In this essay, Ackbar Abbas discussed the exorbitant city and generic city. The exorbitant city is defined as the invisible city as mentioned in Calvino’s novel. The exorbitant city should be based on its own special history which is unique and kind of unrealistic. As mentioned in the essay,” No face is surrealistic in the same degree as the true face of the city”, every exorbitant city should be different from each other in the aspect of the cultural and structural aspects. Because of the history of the city, the exorbitant city should be complex, unstable, labyrinthine and phantasmagoric. As for the generic city is just superficial, without special meaning and status which is limited by realistic, overcomes any fixation on identity. However, there is a tendency that many Asian cities are trying to be globalized, to have some landmark and futuristic buildings, and there is a point that when cities are becoming exorbitant, they are also becoming generic if we considering the globe as a whole block. When the “exorbitant” architecture style is becoming a necessary need for becoming a global city then there is no much difference between the cities and then the cities will just become “generic”.
NAME: WU GUANLIN
UID: 3035498050
Excellent reflection on Abbas’ reading – especially your analysis on the defining features that distinguish the generic and exorbitant city, and the ambiguous boundaries between them both.