The Ethics of Mobilities: Rethinking Place, Exclusion, Freedom and Environment

by Bergmann,Sigurd

• ISBN13: 9780754672838
• ISBN10: 0754672832
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-11-28
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

With this book the international academic discourse on mobility is taken a step further, through the intertwined perspectives of different social sciences, engineering and the humanities. Mobilities in Transit builds upon the recent interest in social surveillance, raised by the use of technology for the surveillance and control of mobility as well as for transport. It widens this theme to encompass a broad scale of issues, ranging from freedom and escape to social exclusion and control, thus raising important questions of ethics, identity and metaphysics; questions that are dealt with by a diverse, yet structured range of chapters, arranged around the themes of ethics and religion, and freedom and control.As such, this volume undertakes not only to describe and explore contemporary and narrow notions of mobility but also to investigate and nurture their transition to richer conceptual models. Spatial, ethical, and technical dimensions of mobility, so far not satisfactorily analyzed, are related for the first time in this collection to established research on mobilities in geography, economics and sociology. Through their variety and diversity of perspectives, the chapters of this book offer a substantial interdisciplinary contribution to the socially and environmentally relevant discussion about what a technically and economically accelerating mobility does to life and how it might be transformed to sustain a more life-enhancing future. Mobilities in Transit, then, will excite not only international interest, but will also appeal to scholars across a wide range of disciplines, in fields as diverse as theology and engineering.

Table of Contents

In between standstill and hypermobility: introductory remarks to a broader discourse

The beauty of speed or the discovery of slowness: why do we need to rethink mobility?

Mobility, freedom, and public space

Automobility and the driving force of warfare: from public safety to national security

Stranded mobilities, human disasters: the interaction of mobility and social exclusion in crisis circumstances

Gendered mobility: a case study of non-Western immigrant women of Norway

Mobility as stress regulation: a challenge to dialogue in planning?

Understanding mobility holistically: the case of Hurricane Katrina

Existential homelessness: placelessness and nostalgia in the age of mobility

From sacred place to an existential dimension of mobility

The phenomenon of mobility at the Frankfurt international airport: challenges from a theological perspective

Religion, mobility and conflict

The desire for speed and the rhythm of the earth

The ontology of mobility, morality, and transport planning

Walk the talk - mobility, climate justice and the churches

Ecologic approaches to mobile machines and environmental ethics

Index

Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.

Excerpts

With this book the international academic discourse on mobility is taken a step further, through the intertwined perspectives of different social sciences, engineering and the humanities. Ethics of Mobilities departs from the recent interest in social surveillance, raised by the use of technology for the surveillance and control of mobility as well as for transport. It widens this theme to encompass a broad scale of issues, ranging from freedom and escape to social exclusion and control, thus raising important questions of ethics, identity and religion; questions that are dealt with by a diverse, yet structured range of chapters, arranged around the themes of ethics and religion, and freedom and control.