Open Source Urbanism: tracing the influence of knowledge sharing networks within informal system.
Data as ‘open-source’ in the digital space has authorized an individual to freely access information, while also to modify, develop and share new knowledge. The everyday negotiations of the urban citizen, therefore, seeks an increasing reliance on the ‘creative commons’ to further their independent knowledge goals. In urban planning theory, the research analyses this interface between the urban dweller and models of ‘open-source’ urbanism, as a shift from conventional boundaries of the private-public and formal-informal. In a complex pro-developmental city as Mumbai, there lies a high scrutiny on access and informality within formal institutional public realms. These boundaries are often enclosed enclaves, or poised with check points for security threats, that ultimately alter as socio-economic surveillances. The research aims to examine contemporary notions of ‘public’ access within complex socio-spatial inequities of Mumbai. For the DRP, we aim to analyse Mumbai’s knowledge landscape. The research will examine formal institutional precincts (such as TISS/the Asiatic and/or universities, public libraries) –and their interface with the neighbourhood. By way of an ethnographic study and mapping/drawings, this analysis would consider the 1) spatial – the institute’s architecture, urban interface; and the 2) social – socio-economic access, policy, POPS models (privately owned public space- and vice versa), (ICT) urban environments. Thereby, seeks to inform a larger framework for the integration of informal networks within urban planning theories.
