ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the history of what appears under the general term of “urban critique” in its many incarnations, such as modern-day psychogeography, place-hacking, DIY urbanism, guerrilla urbanism, and urban exploration. By examining the act of placing one’s body into the space under examination, we can begin to understand the dynamics that operate on us when crossing the material boundaries that appear in space, but also the symbolic ones that might be culturally formed in our psyche (such as ideas about who and who might not be allowed in certain spaces). By providing examples of the different forms of contemporary urban critique, the discussion will focus on how some people actively seek to question the way urban space is manifest and ask why it appears the way it does and whether we are able to challenge its seemingly fixed materiality.
