ABSTRACT
Prior to any discussion concerning the relevance of mapping and the divergent creative practices featured in this book, it is useful to establish the context within which we are now operating. In order to provide the reader with a clear definition and understanding of this context it is necessary to define a critical position that accounts for a particular view of the contemporary urban environment, its global development and emergent characteristics. This definition has a dual function; firstly it is presented to guide readers through the rest of the book and secondly it is intended to provoke thought about the current urban condition and the role of architecture in an order that has witnessed the recession of tradition and convention. The latter point is particularly pertinent for designers who face the twenty-first century city as a mediated landscape of networks, nodes and fluctuating systems of density, programme, and urban space.
