evidently in the post-Revolution period), a modernist, technocratic, and technologised attitude towards city-making remained dominant. Attempts to establish a critical or anti-Western trend in urban planning and architecture against the dominant modernisation project either remained as abortive rhetoric or remained marginalised and due to political changes failed to be consolidated into a competing discourse. The making of Tehran has been, and continues to be, an incremental encroachment of modernity that struggles for contemporisation.

Item Type:	Book Section
Uncontrolled Keywords:	cities, Middle East
Subjects:	N Fine Arts > NX Arts in general
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group:	Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences > School of Design (DES) Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences > Digital Arts, Research & Enterprise (DARE)
Last Modified:	02 Nov 2021 23:01
URI:	http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/27529

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