See details on Critical Planning Journal’s website here: https://criticalplanning.squarespace.com/config#/|/call-for-papers/
CPJ invites all forms of submissions on the life and contributions of Jacqueline Leavitt and Edward W. Soja. In 2015 the Department of Urban Planning at UCLA lost two leading urban planners, thinkers, and activists. We invite contributions from friends, colleagues, collaborators, and students, as well as other activists, scholars, journalists, artists, students, and professionals in the form of personal reflection, academic analysis, creative writing, poetry, visual art, film, etc. The format is open.
Jacqueline Leavitt inspired academics, community members, and activists with her critical calls to action and fierce commitment to justice. As a champion of gender equity, Leavitt’s research and community work revealed inequalities in housing and labor, and featured the experiences of women in domestic and international contexts. In an interview with Progressive Planning Magazine she noted that she “entered urban planning believing in its ability to support social movements through both rigorous research and ethical practice,” an approach she embodied in her teaching and scholarship, and instilled in her students. As we consider the future of planning, Leavitt’s legacy will undoubtedly guide those who wish to center the struggle for justice as they connect scholarship and activism.
Edward W. Soja was one of the great lights of late twentieth century human geography and driving voice behind the spatial turn in critical social theory. He developed what is arguably the most elegant conceptualization of the socio-spatial dialectic, and brought to light intersections in the spatial philosophies of Henri Lefebvre, bell hooks, and Michel Foucault. Soja then went on to initiate a dialogue between Marxism and poststructuralism at a time when these debates were at their most vitriolic. These efforts culminated in the creation of spatial trialectics and a robust space for Marxist-leaning geographers to engage with questions of alterity and thirdspace. Throughout, the question of postmodernism in the geography of urban and regional restructuring remained a grounding problematic for his scholarship, particularly in the context of Los Angeles, the city that was considered “exceedingly tough to track.” It was Soja’s commitment to the theory and praxis of social justice that remained the unifying concern.
Please send submissions to critplan@ucla.edu by July 1, 2016.
CRITICAL PLANNING JOURNAL is a peer-review journal founded and run by graduate students at the University of California, Los Angeles, and housed within the Department of Urban Planning.
Guest Editors: Susan Ruddick for Soja content: sue.ruddick [at] utoronto [dot] ca and Nina M. Flores for Leavitt content: nina.flores [at] gmail [dot] com.
Questions: please contact Managing Editor Kenton Card: kentoncard [at] ucla [dot] edu.
Path to the Possible 