Category Archives: Reviews

Reading the City from the Streets

Posted on 31. July 2018 by Global Urban History

Kenda Mutongi. Matatu: A History of Popular Transportation in Nairobi. Chicago/London: The University of Chicago Press, 2017. 350 pp., US$ 30.00 (paper). Reviewed by Norman Aselmeyer, European University Institute In Nairobi, it is a hopeless task to guard oneself against … Continue reading →

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Remodeling Tianjin: A New History of Globalization in a Chinese City

Posted on 29. November 2017 by Global Urban History

Pierre Singaravélou, Tianjin Cosmopolis: Une autre histoire de la mondialisation, Paris, Seuil, 2017. 384 pp., € 24.00. Reviewed by Gabriel Doyle, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales In the study of European imperialism in China, the Boxer rebellion that … Continue reading →

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The Urban and the Powerful: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Global Urban History

Posted on 1. September 2017 by Global Urban History

Göran Therborn, Cities of Power: The Urban, The National, The Popular, The Global, London, Verso, 2017, 408 pp. $35/£20/$47 CAN. Reviewed by Gemma Masson, University of Birmingham The recent growth in popularity of global history has caused many scholars to … Continue reading →

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Comparing Transnational and Global Urban History

Posted on 25. May 2017 by Global Urban History

Nicolas Kenny and Rebecca Madgin, ed., Cities Beyond Borders: Comparative and Transnational Approaches to Urban History, Farnham, Ashgate, 2015. 262 pp., £75. Reviewed by Joseph Ben Prestel, Freie Universität Berlin Global urban history is not the only approach that seeks … Continue reading →

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Sacred Sites: A New Book on Urbanism in Ancient Central Mexico

Posted on 24. April 2017 by Global Urban History

David M. Carballo, Urbanization and Religion in Ancient Central Mexico, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. 309 pp., $ 58.99 / £ 41.99 / € 64.99. Reviewed by Caterina Pizzigoni, Columbia University In a study that is as concise as it … Continue reading →

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Emporia of Cosmopolitanism: A Social History of Early-Twentieth-Century Port Cities in Southeast Asia

Posted on 10. April 2017 by Global Urban History

Su Lin Lewis, Cities in Motion: Urban Life and Cosmopolitanism in Southeast Asia, 1920–1940, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016. 309 pp., $ 99.99 / £ 64.99 / € 94.99. Reviewed by Michael Goebel, Freie Universität Berlin There are few recent … Continue reading →

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Imagining Johannesburg: A New Book on South Africa’s Metropolises

Posted on 13. March 2017 by Global Urban History

Vivian Bickford-Smith, The Emergence of the South African Metropolis: Cities and Identities in the Twentieth Century, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016. 340 pp., $ 99.99 / £ 64.99 / € 94.99. ISBN 978-1-107-00293-7. Reviewed by Jonathan Hyslop, Colgate University and … Continue reading →

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From Rural to City Dwellers: A New Book on Indians in Kenya

Posted on 29. August 2016 by Global Urban History

Sana Aiyar, Indians in Kenya: The Politics of Diaspora, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2015, 384 pp., $49.95 / £36.95 / €45.00. Reviewed by Saima Nasar, University of Birmingham Indians have contributed to Kenya’s multiracial tapestry for centuries. At Independence, … Continue reading →

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Between a Wall and the Sea: A New Book on Colonial Havana

Posted on 19. July 2016 by Global Urban History

Guadalupe García, Beyond the Walled City: Colonial Exclusion in Havana, Oakland: University of California Press, 2016,  296 pp., $34.95, £24.95 ISBN: 9780520286047 Reviewed by Cecilia T. Fernández, Freie Universität Berlin Strolling through Havana’s so-called “casco histórico,” its colonial center, can … Continue reading →

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Black London: Two New Books on the Postcolonial British Capital

Posted on 7. June 2016 by Global Urban History

Marc Matera, Black London: The Imperial Metropolis and Decolonization in the Twentieth Century, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2015, 414 pp., $29.95 / £22.95, ISBN: 9780520284302 Kennetta Hammond Perry, London is the Place for Me: Black Britons, Citizenship and the … Continue reading →

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