BOOK REVIEW: Globalization, Modernity and Urban Change in Asian Cities (Edited by Pham Quang Minh, Nguyen Van Suu, Ien Ang and Gay Hawkins (Knowledge Publishing House, 2016, ISBN 9-786049-433-924)
Globalization,
Modernity and Urban Change in Asian Cities (Edited by Pham Quang Minh, Nguyen Van Suu, Ien Ang and Gay
Hawkins (Knowledge Publishing House, 2016, ISBN 9-786049-433-924) (Tr 612-613)
Tran Van Kham
VNU University of Social Sciences and Humanities
(VNU-USSH) has just introduced a new book title "Globalization, Modernity
and Urban Change in Asian Cities", edited by Nguyen Van Suu and other
professors from Vietnam and Australia. This is the product of the international
conference in 2015 between VNU-USSH and Western Sydney University, Australia
focusing the impacts of globalization and modernity to urban development in
Asian countries.
This book contains 13 chapters covering
various aspects of globalization, modernity and impacts to Asian urban to some
specific cases about the livelihood and life experiences in urban of Vietnamese
and Malaysia contexts. This collection is informative and would bring benefits
for scholars in many fields of social sciences such as sociology, psychology,
anthropology, communication studies or urban studies as well. It is constructed
from papers in four main contents, as following: At first, It starts with very
basic and fundamental background about the impact of globalization to the urban
studies and presents the theoretical frameworks in terms of engaged research
and urban changes in global perspective. These contributions would encourage
the social research on urban and related problems in Vietnam. At second one,
other three papers show many cases in aspects of developing industrial zones in
Vietnam also draw the transformation in the suburban or peri-urban areas which
need additional and further research in order to have comprehensive views about
the changes of local people life during such transformation. In the third part,
researchers from Malaysia share their research work about livelihood of low
income urban people by the safety network and accessibility to the community
shop to help such low income urban people. That is a good example for service
provision in the urban areas of the developing countries. And at the final
part, five other papers in the overall topic of cultural changes in the urban
of Hanoi identify the specific topic of religious, consumption and waste,
television watching and changes of museum. With this final part, the edited
book would present additional changes in the urban life following the impacts
of globalization and modernity.
Although it is an informative book about the
urban in Asian, it would be easier for readers to follow if it would be
constructed into four main parts as above mentioned with headings (for example:
theoretical background, transformation in peri-urban, economic changes and
cultural changes), and it would include the index of keywords and authors for
better presentation. In the final reviewing, it is a good reading collection
for researchers who are interested in the contemporary urban changes in the
globalization and modernity in general and in the specific contexts of Vietnam
and Malaysia in particular.
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