Journal of Researches in Islamic Architecture

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Despite its simple appearance, the Islamic city is one of the most challenging concepts studied in scientific disciplines including architecture, urbanism and the history of art.  Besides theories approving or rejecting this concept, much research has been devoted to the study of the nature of the Islamic city and similar concepts such as Middle East city, Arabic-Islamic City, Muslims’ city, Islamdom city, Islamicate city, and such expressions in Persian literature as good-life city, city of God, divine city, usury-free city etc. in order to present a specific definition of it by investigating its characteristics and component parts. The importance of this concept is due to the fact that the viewpoints presented about it have had a considerable role in any attempt for designing, planning, and organizing of cities based on Islamic culture in the contemporary period and the Islamic city has been considered as the key to the explanation of Islamic urbanism. On the other side, because of the history and the reasons for the genesis and circulation of this expression resulted from the opinions of the primary researchers of this concept, the Islamic city has always been influenced by issues that have led to its becoming a stereotype from its very beginning in related studies. Based on this stereotype and the claimed concept the possibility of using it in the contemporary city has been doubted. This study is to Explaining the Characteristics and Components of Islamic City with Situational Analysis. Situational Analysis is an extension of grounded theory, transnationally the most popular form of qualitative analysis in the social sciences and humanities today. The situation of inquiry is to be empirically constructed through the making of three kinds of maps and following through with analytic work and memos of various kinds. situational maps lay out the major human, nonhuman, discursive, and other elements in the research situation of inquiry and provoke analysis of relations among them; social worlds/arenas maps lay out the collective actors and the arena(s) of commitment and discourse within which they are engaged in ongoing negotiations—meso level interpretations of the situation; and  positional maps lay out the major positions taken, and not taken, in the data vis-à-vis particular axes of difference, concern, and controversy around issues in the situation of inquiry. All three kinds of maps are intended as analytic exercises, fresh ways into social science data that are especially well suited to contemporary studies from solely interview-based to multi-sited research projects. They are intended as supplemental to traditional grounded theory analyses that center on action. Instead, these maps center on elucidating the key elements, discourses, structures, and conditions of possibility that characterize the situation of inquiry. Thus, situational analysis can deeply situate research projects individually, collectively, social organizationally/ institutionally, temporally, geographically, materially, discursively, culturally, symbolically, visually, and historically. The results of the study demonstrate that as a situation have different actors’ actants and component including individual human actors, nonhuman actants, collective human actors, implicated actors/actants. Discursive constructions, political elements, symbolic elements, temporal elements, spatial elements, etc. On the other hand this situation have different social worlds and arenas. social worlds are groups with shared commitments to certain activities, sharing resources of many kinds to achieve their goals and building shared ideologies about how to go about their business. They are interactive units, worlds of discourse, bounded not by geography or formal membership but by the limits of effective communication. Social worlds are fundamental building blocks of collective action and the main units of analysis in such studies. In arenas, all the social worlds come together that focus on a given issue and are prepared to act in some way. Ignoring of this Social world and arenas leads to a rigid and limited understanding of Islamic city. Finally there is positional maps. Positional maps analyze the contested discourses in the situation, seeking especially to analyze silences. Positional maps assist analysts in seeing complexity, variation, and heterogeneity in situations where once only binaries and/or longstanding, oversimplified divisions may have appeared. This often enables analysts to see established lines of controversy and division in fresh ways. This positional maps demonstrate that there is different silent actors and untaken position about Islamic City. A comprehensive and inclusive explanation of Islamic City should figuring out this positions.
 

Keywords: Islamic City, Positional map, Situational analysis, Situational map, Social worlds/arenas map.

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