Review: Urban living has gone beyond the simplistic environmental notion that it is bad, towards the idea that city dwelling is a feature of the human environment and that what is needed is sustainability. Whilst these and other aspects can be debated there remains one vital point that is often overlooked - cities contain people! There is no intention of being trite here - much of the work on sustainable living assumes, inter alia, that all people are similarly motivated towards environmental good. The point of this text being reviewed here is that this is far from the case and that if we wish to really work on urban footprints we need to see how the urban area is being used. Urban social geography has a long history of examining how and why people interact within cities and as such there is much we can learn from it.

This book, now in its fifth edition, is aimed at the reader wishing to know more detail about urban social geography, its philosophies, techniques and main findings. We open with a chapter arguing for the validity of urban social studies and the contributions that geographers can make as we try to make sense of the spatial changes wrought by economic and social changes. Chapter two takes a familiar theme - urban economics, and outlines the changes that have been brought to the city as a result. It's clear that we build on a historical legacy for the chapter starts with the preindustrial city and ends with a consideration of urban form relating to new technologies. The next topic is culture - notoriously difficult to define - but seen as crucial in the way we construct cities to reflect our own ideas. The result, especially in post-modern cities, is closely tied to consumption. It's clear that cities are not uniform; chapter four examines some of the reasons for this in terms of housing stock and the social differentiation this brings with it. If there are social differences in place then it seems reasonable, as chapter five investigates, that there will be a political response to this. It also means that there will be a link back to economics as inequality has a financial dimension. If we take this as the starting point, then chapter six continues along this path to explore housing markets. Cities are not just places to work and consume - people have a psychological and social relationship with their urban space as well. This means that cities are places of social organisation and human behaviour. Of course, this doesn't automatically create a homogenous setting. As chapter 8 rightly reminds us, cities are places of separation with minority groups often discriminated against. The other side of the spectrum - wealthy enclaves - is not part of the discussion here but there is an opportunity to study community ideas further in chapter 9 which focusses on social interactions. From this point, the text looks at specific groups within cities. We start with chapter 10 studying crime and deviant behaviour and try to get some idea of the pattern of crime and the reasons behind it. Chapter 11 looks at gender relationships in the city along with prostitution and homosexuality and the ways these have re-shaped urban areas. Chapter 12 leaves the notion of individuals and looks instead at the ways we move around and how this affects our lives. To an extent, this links us to the next chapter which, although dealing with conflict, notes the importance of mobility (actually automobility) on the production of growing inequalities in (Western) cities. A final chapter looks at some avenues for development of the subject.

This is an excellent text offering much in the way of detailed introduction to the subject. It covers an impressive amount of subject matter but constructs the chapters to look both at the older work and the modern concerns of urban life. Although the work can become complex with a welter of new words and concepts the authors provide some excellent ways through the ideas. Chapters have a range of learning aids: initial questions, text boxes dealing with key concepts, biographies of the main researchers and some methodologies. Chapter summaries are provided (along with a general glossary) and the reader finishes with a series of key terms covered in the chapter. There's an extensive reference list with some recommendations. Unusually, there's often references to films - the book has a very wide range of carefully selected movies that illustrate the points being made which makes a welcome change from the more usual text. Overall, a very worthwhile addition to the library and a text that should be seen as a key reader for those seeking a serious grounding in this important area.