‘everywhere where there is interaction between a place, a time, and an expenditure of energy, there is rhythm.’ – henri lefebvre
if rhythm is indeed the resonance between spaces and times and the forces imposing upon them a state of consistency, then it becomes a particularly useful conceptual device with which we may analyze the city. but whilst it may be an important unit for measuring the everydayness of city life, it also reveals the fractures within the urban that resist explanation by a single conceptual paradigm.
the partitioning of spaces segments off populations from each other by a variety of criteria (i.e. race, class, gender, sexuality, dis/ability, age, and so forth). it restricts certain bodies while enabling others to move; it allows bodies to remain still while forcing others into movement. insofar as access is concerned, we may think of the city as coded and coding.
likewise, no single model of time captures the varying rhythms of those experiencing the city differently. coded bodies must navigate the city along different paths, at different times, and by different means. technology may contract space by accelerating time (email travels lightspeeds quicker than snailmail); it may simultaneously expand space (traffic jams stretch out the freeway experience). temporal sequences, paces, speeds, and stills encode bodies and the spaces they traverse and inhabit. differently.
the inhabited experience of urban space differs from person to person, so it would be a mistake to talk about a city’s rhythm in the singular. rather, urban space is multiple; there are as many “cities” as there are people experiencing it.
the city is polyrhythmic.
